Description

Henry David Thoreau dropped the gauntlet with Walden in 1854, and it is more relevant than ever.

To Live Deliberately is our visual reimagining of Thoreau’s most well known essay, Where I Lived and What I Lived For. Accompanied by 30 illustrations, the essay challenges the trappings of modern living and embraces an ascetic rejection of the material and the trivial in exchange for a reconnection with nature as a path toward self discovery.  

We judiciously edited his essay to avoid any unnecessarily confusing news references, and were amazed to discover that not only does this manifesto otherwise hold up, but feels surprisingly modern and more relevant than ever. Thoreau’s rejection of news as largely gossip, and the obsession with travel and railroads as idle self indulgence bear a sobering resemblance to our modern preoccupation with social media and internet surfing. In both instances, the impulse to seek distraction is the same.