Henry David Thoreau

A Life

Laura Dassow Walls

“I’ve always been slightly skeptical of biography doorstops. I read this book in two sittings. It will not be used as a doorstop—ever. . . . Walls, scouring Thoreau’s published and unpublished writings, gives her readers hundreds of fleeting chances to catch sight of a beautifully untamed but distinctly American existence.”—John Kaag, Chronicle of Higher Education Cloth $35.00