From AudioFile
This relatively minor work by Thoreau illustrates the qualities that define his greatest works: his clarity and ease of style, and his concreteness as a naturalist and observer of nature and society. Compiled from magazine articles published in the 1850s after his death, these chapters detail several short trips Thoreau made to "the bare and bended arm of Massachusetts" between 1849 and 1855. Patrick Cullen's unforced and straightforward delivery treats the text as journalism and travelogue, rather than lyrical prose, and thus conveys both Thoreau's strengths as a reporter and the secret of handling this author successfully in the audio format. In addition to its literary merit, this book is also an effective evocation of Cape Cod a century and a half ago, when the old ways were being both lost and preserved against the encroachments of civilization, technology, and inexorable modernity. D.A.W. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine


Review
Cape Cod is Thoreau's sunniest, happiest book. It bubbles over with jokes, puns, tall tales, and genial good humor. . . . Unquestionably the best book that has ever been written about Cape Cod, and it is the model to which all new books about the Cape are still compared.


Book Description
This new paperback edition of Henry D. Thoreau's compelling account of Cape Cod contains the complete, definitive text of the original. Introduced by American poet and literary critic Robert Pinsky--himself a resident of Cape Cod--this volume contains some of Thoreau's most beautiful writings. In the plants, animals, topography, weather, and people of Cape Cod, Thoreau finds "another world" Encounters with the ocean dominate this book, from the fatal shipwreck of the opening chapter to his later reflections on the Pilgrims' landing and reconnaissance. Along the way, Thoreau relates the experiences of fishermen and oystermen, farmers and salvagers, lighthouse-keepers and ship captains, as well as his own intense confrontations with the sea as he travels the land's outermost margins. Chronicles of exploration, settlement, and survival on the Cape lead Thoreau to reconceive the history of New England--and to recognize the parochialism of history itself.


Download Description
Our way to the high sand-bank, which I have described as extending all along the coast, led, as usual, through patches of Bayberry bushes, which straggled into the sand. This, next to the Shrub-oak, was perhaps the most common shrub thereabouts. I was much attracted by its odoriferous leaves and small gray berries which are clustered about the short twigs, just below the last year's growth. I know of but two bushes in Concord, and they, being staminate plants, do not bear fruit.


About the Author
Robert Pinsky is Professor of English at Boston University and an editor of the weekly online magazine "Slate". He is the author of many books of poetry and literary criticism. He served two terms as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, 1997-2000.

ANNOTATION

Thoreau's classic account of his meditative, beach-combing walking trips to Cape Cod in the early 1850s, reflecting on the elemental forces of the sea. With an introduction by Paul Theroux. This is one of the first titles in Penguin's new Nature Library series.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Cape Cod chronicles Henry David Thoreau's journey of discovery along this evocative stretch of Massachusetts coastline, during which time he came to understand the complex relationship between the sea and the shore. He spent his nights in lighthouses, in fishing huts, and on isolated farms. He passed his days wandering the beaches, where he observed the wide variety of life, and death, offered up by the ocean. Through these observations, Thoreau discovered that the only way to truly know the sea - its depth, its wildness, and the natural life it contained - was to study it from the shore. Like his most famous work, Walden, Cape Cod is full of Thoreau's unique perceptions and precise descriptions. But it is also full of his own joy and wonder at having stumbled across a new frontier so close to home, where a man may stand and "put all America behind him."

FROM THE CRITICS

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