Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) occupies a central place in American literature. He never wrote a novel or a short story, and his poetry is mediocre at best, but his journals, speeches, and essays are presented as classic literature in anthologies and college courses around the world. Walden (1854), which chronicles his two-year sojourn in a cabin in the woods, is justifiably considered a literary masterpiece in terms of its style and its message. In Walden, Thoreau celebrates the American values of self-reliance, pragmatism, and above all, individualism. But could it also be read as a manifesto or “how to” manual for people on the spectrum?
Thoreau was a quirky man. He demonstrated so many traits of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) that it seems very likely he was affected by it. His social skills and language abilities were undeniably impaired—he was isolated, socially awkward, and a poor conversationalist. He lectured others on his special subjects, spoke with a slight speech impediment, and had difficulty making eye contact with others. Cognitively, he was an extremely intelligent man whose investigations into the natural history of Massachusetts were precise and thorough.
Like most people on the spectrum, he tended to perseverate on beloved topics—in Thoreau’s case, his special interest was Walden Pond and the flora and fauna that surrounded it. Although he was hyper-lexic, he was a terrible speller. And although his handwriting was poor, he was a brilliant writer. His style was highly-detailed, self-reflexive, and complex: ASD no doubt played a strong role in shaping his distinctive writing style, as well as determining its unusual content. It also answers questions about his motives for writing both Walden (a philosophical memoir about his two-year stay in the woods) and the political essay “Civil Disobedience.”
Autism may have influenced his writing in several ways:
Reliance on visual details (thinking in pictures)
Details form catalogues (perseveration)
Focus on the self (pond is described as it impacts him), not other people
Meaning is concrete and associational rather than abstract and linear
Walden provides a guide for an autistic lifestyle:
Preserve sameness of environment
Wear same comfortable “broken in” clothes day in, day out
Compulsive adherence to routines (walked same path daily)
Food issues, sameness of diet (carrots, rice, beans, potatoes)
Preference for small, quiet spaces (cabin, attic, wooden box)
Pursue all-absorbing narrow interests (pond and its environment)
Repetitively focus on special interests (birds, plants, fish, water)
Restrict social interaction
Arrange for solitude to preserve mental health
Intense dislike of loud noises and crowds
Values independence and freedom, yet accepts some help
Identity developed through oppositional behavior
Thoreau moved to Walden to escape from the pressures of his life that he found hard to manage because of his place on the spectrum. He wrote his great masterpiece, Walden, in order to better understand himself and his peculiar place in the world. The process of writing was therapeutic for him. It allowed him to catalogue the observations and details that were comforting. In the end, he created a masterpiece that can be read, at least on one level, as one man’s autistic journey to understanding not only why, but how he marched to the quirky beat of his own drum.