SOURCE: “Thoreau and the Organic Principle in Poetry,” in Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, Vol. 53, No. 1, March 1938, pp. 286-302.

In the following essay, Lorch examines Thoreau's organic theory of poetry, noting its importance in his poetic credo.

I. Thoreau and Organic Expression

Studies of Henry David Thoreau as a man of letters have led primarily to an examination of his attitude toward nature, society, government, and religion, and, on the purely literary side, of his style. His theory of the art of poetry has received less emphatic attention, perhaps because Thoreau wrote very little verse, because he failed to embody his theory in any formal discourse, and because it is commonly assumed that in the main his theories coincide with those of Emerson. Nevertheless, Thoreau was deeply interested in the theory of poetry. His utterances concerning it may be found in every volume of his...