Benjamin D. Maxham - Henry David Thoreau - Restored
Thoreau's birthplace, the Wheeler-Minot Farmhouse in Concord, Massachusetts
Original title page of Walden, with an illustration from a drawing by Thoreau's sister Sophia
Thoreau in 1854
Grave of Thoreau at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord
John Brown "Treason" Broadside, 1859
Henry David Thoreau
Henry David Thoreau was an American naturalist, essayist, poet, and philosopher best known for his book Walden and the essay Civil Disobedience.
The Forgotten First Syllable Stress
Modern speakers often pronounce the author's surname with stress on the second syllable, yet Edward Waldo Emerson recorded in 1918 that companions called him "Thórow." Although known to history as Henry David, he adopted that order only after graduating. He never petitioned to make a legal name change, keeping his original registered identity throughout his lifetime.
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Photograph of Emily Dickinson, seated, at the age of 16
The Dickinson Children, with Emily on the left, c. 1840. From the Dickinson Room at Houghton Library, Harvard University.
In 2012, the Amherst College Archives and Special Collections unveiled this daguerreotype, proposing it to be Dickinson (left) and her friend Kate Scott Turner, c. 1859. It has not been authenticated.[73]
Emily Dickinson's tombstone in the family plot
Dickinson's handwritten manuscript of her poem "Wild Nights – Wild Nights!"
The Dickinson Homestead today, now the Emily Dickinson Museum
Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson was an American poet whose uniquely styled and witty poetry gained canonical recognition after her lifetime.
Four Hundred Pressed Specimens of Linnaean Botany
Dickinson was known more widely to contemporaries as a dedicated gardener than as a poet. During her lifetime, she assembled a sixty-six-page leather-bound herbarium holding 424 pressed specimens classified through the Linnaean system. Scholar Judith Farr observes that her verse frequently intertwined with these botanical passions, proving that her profound scientific engagement with nature directly nourished her craft.
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Kamo no Chōmei, by Kikuchi Yōsai
Kamo no Chōmei
Kamo no Chōmei was a Japanese author, poet, and essayist who became a Buddhist hermit and authored the celebrated recluse literature essay Hōjōki.
A Child's Court Rank and Lost Succession
Born into a prominent family, Kamo no Chōmei benefited early from high-ranking religious ties. In 1160, his father's promotion paved the way for the seven-year-old to receive fifth rank, junior grade. When his father died in the early 1170s, however, Chōmei lost his expected promotion within the hierarchy. This political setback permanently derailed his institutional career.
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Statue of Julian of Norwich
Map of 14th-century Norwich (c. 1300) by Samuel Woodward (1847); St Julian's Church, towards the south of the map, is circled in red, on the west bank of the Yare.
The beginning of the 15th-century Short Text. "Here es a vision schewed be the goodenes of god to a devoute woman and hir name es Julyan that is recluse atte Norwyche and ȝitt ys on lyfe anno domini millesimo ccccxiii". (BL, Add MS 37790)
First edition of XVI Revelations of Divine Love (1670)
window of Norwich Cathedral
Julian depicted in a Holt church
Julian of Norwich
Julian of Norwich was a medieval English anchoress whose Revelations of Divine Love is the earliest surviving English-language work attributed to a woman.
Blood on the Bedside Crucifix
On 8 May 1373, Julian lay so severely ill that a curate arrived to administer her last rites. As her sight failed and numbness set in, she gazed upon a crucifix held above her bed and saw the figure of Jesus begin to bleed. This experience produced a series of visions that formed the foundation of her mystical writing.
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Richard Proenneke
Proenneke Cabin NPS
Richard Proenneke is located in Alaska
Richard Proenneke
Richard Louis Proenneke (1916–2003) was an American naturalist and writer who lived alone for nearly thirty years in a hand-built log cabin in the mountains of Alaska.
A Hospital Epiphany from Rheumatic Fever
Proenneke’s solitary wilderness endurance was sparked by a severe bout of rheumatic fever contracted after hiking near San Francisco. Following six months of convalescence at Norco Naval Hospital, he received a medical discharge in 1945. This debilitating episode reshaped his entire mindset, driving him to dedicate the remainder of his life to physical health and body strength.
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Darger in old age with a mustache, sitting down on a stairway
Postcard showing the boys' housing at the Lincoln Asylum, c. 1909
Camp Grant in 1917, where Darger completed his basic training in the United States Army
The picture of the murder victim Elsie Paroubek in the May 9, 1911, edition of the Chicago Daily News, the loss of a clipping of which devastated Darger and greatly extended the length of In the Realms of the Unreal[51]
Untitled painting by Darger, showing a group of primarily naked girls in combat during a thunderstorm
The Henry Darger Room at the Chicago Intuit Art Museum, with furnishings from his apartment
Henry Darger
Henry Joseph Darger Jr. (1892–1973) was an American janitor and hospital worker who became known posthumously for his immense body of art and literature.
Asylum Confinement for Childhood 'Self-Abuse'
In November 1904, Darger was institutionalized at the Illinois Asylum for Feeble-Minded Children in Lincoln, Illinois. The official medical justification prepared by a physician and his father labeled him mentally deficient solely due to his 'self-abuse' (masturbation). This institutional confinement shaped his youth following his early placement in charity facilities.
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Salinger in 1950
Where Salinger grew up, 1133 Park Avenue in Manhattan
Cover and spine of The Catcher in the Rye, first edition
Salinger on the cover of Time (September 15, 1961)
Margaret Salinger's memoir Dream Catcher; its cover features a rare photograph of her as a child with her father.
Created for the cover of Time magazine, Robert Vickrey's 1961 portrait of Salinger was placed on view in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., after Salinger's death.[141]
J. D. Salinger
Jerome David Salinger (1919–2010) was an American author best known for his 1951 novel The Catcher in the Rye.
Disgust in the Polish Slaughterhouses
Long before establishing himself as a novelist, Salinger was pressured to enter a commercial European trade. His father urged him to learn the meat-importing business with an enterprise located in Vienna and Bydgoszcz, Poland. The horrific conditions of the slaughterhouses thoroughly disgusted Salinger, prompting him to abandon the industry and pursue a creative path instead.
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Saint Anthony (Damaskinos)
Painting of Saint Anthony, a part of The Visitation with Saint Nicholas and Saint Anthony Abbot by Piero di Cosimo, c. 1480
Four tales on Anthony the Great by Vitale da Bologna, c. 1340, at the Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna
The Torment of Saint Anthony, copy by the young Michelangelo after an engraving by Martin Schongauer c. 1487 – c. 1489. Oil and tempera on panel. One of many artistic depictions of Saint Anthony's trials in the desert.
Pilgrimage banners from the shrine in Warfhuizen
Saint-Antoine-l'Abbaye, Isère, France
Anthony the Great
Anthony the Great (died 356) was a Christian monk from Egypt revered as a saint and a foundational figure among the Desert Fathers and in Christian monasticism.
Pushing Beyond Established Ascetic Fringes
Anthony is widely remembered as the originator of Christian monasticism, yet solitary ascetics flourished long before his lifetime. His true distinction lay in departing human settlements for the deep wilderness around AD 270. That dramatic retreat into the uncharted desert captured contemporary imaginations and established his enduring renown.
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Plaque de Saint-Simeon (Louvre, Bj 2180) (cropped)
Sixteenth century icon of Simeon Stylites. At the base of the pillar is his mother's body. (Historic Museum in Sanok, Poland)
Ruins of the Church of Saint Simeon Stylites with remains of his column (centre, now topped with a boulder)
A 1901 illustration by W. E. F. Britten for Alfred Tennyson's St. Simeon Stylites.
Simeon Stylites
Simeon Stylites was a Syrian Christian ascetic who achieved notability by living for 36 years on a small platform on top of a pillar near Aleppo.
Expelled for Incompatible Extremes
Simeon entered a monastery before the age of 16 with intense spiritual zeal. From his very first day, his pursuit of extreme austerity troubled the other monks rather than inspiring fellowship. The brethren judged him completely unsuited to ordinary community life. Consequently, the leadership asked Simeon to leave the monastery to pursue his severe disciplines on his own.
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Saigyō Hōshi in the Hyakunin Isshu
Saigyō by Kikuchi Yōsai
Saigyō
A Japanese poet of the late Heian and early Kamakura period.
Imperial Guard Renounces the Court at Age 22
Born Satō Norikiyo to a noble family in Kyoto, the young aristocrat initially served as an imperial guard to retired Emperor Toba. In 1140, at the age of 22, he abruptly renounced his worldly position and courtly career for reasons that remain unknown to history. Taking the religious name En'i, he abandoned secular society to become a Buddhist monk amidst the traumatic political shift between court nobles and samurai warriors.
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