The Literature of Walking

Wordsworth’s walks around Tintern Abbey are enlightened by time and repetition. He had visited so often that walking around the abbey led him to recall, and reflect, on the ways that time has changed him. He writes in “Lines Composed a few Miles above Tintern Abbey” that as a young man he came through those hills “like a roe,” bounding, running like he had something to be running from. My Tintern Abbey is called Dogwood Park, and it’s a playground in my hometown with a little loop through a small forest. In addition to the main playground, little miniature play areas are spotted around the loop, each themed after nature: one has a rope jungle gym themed after a spiderweb, another has a spinning contraption resembling a cocoon, another has a dragonfly see-saw. I visited a hundred times when I was young (actually young, perhaps younger than Wordsworth had in mind when he saw himself “bounding” like a deer), and when I walk through that loop now, I can recall a hundred different memories ...

  Neo Romantics: Mary Oliver I’ve already written a blog post complaining about Henry Thoreau, so it’s now time for my favorite topic; Mary Oliver. When Thoreau writes about walking, he sees the act as one of independence. To walk alone, in nature, sets a man apart, Thoreau writes in "Walking"; it makes him part of nature, not part of society, and sets him towards a great and higher purpose. Mary Oliver’s poetry is sparser in its language and less forthcoming with its philosophy, but the philosophy is there nonetheless. In her poem “When I am among the trees,” nature exists alongside the walker like an old friend. “They give off such hints of gladness,” Oliver writes of the willows, the oaks and the honey locust. If Oliver’s nature is a person, then its personhood is her salvation - the gladness of the trees saves her daily, she writes. The trees invite her in to stay.  While in Thoreau’s essays nature redeems him, strengthening him in his independence, the redeeming qualitie...

  Philosophies of bipedalism, David Thoreau, and the male loneliness epidemic In my mind, there is a loosely related network of items which, taken together, explain why I don’t really like Henry Thoreau. Here they are: 1. A man who walks is of a superior sort, Thoreau posits in his essay “Walking.” The non-walker, by contrast, develops certain traits: “softness and smoothness,” being thin-skinned, and, for women, sleeping all day. 2. Thoreau also posits that his habit of walking in nature, so far from society, mirrors the preferences of “the old prophets and the poets”: Homer, Chaucer, Moses. 3. His other heroes include Romulus and Remus, who, he says, can embody Wildness itself because in the absence of a mother they were raised by a wolf. Unfortunately for the rulers of later Roman kingdoms, these did have mothers instead of she-wolves; Thoreau suggests this was their undoing. 4. Thoreau’s mother did his laundry while he stayed in the cabin. 5. Thoreau writes that he is drawing e...

Walking as Activism.  I’ve reported on the No Kings protests twice now, once in Bloomington and once in Indianapolis. As we read about the ways that walking has been treated as activism, the ties between collective walking, protest, political unity and the sometimes warlike motifs used in peaceful political movements, images from No Kings kept floating to mind. In Martin Luther King’s “Our God is Marching On,” he speaks about the fight for civil rights as a battle, in line with other conflicts “fought and won” in Alabama’s history. The associations between walking together into battle and walking together into protest didn’t undermine MLK’s peaceability, but instead underscored the critical necessity of the march and acknowledged the violence endured by black communities and civil rights activists. Then there’s another side of collective walking, one closer in theory to Peace Pilgrim’s joyous approach to the craft. A collective walk can also be a parade, where spectacle, imagery an...

Throughout Cormac McCarthy's The Road , the two main characters' shopping cart is both essential equipment and a burden on thier ability to properly manuever and survive. This is established early on in the narrative: "He pushed the cart and both he and the boy carried knapsacks. In the knapsacks were essential things. In case they had to abandon the cart and make a run for it" (5-6). It's accepted truth that their greatest asset is also their greatest liability, and contradiction stands at the heart of the novel: it's true of all the items they accumulate, yes, but it's especially true of the boy, who slows the journey down considerably and yet is the man's only reason for embarking on the journey at all. These contradictions also remind one of the fact these characters, all of them, are homeless and permanently displaced. Their tattered clothes, their uncertain access to food and shelter, their shopping cart, bring to mind images of the homeless in o...

                 In Stewart’s piece “Walking Distance,” she contextualizes her walk and her stream-of-consciousness thought in the streets of New York. Of all the walking writers we have read this semester, Stewart feels the most immediately relevant to contemporary young people. She frames walking as a kind of bildungsroman, using stream-of-consciousness thought as the medium through which this process unfolds. “Walking Distance” is decidedly inquisitive and free-flowing—it claims that walking is like a life simulator, a test-drive for young adults.  What I mean by this is the physical space traversed in a walk becomes a simulated version of progress, something inherently rewarding for young people who may feel lost, stagnant, or unsuccessful. Walking simulates success, progress, and achievement. Stewart acknowledges this inner turmoil characteristic of young adults, reminding me of myself and my friends who are college students. S...

 Going to the dog park for a walk is a strange experience, mostly because most of the walks we've discussed have been, in my mind, alone. I instinctively think that every walk we talk about is maybe not meant to be alone, but is implied to be solo. At the dog park, you may arrive alone (with your dog, typically), but it is almost impossible to go without some sort of interaction. At its busiest times, there are up to thirty people there, almost all of them having nothing better to do than chat with the other people there. It is also so much different as the age demographics of people vary wildly. There are plenty of college-age students, but also a range up to the elderly, too, as many of the locals prefer the specific dog park that I go to.  I normally like to just walk around the outskirts of the park, get my steps in, and watch from afar as my dog enjoys its social time. By doing this, though, I am missing out on learning about so many different people, all with wildly diff...

 Normally, I would not go out of my way to walk at night. I use this time to do homework, be social, or just relax. I decided to go on a night walk after we discussed it, wanting to get a better sense of the themes discussed. I live by the stadium, and the best spots to do this are nowhere near, as it is all busy streets and stadium lights. There is no mystery to be found, nothing new to experience, as the massive fluorescence covers every square inch of a mile radius. I decided to take a different approach and go near one of my favorite little trails, the Lower Cascades.  As I arrive, it is immediately ominous. The playground is empty, and apart from a few cars driving past, no one is near. Normally, the place is full of families with their kids running around, playing on the swingset, and dog walkers. All I can hear is the flow of the water from the creek and the main street nearby. The first thing I experience on the walk is the fear of the unknown. There are occasional str...

 For the reading assignment, I decided to read "The Salt Path," and I did not know anything about it previously. I'm glad I did, however, because I found the story put a lot of my struggles in comparison to what Raynor Winn had to overcome. The story follows how she and her husband lost their home, how her husband had to battle a terminal illness, and how they grew closer even after being with each other for so many years.  To see the way Winn had to battle losing practically everything material in her life, and came out better than she went in. To be in a situation like that and deciding that the best course of action was, quite literally, to keep moving was incredibly eye-opening. That is normally the point in someone's life where they give up, as they are at rock bottom. By making the decision to go on this journey of hundreds of miles on foot, they were able to change their lives, and I find this truly inspiring. It was also interesting to find that through the wa...

Allen Ginsberg, in a 1991 essay titled "Taking a Walk through Leaves of Grass," christened Walt Whitman the "prophet of American democracy." The 19th-century poet was certainly deepply aware of the vastness of his young country, the diversity within its borders and what he perceived to be total potential. His poetry, a free-verse catalogue of every facet of the American experience, every facet of the American population, is no less than democracy manifest in art. On the poem "Song of Myself," Ginsberg remarks that it is "a long survey of America ... in which he extended his own awareness to encompass the entire basic spiritual awareness of America, trying to make an ideal America that would be an America of comradely awareness, acknowledgement of tenderness, acknowledgement of gentleness, acknowledgement of comradeship, acknowledgement of what he called adhesiveness." Published first in the second edition of Leaves of Grass , "Song of the Op...

What is this learning for? This course has complicated the idea of the solitary walker by showing that a walk is often done in union with others, such as the father and his son in The Road, or with the walker together with the forces of nature and distant humanity. Additionally, every walk is an act of reliance on other people, animals, and systems. As many do when walking, we utilize clothing, shoes, and a sense of direction. All of these items have been influenced and were helped to be created by other humans. Multiple forms of dependence make walking possible. One example is social dependence, such as the assumption that walking outside our homes is safe. In many areas of the world today, in certain areas throughout history, this has not always been the case. Even today, during periods of unrest in the United States where there are large numbers of riots and criminals in the streets, or even large numbers of disruptive protestors in public, many individuals do not feel safe walking...

What are they thinking? I began the walk on the IU campus, next to Ballentine Hall. I walked out at a very slow pace, observing my surroundings, including nature, but mainly the other people around me. Most of the walkers are what I assume to be students, typically walking at a hurried pace in their athleisure clothing. Most of these students were white, and either we were wearing some kind of headphones or were intent on looking at our cell phones. I continue down across the street to the Memorial Union, noticing the two straight lines formed by the mass of students walking in either direction. I began to wonder where the staff and professors were and how their walking routes might differ from the students I see before me. As I continued towards the sports complex and across the street, I noticed this sort of silence as the young people around me rarely spoke to those who walked beside them. This made me wonder why exactly they are so silent. I began to think over what thoughts these ...

Why am I thinking this? I started my walk with the question in my mind of whether or not certain elected offices in the United States, such as local offices of town trustee, county clerk, county judge, etc., continue to be elected offices in many states or become appointed offices. As I walked, I began to think of a few main points as to why electing these offices should remain. One is that the local population should have some kind of say in their government, with the United States having a very long tradition of elected local offices, strengthening this tradition. As I walked up a hill, I thought of whether these offices were no longer elected positions, and who should appoint them? For an office like county sheriff or county clerk, it may be argued that the county commissioners should be able to appoint such jobs. As the hill leveled off, I began thinking that it would be valuable to look at different states and how they handle the question of election versus appointment of certain ...

How am I moved by seeing? I went to the county court building for my pilgrimage. The county court building is located downtown and is where the county courts and county clerk reside, along with the county jail and sheriff’s office. There are additional county government offices there, such as the veterans representative office. It’s located in a multistory limestone building with a glass entryway for visitors guarded by multiple county security officers and a security screening station. There are multiple courtrooms on the first floor, with seemingly 3 courts on each side of a long hallway. The courtrooms themselves are filled with seating space, and were packed when I visited there. In general, the county court building was much less busy than I expected it to be. While one of the courtrooms was packed, all other courtrooms on the first floor were empty, with no staff or visitors there. I observed as the process unfolded, where members of the public attempted to get out of a traffic t...

What am I perceiving? As I start, I feel the cold on my hands, see dead trees, and some trees still alive. I pass dead bushes, biting cold still against my fingers and ears, white snowflakes in my face and eyes. There’s no direct sunlight, a total grey cloud coverage, and I see small light snow flying through the air. There is snow sticking to the person in front of me’s sweatshirt, snow sticking to my paper before falling off of it…to my arms, lying on my jacket, to my pen, to my hand. Trees with dead brown leaves still on them, and brown leaves lightly cover sections of tan and green grass. I stand on dead tree sticks, smelling clouds grey and white, grey and white steam collides with smoke coming up from the grates. Small snow sticks to the page as I write this. The white snow accumulates on my finger while writing this. It builds up on the side of my finger until it slides off. Later in the walk, I feel the snow falls harder now, looks like a little imperfectly shaped salt which sl...

I am on this campus almost every single day for multiple hours at a time. Over the last three years, I have become very familiar with IU and have memorized all the usual routes I take. During the day, I walk with music blaring in my ears, barely paying attention to my surroundings. My focus is usually on getting from one place to another as quickly as possible, rather than actually noticing what is around me. Unfortunately, being a student in the sciences means that many of my exams are held in the evening. At night, the campus that is usually filled with students becomes almost completely empty. The same paths I walk every day begin to feel unfamiliar. I have to rely on the dim light from street lamps to guide me along the narrow paths, and the usual carefree attitude I have while walking disappears.  My vision becomes limited to what is lit by the street lamps, and I become much more aware of every noise and movement I see in my peripheral vision. The music that normally plays lo...

One of this week’s prompts was to walk as a flaneur in Bloomington. Benjamin presents the flaneur as someone who moves through the city observing the crowd, both part of it and slightly detached from it. With that in mind, I decided to wander around campus without a destination, making a conscious effort not to use my earbuds and to stay as present as possible to observe. Starting near Read Hall, where I lived during my freshman year, I quickly realized how different it felt to move through a place I thought I already knew so well. As I walked, I noticed how many students were rushing out of the building and down the sidewalks, most likely late for class. Moving along the path, I passed the fountain, which was turned off due to the cooler weather, but the faint smell of chlorine still lingered in the air. Walking by the Jacobs School of Music, I could faintly hear string and brass instruments echoing from inside the buildings. Continuing past Goodbody, I was struck by how quiet every...

           One of my earliest memories is walking on the beach in Morehead City as a baby with my parents before my sister was born. I remember holding their hands as I climbed to the tops of sand dunes, watching the horses graze mere meters from where I stood. I also remember wading through the shallow waters of the creeks in the greenway with my friends, stepping over untrustworthy pockets of sand and pulling my shorts up so they wouldn’t get soaked. I remember scaling Grandfather Mountain and getting so close to the edge of an overhanging rock that my heart leapt into my throat.  Walking in Paris was vastly different from these experiences. They felt different from walks in nature, in places familiar to me; walks in nature always feel a little surreal and I become almost drowsy with awe. Paris is real—constructively so. The Parisian neighborhoods, while beautiful, are predictable. Everything feels so planned, permanent, and structurally unchanged. T...

  I decided to read The Salt Path by Raynor Winn this week because I was intrigued by its premise. The story follows Raynor and Moth Winn, a married couple who lose all of their assets and soon after learn that Moth has a rare neurological disease called Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD), which affects movement, speech, and memory. Faced with both financial and personal uncertainty, they choose to walk the South West Coast Path while figuring out what to do next.  As I read this, I kept thinking about how overwhelming their situation must have been and how they saw walking as their only real option. Throughout their journey, they encounter constant challenges including harsh terrain, unpredictable weather, and the physical limitations caused by Moth’s illness. At the beginning, the walk is difficult and uncertain, but over time they begin to adapt. Instead of giving up, they learn to push through each obstacle, becoming more resilient and self-reliant along the way. This mad...

  “Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, On Revisiting the Banks of the Wye during a Tour. July 13, 1798” by William Wordsworth was my favorite piece we have read so far. Recollection and reconnection are central themes in this poem. Wordsworth reflects on a place he once knew while also acknowledging the connection he still feels to it, even though it has changed. Through revisiting this place from his childhood, he experiences happiness, nostalgia, and peace, but at the same time there is also a sense of loss. As I read this, I found myself thinking about how it is possible to return somewhere familiar and still feel that something is different or missing. He uses animal-like imagery and personification to represent his younger self, showing vitality, freedom, and the purity of being a child. In contrast, his present self is more reflective and searching for something deeper, whether that be purpose, love, or meaning. As the poem continues, we learn that he is talking...

In our first class, we were each assigned a specific perspective to focus on during a silent group walk. As this was the first activity we did together, many of us found it challenging. We were instructed to take notes only related to our assigned role and avoid straying from that focus. I was assigned to pay attention to the sounds around me. As someone who usually walks while listening to music, this task felt slightly daunting. I rely on music to fill the silence, so being told to walk without it and without any technology made me uncomfortable at first. We were also required to walk in complete silence as a group, which felt strange. It was a group of about ten people, mostly strangers, walking together around a part of campus we had all been familiar with for at least a year. At the beginning of the walk, I struggled to focus only on sound and not get distracted by my own thoughts. However, after about five minutes of walking through the falling snow, I began to notice how many ...