Hourihan does us a great service by showing us the true religiousness of Whitman, set against the American Romanticism of Transcendentalism. Hourihan has an invaluable background in Indian spirituality which allows Whitman's mysticism to emerge, free as it is from what Whitman called 'ecclesiasticism.' It is only when set against the Upanishads, the "Bhagavad Gita" or the Advaita Vedanta that one can see the religiousness of Whitman, who otherwise calmly dismisses the Christian tradition of his land. Knowing much less about Thoreau than Whitman, I was interested in Hourihan's assessment of him, alongside Whitman. He regarded Thoreau's early experience on Walden Pond as transformative, though one he never fully recaptured, trying instead to refine the written account. Hence the title of the book, suggesting Thoreau's 'quest' remained relatively unfulfilled next to Whitman's 'self,' a self that had approached the full realisation that is the focus of Vedantism.... Any work on Thoreau and Whitman that explores their spirituality is welcome, but it is particularly so when it comes from an author with a doctorate in Western literature. --Mike King, Network Review, Journal of the Scientific and Medical Network, Winter 2004
Can an artist be a mystic? And can a mystic be a partially realized soul who stops on the road to realization? In these two fascinating studies published in one volume Paul Hourihan gives a resounding YES! to each of these questions. Anyone who has been drawn to Thoreau's prose and to Whitman's poetry will be intrigued to learn why. Hourihan deals directly and fearlessly with the question of how these two nineteenth century American proto-Vedantists reached moments of genuine spiritual insight and realization, but then sought to perpetuate them not in their lives but rather as the subject matter for their much revised and reworked literary works "Walden" and "Leaves of Grass" The artist in them benefited, but the mystic lost out. When "Walden" turned out to be no commercially successful publication, Thoreau fell victim to a severe depression; Hourihan adds, in one of the many insightful bits of commentary that are scattered throughout his essay, that one revered swami, when asked what was the principal difficulty of spiritual life, replied after a silence, "Don't let your mind give in to depression" (p. 13) ...This mystical experience that "My Self" is present in all human beings without exception left Whitman with enough material for a lifetime of poetry. But if the artist in him flourished, the mystic ran into a roadblock.... Like Thoreau, he fails to develop further. But Hourihan still finds inspiration in both, and especially in the combination of both. He concludes that "Thoreau gives us willpower, Whitman gives us humanity the ideal is to combine them!" (p. 126) It is a fitting conclusion for a reverent and yet fittingly at times irreverent appreciation of two classic American artists and mystics. --Steven F. Walker, American Vedantist, Winter 2005
"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away" These words by Henry David Thoreau could not come at a better time than now, when we all hear the sound of a different drummer who sometimes seems so far away. The works of Thoreau and Walt Whitman are interpreted from a mystical standpoint, making it possible to understand the deeper meanings of their writings. A must-read. --Shirley Roe, Allbooks Reviews
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