Simmons 1

Imani Simmons

Apollo English

Ms. Goodrich

May 20, 2021

Differing philosophies, same nature

The center of the painting features Thoreau on the left and Emerson on

the right. Their placement corresponds to the background: Emerson’s side is

lusher and fantasy-like with mushrooms, bright flowers, and a healthy tree.

Thoreau’s side is more tame and dull, with old flowers and a decaying tree.

Starting with Emerson, his side is inspired by his two poems, The

“World-Soul” and “Earth Song”. “The World-Soul” poem highlights the daily

life of people around us. From that, I took how Emerson himself saw and

viewed daily life and old age. In the poem “Earth Song”, I took how Emerson

saw nature. He saw nature as a being with a soul or had a spiritual

connection. Emerson described nature as part of the universe, to him nature

was a divine being that brought humans closer to god.

To represent Emerson I used bright colors and fantasy elements like

colorful butterflies and vines, and gold accents in the flowers, trees, and on

Emerson to represent divinity. Also featured on Emerson’s side are John Muir

and Walt Whitman. Both thought like Emerson when it came to nature. They

all thought nature was beautiful and should be protected. John Muir is seen
 Simmons 2

reading a book, he loved Emerson’s work because he was living that life of

nature. Walt Whitman is featured reaching up at a tree, this is because he

believed that nature connects the living and the dead.

In Thoreau’s part of the piece, he is seen talking to Emerson. Thoreau

was influenced by Emerson and it made a big impact on him, but he wrote

about nature differently. Thoreau was more somber and mellow than

compared to Emerson. In his poem, “I Am The Autumnal Sun”, Thoreau talks

about the cyclic nature of life. I took the line “ The mast is dropping within my

woods, The winter is lurking within my moods, And the rustling of the

withered leaf” and based the background off of that. Thoreau describes

autumn as going into winter, throughout most of Thoreau’s poems

somberness is a recurring theme. In his poem, “All Things are Current found”,

the running tone is also somber. He uses the lines “ These are our own

aspects, These are our own regrets” to get that point across. With this mood, I

incorporated autumn turning winter setting, with barren trees and patchy

grass. To pair with Emerson, this side has silver accents to go with the setting.

While Emerson and Thoreau were similar in philosophy, they thought

and wrote differently. Emerson was more lighthearted when it came to

nature, and believed it was divine. Thoreau was similar but wrote more about

the somber moods of nature.

I chose these two poets because of their views, while they are different

they have lots of similarities within their philosophies.