Autumnal Tints

Written by Henry David Thoreau

Narrated by Brett Barry

From the purple grasses of August, to the yellow elms of October, to the scarlet oak leaves of November, Henry David Thoreau casts his eye on the brilliant colors of autumn and guides us on a journey through the season’s bounty. In this classic essay, first published in 1862, Thoreau delights in fall’s foliage and reveals both a practical and philosophical understanding of the changing environment. 

Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) is America’s most revered chronicler of nature. His major work, Walden, is a much beloved classic about his years spent in a cabin on the shores of Walden Pond. But Thoreau wrote prolifically during his short life – journal entries, poems, and travelogues, as well as numerous lectures and essays on natural history and social reform. 

“Autumnal Tints” is one of Thoreau’s best known essays. Written as a lecture, which he delivered in 1859, the text was first published in the October issue of The Atlantic Monthly, just months after his death in May, 1862. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Silver Hollow Audio
• Release date: Sep 1, 2008
• ISBN: 9780979311536

Henry David Thoreau

Henry Thoreau was born in Concord, Massachusetts, in 1817, and attended Concord Academy and Harvard. After a short time spent as a teacher, he worked as a surveyor and a handyman, sometimes employed by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Between 1845 and 1847 Thoreau lived in a house he had made himself on Emerson's property near to Walden Pond. During this period he completed A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers and wrote the first draft of Walden, the book that is generally judged to be his masterpiece. He died of tuberculosis in 1862, and much of his writing was published posthumously.