Civil Disobedience
Assigned by 1 of the 9 reading lists, catalogue entry only
- Written
- 1849
- Form
- Essay
- Language
- English
- Length
- Short · 25 ppunder 120 pages
- Difficulty
- Moderate2 of 5 for a first-year reader
We recommendWalden and Civil DisobediencePenguin Classics, 1983Both texts in one cheap volume with Michael Meyer's introduction.
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An essay based on a lecture Thoreau gave after spending a night in the Concord jail in 1846 for refusing to pay a poll tax that supported slavery and the Mexican War. He argues that the best government is the one that governs least, that a person's first obligation is to do what he thinks right rather than what the majority decides, and that when a government commits injustice a citizen should withdraw his support from it, even at the cost of prison. Published as Resistance to Civil Government in 1849, it was retitled after his death and later influenced Gandhi and Martin Luther King.
No reading guide yet
The catalogue entry above is complete: the dates, the form, the themes and every program that assigns Civil Disobedience are verified against each program's published list.
What is missing is the part that takes real work: the summary, the key passages, and a recommended translation. The edition named below is the one most programs assign, so the buy links are useful already.
