Concord
Concord was a small town with an unusual concentration of writers. Emerson moved there in 1834, Thoreau built a cabin at Walden Pond in 1845, and Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women in a house on the same street. The town was also, in 1775, the site of the first real battle of the American Revolution.
The public library holds local history, manuscripts and the William Munroe Special Collections, including material on Thoreau and Emerson. Walden Pond is a state reservation, and the site of Thoreau's cabin is marked, which makes the book unusually easy to read in the place it describes.
A library to check
- Concord Free Public Library — catalogues and digital collections, open to readers online
Books connected to Concord
- Nature — Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1836. The founding text of American transcendentalism, and a bracing argument against secondhand experience.
- Essays: First Series — Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841. The most quotable book in American literature, and a permanent argument against conformity.
A note on accuracy
We describe literary connections and public collections, not street addresses, opening hours or ticket prices. Those change and we cannot verify them for every reader. Follow the institution's own site for current visiting information.