To introduce characters or more struggles through the cartoon is a welcome initiative.
This is what Maximilien Le Roy, who is not his first attempt ( Nietzsche Make the wall the
night freedom listens to us ...). ---- Dedicated to Henry David Thoreau, the comic begins
immediately on the mature man, one who leaves to settle in the woods of Walden, which
inspired his masterpiece Walden or Life in the Woods. ---- This is the Thoreau of
voluntary simplicity, whoever rejects the worship of money, social success, technological
progress to the death, religion (monotheistic, at least), fame or the " feigned kindness.
" At the time of the decay and large masses against poverty and hunger in the world, his
speech is a burning issue and is still a thinker today. ---- Some like to portray him as a
sort of hermit illuminated, anti advocating non-violence as an absolute finality.
Instead, the authors focus on the radical environmentalist, abolitionist to help runaway
slaves, who thought to engineer plots against the state, which will defend the militant
John Brown, an abolitionist who also was convicted of the murders of several slave owners.
Thoreau is also the man who prepare resistance to civil government after his night in jail
for not having paid federal taxes. A thinker can therefore not be so peaceful and harmless
as we are willing to believe.
On the form, the designer Daniel Alexander (A. Dan) leaves much room for contemplation of
the sublime landscapes in North America, according to the mind of the philosopher.
And as usual with Le Roy, you are entitled to a little more: the foreword of comics, but
also the interview with Michel Granger just close the book (where you can see the cabin
where lived Thoreau and the beautiful Walden Pond, among others).
However, we may regret - especially if the character is already known - some light at the
scenario and a price a little high. But not enough to hide his pleasure either, so do not
hesitate to embark with the naturalist philosopher poet who wanted to end " suck out all
the marrow of life . "
Further questions and sterile debates - Thoreau was it libertarian? - The last word back
to Michel Granger: " A century and a half later, in the context of a threatening
financial crisis and the imminent expiry of an ecological crisis, its prophetic intuitions
open our eyes to the evolution dangerous to our civilization and incentives to engage in
alternative "
Nico (AL Lorraine)
A. Dan and Maximilian Le Roy, Thoreau. The sublime life , Lombard, 2012, 88 p., 20.50 euros.
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