From 1837 to 1861, Thoreau kept a Journal that began as a conventional record of ideas, grew into a writer's notebook, and eventually became the principal imaginative work of his career. This work comprises a single manuscript notebook of nearly five hundred pages that Thoreau filled between March 9 and August 18, 1853.

In the publication of THE WRITINGS OF HENRY D. THOREAU, Princeton University Press joins university presses throughout the United States in making the works of major American writers available in comprehensive scholarly editions. This project was inaugurated by the Modern Language Association of America and sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Although Thoreau has earned a national and international reputation as a naturalist, social critic and philosopher of human rights, and literary artist of the first rank, no scholarly edition of his complete writings has previously been undertaken. In addition to newly edited texts of his major published works, the edition will include his poetry, translations, correspondence, college essays, and unfinished late natural history projects, "Wild Fruits" and "The Dispersion of Seeds". Thoreau's Journal -- the private record of his experiences, the source of his many writings, and a unique literary document in itself-will be printed for the first time in its original, unrevised form, including many previously unpublished passages and notebooks.