Antonio Casado da Rocha. Thoreau. Biografia essencial. Barcelona: International Catalan Institute for Peace; Angle, 2020. Classics of Peace and Nonviolence, 19.
Henry David Thoreau is considered one of the founding fathers of American literature, a prophet of ecology and environmental ethics, and an inventor of civil disobedience. An original and pioneering intellectual, his thought embraces issues and concerns that have become important many years after his death. Undoubtedly, his opposition to the new values of an increasingly industrialized society meant that he was often misunderstood by his contemporaries.
“His life-long resistance to power, his defense of individuality and his literary and philosophical production, devoted above all to social commentary and the dismantling of clichés in accordance with principles of moral rigor, make him extremely relevant today. […] This biography written by Antonio Casado da Rocha brings us closer to a fascinating character and raises questions that are of decisive importance – and will continue to be so for many years to come. That is why Thoreau is a classic.” (Excerpt from the foreword by Ramon Alcoberro).
Translation by Alba Galí and Jaume Salvanyà.
About the author
Born in Donostia-San Sebastián in 1970, Antonio Casado da Rocha has a degree in Humanities from the National University of Ireland and a doctorate in Philosophy from the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). After several stays abroad, he is currently a permanent researcher in the Department of Philosophy of Values and Social Anthropology at UPV/EHU, where he teaches contemporary ethical issues. He was vice dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Educational Sciences from 2012 to 2017 and he has been the director of University Outreach on the Gipuzkoa campus since 2017. He has published articles and books on care ethics, environmental ethics and research, such as La desobediencia a partir de Thoreau (Gakoa, 2002), Bioética para legos (Plaza y Valdés, 2008), Thoreau, Biografía esencial (Antonio Machado, 2014), Autonomía con otros (Plaza y Valdés, 2014) and Una casa en Walden (Pepitas, 2017).