As the author of "Into the Wild" comments on the influence Thoreau's essay, "Civil Disobedience ", had on Chris McCandles, we today studied Thoreau's essay . Matthew had some difficulty with the text of the essay which we accordingly parsed in terms of the validity of Thoreau's argument about the role of government and the role of citizens to challenge government policy. As this essay had also appeared in an SAT passage, I assigned the SAT reading last night along with the essay itself. Matthew did extremely well in answering the SAT questions on the passage. We then completed the separate homework questions on "Civil Disobedience" and examined whether the essay actually justified any of Chris McCandles' transgressions . With respect to the book,"Into the Wild" ,we then analyzed why at times the author shifts his narrative from the past tense to the present tense, and why Chris fears intimacy, not only with his family ,but also with his peers. We explored the influence of Tolstoy and Thoreau in Chris' decision to embrace chastity as a road to his spiritual enlightenment . HW due Thursday -Read next two chapters/ans.study guide