"Not till we are completely lost, or turned around,-for a man needs only to be turned round once with his eyes shut in this world to be lost,-do we appreciate the vastness and strangeness of Nature. Every man has to learn the points of compass again as often as he awakes, whether from sleep or any abstraction. Not till we are lost, in other words, not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations." (The Village, p118)
I really liked this passage, and I think we can connect it loosely to Pip in Moby Dick, as well as discuss its own merit. What is it about being lost that allows us to recognize ourselves? If we connect it to Pip, why did Melville have Pip go mad while HDT believes we find our selves, understand ourselves and where we are? Does HDT count his experiment at Walden as being lost? Whether he does or doesn't, what does being lost entail?
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