Selected Journal Entries



Listed are the date and an indication of the most important part of the contents. For journal entries and letters related to The Singing Wilderness, click here.

[bullet]January 12, 1930: Sigurd's earliest discovered journal entry.

[bullet]January 16, 1930: Sigurd compares his life with that of John Burroughs.

[bullet]January 20, 1930: Sigurd discusses what he would later call his "flashes of insight."

[bullet]February 2, 1930: Sigurd discusses his writing and his dim view of socializing.

[bullet]March 12, 1930: A good winter, but his outfitting company work is gearing up and it's hard to find time to write.

[bullet]April 2, 1930: Of time (lack of), science and writing

[bullet]April 7, 1930: Sigurd finds peace and joy by getting away from the office and going outdoors

[bullet]September 28, 1930: Sigurd is determined to decide this winter if he really has writing talent.

[bullet]December 5, 1930: Sigurd is trying to write regularly before his students arrive for class.

[bullet]December 9, 1930: Sigurd begins studying wolves, but what he really wants to do is write.

[bullet]April 8, 1931: Sigurd reflects on writing, graduate school, and his near death from pneumonia.

[bullet]December 9, 1931: Sigurd reflects on writing, graduate school, and scientific research.

[bullet]December 28, 1931: Sigurd, visiting wildlife researchers at the University of Michigan, is realizing that university life is not for him.

[bullet]December 29, 1931: Sigurd turns to Emerson and Thoreau for help in deciding what to do with his life.

[bullet]March 15, 1932: Sigurd writes about an abandoned trapper's cabin that he has adopted as a personal retreat.

[bullet]September 16, 1932: New year of teaching, new master's degree, but still unhappy.

[bullet]September 22, 1932: Teaching vs. Writing and Outfitting.

[bullet]December 9, 1932: Sigurd wonders whether or not he should become an artist.

[bullet]January 7, 1933: Snowshoe trip to Basswood Lake; comments on cabins.

[bullet]January 20, 1933: Sigurd realizes that he must write what he loves if he is to produce anything worthwhile.

[bullet]February 6, 1933: "Be true to yourself"

[bullet]September 14, 1933: "What I want is a working-writing combination, ala Thoreau and Burroughs."

[bullet]October 11, 1933: On returning from the meeting of the International Joint Commission in Minneapolis

[bullet]November 14, 1933: An offer from Aldo Leopold

[bullet]November 28, 1933: Reflecting on True Happiness

[bullet]December 2, 1933: "I have the terrible urge for self expression."

[bullet]December 31, 1933: "The last day of the old year and for once I am happy."

[bullet]February 19, 1934: Writing, happiness, and the approaching canoe outfitting season.

[bullet]August 10, 1934: A new house, and ideas about his writing

[bullet]September 30 and October 1, 1934: "My job is the interpretation of the beauty and the meaning of this country..."

[bullet]1930s, Undated: Writing goals. "A new slant different from Thoreau..."

[bullet]1930s, Undated: Writing. "Writing is the insulin of a disease of long standing."

[bullet]Summer 1945: Encounter with an Elderly Man on a Walk in Scotland

[bullet]April 4, 1949: Sigurd's 50th Birthday

For journal entries and letters related to The Singing Wilderness, click here.