Being Henry David

While Danny’s relationships with real people help him reclaim his sense of himself as a connected person with positive qualities to offer others, Danny’s anxieties about who he is and what he might have done are expressed through an imagined relationship with the ghost of Thoreau. Inspired by Walden, Danny conjurers its author’s spirit as a surrogate for his subconscious. Separating out a part of himself that asks difficult questions with potentially devastating answers shows a new aspect of the Influence of Literature on Personal Growth. In Chapter 12, for example, Danny imagines Thoreau asking, “what the hell are you doing, Hank, allowing yourself to settle into a life where you don’t belong? Have you gotten so unbelievably selfish that you’ve forgotten all about your sister” (181)? Thoreau’s voice is mean and mocking—it sarcastically addresses Danny as “Hank,” even though Danny knows this is not his real name, and insults him as “unbelievably selfish.” The taunts show that because Danny doesn’t know how to reconcile his ambiguous sense of his past with his identity in the present, he externalizes the negative self-talk that has led him to run away from home in the first place.

When Danny discovers who he is and where he is from, he must confront his pain, loss, and guilt for the first time. Now, his sense of self can again be drawn from his past—he is no longer forming Identity in the Absence of Memory. In Chapter 12, the narrative shifts into the past as soon as Danny “begin[s] to remember [his] life” (187). The image of himself he finds online is a narrative device used to catalyze this temporal relocation. The flashback gives readers insight into the life of Danny Henderson in Naperville, Illinois, with his mom, dad, and sister. Meanwhile, the flood of memories helps Danny to understand the people, places, and experiences that have contributed to his identity. However, the flashback ends abruptly, because Danny is not yet ready to own what he did to Rosie: “No more” and “Enough,” a voice in his head tells him (199). This formal decision to fragment Danny’s memories dramatizes Danny’s internal struggle and sustains the narrative tension throughout Chapters 13, 14, and 15.

Danny and Thomas’s continued conversations throughout Chapters 12-15 underscore Thomas’s role as Danny’s mentor figure—a crucial and familiar archetype in the hero’s-journey narrative structure. In Chapter 13, for example, Thomas challenges Danny to think about “all [his] family has been through in the past five years” (204), and to contact them for their sakes. While both Thomas and Thoreau’s ghost urge Danny to ask himself hard questions, only Thomas embodies the empathy that encourages Danny to see himself differently. Where Thoreau’s ghost echoes Danny’s self-hatred, Thomas stresses the importance of not defining oneself by one’s worst action: “You’re not a bad kid,” he reassures Danny (205). In this way, Thomas is trying to alleviate Danny’s guilt so that he can pursue healing and forgive himself. Thomas refuses to abandon Danny no matter how complicated Danny’s revelations are.

Nessa and Jack’s appearance in Concord shifts the narrative stakes and helps Danny remember the importance of community and friendship. Danny is surprised when his New York friends surface in Massachusetts: He arrived there “looking for Thoreau and found Jack and Nessa instead” (248). Their unexpected appearance transforms Danny from confused and vulnerable seeker of help into a protective ally who can help others. Furthermore, Nessa and Jack’s arrival in town shows Danny the network he has created: He relies upon Thomas and Suzanne to nurse Jack’s injury and shield Nessa.