Walking and Talking and William Hazlitt

Where do you stand on walking and talking?

On rambling and ranting?

On orating and hiking?

I’m more of a Hazlitt strider myself:

‘One of the pleasantest things in the world is going on a journey; but I like to go by myself. I can enjoy society in a room, but out of doors, Nature is company enough for me. I am then never less alone than when alone … I cannot see the wit of walking and talking at the same time … “Let me have a companion of my way, “ says Sterne, “ were it but to remark how the shadows lengthen as the sun declines.” It is beautifully said: but, in my opinion, this continual comparing of notes interferes with the involuntary impression of things upon the mind, and hurts the sentiment … ‘

I know what Hazlitt means:

Wordsworthian pantheism,

Or William Blake flights of fancy,

Or psycho-geographical musing,

Or Zen-style footfall mindfulness,

Are often inhibited by the clang of voices,

And the din of conversation;

But on other occasions, it’s true

That the knowledge of a companion

Can act as a stimulus to a new understanding,

Or a novel re-creation of a landscape;

And, sometimes, of course, we need to catch up

On ‘news’ with friends or family –

It is all, I suppose, a matter of balance:

A dynamic harmony of opposites

Helps make for an enriching walk in company -

Sometimes alone, and sometimes alive

To conviviality and congeniality,

And sometimes finding empathy,

Shared meanings and understanding

When exploring the land in shared silence -

Followed by a post-ramble sharing

Of individual and collective experience

In mutual discourse on how we read our walk,

A deconstruction and re-creation

Of how we made sense of it all;

For as William Hazlitt put it:

‘I am for the synthetical method on a journey in preference to the analytical. I am content to lay in a stock of ideas then, and to examine and anatomise them afterwards. I want to see my vague notions float like the down of the thistle before the breeze, and not to have them entangled in the briars and thorns …’