Hard to imagine now, but there have been times and places where just wearing sandals could get you labeled as being in rebellion against established society. Two such places were Berkeley, California in the early 1960s and Millthorpe, England in the 1880s. Millthorpe was home to Edward Carpenter (1844-1929), an English socialist poet, philosopher, and activist who abandoned his upper crust life and university sinecure to grow market vegetables and handcraft sandals for a living. Carpenter’s search for the well-lived life, his passions and concerns resonate uncannily with the mood of long ago Berkeley. In this frank memoir, Carpenter explores how he “escaped from the domination of Civiliza...

“Civilization sinks and swims, but the old facts remain—the sun smiles, knowing well its strength.” Edward Carpenter (1844-1929) wrote his prose poem, Towards Democracy, styled after Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, in a summer burst of creativity. “Early in 1881, no doubt as the culmination and result of struggles and experiences that had been going on, I became conscious that a mass of material was forming within me, imperatively demanding expression . . .” An English intellectual, Carpenter was in rebellion against Victorian prudery. Railing against Industrialization’s dehumanization, he preached a return to a simple life in harmony with Nature. Towards Democracy reads like Beat po...