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The Ecocriticism Reader

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Edited by Cheryil Glotfelty and Harold Fromm

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 CONTENTS
© 1996 by the University of Georgia Press
Athens, Georgia 30602
“Some Principles of Ecocriticism” © 1995 by William Howarth
“The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction” © 1986 by Ursula K. Le Guin
All rights reserved
Designed by Kathi Dailey Morgan
Set in Sabon and Gills Sans by Tseng Information Systems, Inc.
Printed and bound by Thomson-Shore, Inc.
This book is printed on recycled paper that meets the
guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on
Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Preface ix
Library Resources.
Acknowledgments x1
Printed in the United States of America
XV
00 99 98 97 96 C § 4 3 2 I
Introduction: Literary Studies in an Age of Environmental Crisis
00 99 98 97 96 P 5§ 4 3 2 1 CHERYLL GLOTFELTY

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

The ecocriticism reader : landmarks in literary ecology / PART ONE Ecotheory: Reflections on Nature and Culture
Cheryl] Glorfelty, ed., Harold Fromm, ed.
. cm. 3
Includes bibliographical references and index. The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis
ISBN 0-8203-1780-2 (alk. paper). — ISBN 0-8203-1781-0 LYNN WHITE, JR.
(pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Criticism. 2. Ecology in literature. 3. Nature in literature.
5
I. Glotfelty, Cheryll. II. Fromm, Harold. Nature and Silence
PN8I-E24 1996
CHRISTOPHER MANES
8o01'95 —dcz0 95-32150
British Library Cataloging in Publication Data available 30
From Transcendence to Obsolescence: A Route Map
HAROLD FROMM

40
Cultivating the American Garden
FREDERICK TURNER
 vi =§CONTENTS CONTENTS «© vii

52 170
The Uses of Landscape: The Picturesque Aesthetic and Unearthing Herstory: An Introduction
the National Park System ANNETTE KOLODNY
ALISON BYERLY
182
69 Speaking a Word for Nature
Some Principles of Ecocriticism SCOTT RUSSELL SANDERS
WILLIAM HOWARTH
196
92 The Postnatural Novel: Toxic Consciousness in Fiction of the 1980s
Beyond Ecology: Self, Place, and the Pathetic Fallacy CYNTHIA DEITERING
NEIL EVERNDEN
204
105 Is Nature Necessary?
Literature and Ecology: An Experiment in Ecocriticism DANA PHILLIPS
WILLIAM RUECKERT

124 PART THREE Critical Studies of Environmental Literature

The Land and Language of Desire: Where Deep Ecology
and Post-Structuralism Meet 225
SUEELLEN CAMPBELL Revaluing Nature: Toward an Ecological Criticism
GLEN A. LOVE
137
American Literary Environmentalism as Domestic Orientalism 241
DAVID MAZEL The Sacred Hoop: A Contemporary Perspective
PAULA GUNN ALLEN

PART TWO. Ecocritical Considerations of Fiction and Drama 264

Landscape, History, and the Pueblo Imagination
149 LESLIE MARMON SILKO
The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction
URSULA K. LE GUIN 276
A Taxonomy of Nature Writing
155 THOMAS J. LYON
The Comic Mode
JOSEPH W. MEEKER 282
Indexing American Possibilities: The Natural History Writing
of Bartram, Wilson, and Audubon
MICHAEL BRANCH
 viii * CONTENTS

503
Desert Solitaire: Counter-Friction to the Machine in the Garden
DON SCHEESE PREFACE

323
Heroines of Nature: Four Women Respond to the American Landscape
VERA L. NORWOOD

351
Nature Writing and Environmental Psychology:
The Interiority of Outdoor Experience
SCOTT SLOVIC
One day late in the 1980s an unsolicited packet arrived in the mail that
371 was radically to alter my professional life as a literary scholar-critic and
The Bakhtinian Road to Ecological Insight to have repercussions in my private life as well. The contents consisted
MICHAEL J. MCDOWELL of a form letter and bibliography from a Cornell graduate student in En-
glish named Cheryll Burgess. She was finishing up a dissertation on three
Recommended Reading 393 American women writers, but her most intense interest seemed to be the
anything-but-apparent connection between literature and the environment.
Periodicals and Professional Organizations 401
Her plans were ambitious, not to say grandiose: to pursue an interest in
Contributors 403 ecology while remaining a literary professional, to promulgate the concep-
tion of “ecocriticism” while producing an anthology of ecocritical essays,
Index 409 and formally to become the first American professor of literature and the
environment.
The bibliography contained more than two hundred essays and books
that bore some relation to the idea of ecocriticism, but even more useful
was the potential mailing list it provided of authors who might be of some
assistance in producing the ecocritical anthology. Writing to most of them,
Cheryll Burgess described her aims, included a copy of the bibliography,
and waited for replies—which soon began to pour in. One result of this
large-scale operation was that I found myself agreeing to serve as chief as-
sistant, although not without some unease that with most of the hard and
creative work already done I would emerge in the role of an unearned bene-
ficiary of someone else’s groundbreaking labors. Although I have helped
to make some decisions and discovered a number of essays to include, this
preface gives me the opportunity to disclaim major status.
As things turned out, much more than Cheryl! Burgess Glotfelty’s origi-
nal aims have been realized. She has in fact promulgated an awareness

ix
 xiv = ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

William Rueckert, “Literature and Ecology: An Experiment in Ecocriticism.” From CHERYLL GLOTFELTY
the lowa Review 9.1 (Winter 1978): 71-86. Reprinted by permission of the lowa
Review and the author.
Scott Russell Sanders, “Speaking a Word for Nature.” From Secrets of the Uni-
verse by Scott Russell Sanders. © 1991 by Scott Russell Sanders. Reprinted by Introduction
permission of Beacon Press.
aw.
—_.)
-—
Don Scheese, “Desert Solitaire: Counter-Friction to the Machine in the Garden.”
From North Dakota Quarterly 59.2 (Spring 1991): 211-27. Reprinted by permis-
LITERARY STUDIES IN AN
sion of North Dakota Quarterly and the author.
Leslie Marmon Silko, “Landscape, History, and the Pueblo Imagination.” From AGE OF ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS
Antaeus 57 (Autumn 1986): 83-94. © 1986 by Leslie Marmon Silko. Reprinted
by permission of the author, her agent Sara Chalsant, and Wylie, Aitken and
Stone Incorporated.
Scott Slovic, “Nature Writing and Environmental Psychology: The Interiority of
Outdoor Experience.” Adapted from the introduction to Seeking Awareness in
American Nature Writing: Henry Thoreau, Annie Dillard, Edward Abbey, Wen- Literary studies in our postmodern age exist in a state of constant flux.
dell Berry, and Barry Lopez. © 1992 by the University of Utah Press. Used by Every few years, it seems, the profession of English must “redraw the
permission of the University of Utah Press. boundaries” to “remap” the rapidly changing contours of the field. One
Frederick Turner, “Cultivating the American Garden.” From Rebirth of Value: recent, authoritative guide to contemporary literary studies contains a full
twenty-one essays on different methodological or theoretical approaches
Meditations on Beauty, Ecology, Religion, and Education by Frederick Turner. ©
1991 by the State University of New York. Reprinted by permission of the State
to criticism. Its introduction observes:
University of New York Press.
Lynn White, Jr., “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis.” From Sctence
Literary studies in English are in a period of rapid and sometimes disori-
155.3767 (10 March 1967): 1203-7. © AAAS. Reprinted by permission of the enting change. . . . Just as none of the critical approaches that antedate this
American Association for the Advancement of Science. period, from psychological and Marxist criticism to reader-response theory
fields
and cultural criticism, has remained stable, so none of the historical
and subfields that constitute English and American literary studies has been
left untouched by revisionist energies. . . . [The essays in this volume] dis-
close some of those places where scholarship has responded to contemporary
pressures."

Curiously enough, in this putatively comprehensive volume on the state

.
of the profession, there is no essay on an ecological approach to literature
Although scholarship claims to have “responded to contemporary pres-
sures,” it has apparently ignored the most pressing contemporary issue of
all, namely, the global environmental crisis. The absence of any sign of
an environmental perspective in contemporary literary studies would seem
to suggest that despite its “revisionist energies,” scholarship remains aca-
demic in the sense of “scholarly to the point of being unaware of the outside
world” (American Heritage Dictionary).
 xvi * CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION ® xvii

If your knowledge of the outside world were limited to what you could able group; hence, their various efforts were not recognized as belonging
infer from the major publications of the literary profession, you would to a distinct critical school or movement. Individual studies appeared in a
quickly discern that race, class, and gender were the hot topics of the late wide variety of places and were categorized under a miscellany of subject
twentieth century, but you would never suspect that the earth’s life support headings, such as American Studies, regionalism, pastoralism, the frontier,
systems were under stress. Indeed, you might never know that there was human ecology, science and literature, nature in literature, landscape in lit-
an earth at all. In contrast, if you were to scan the newspaper headlines of erature, or the names of the authors treated. One indication of the disunity
the same period, you would learn of oil spills, lead and asbestos poison- of the early efforts is that these critics rarely cited one another's work;
ing, toxic waste contamination, extinction of species at an unprecedented they didn’t know that it existed. In a sense, each critic was inventing an
rate, battles over public land use, protests over nuclear waste dumps, a environmental approach to literature in isolation. Each was a single voice
growing hole in the ozone layer, predictions of global warming, acid rain, howling in the wilderness. As a consequence, ecocriticism did not become
loss of topsoil, destruction of the tropical rain forest, controversy over a presence in the major institutions of power in the profession, such as
the Spotted Owl in the Pacific Northwest, a wildfire in Yellowstone Park, the Modern Language Association (MLA). Graduate students interested in
medical syringes washing onto the shores of Atlantic beaches, boycotts environmental approaches to literature felt like misfits, having no commu-
on tuna, overtapped aquifers in the West, illegal dumping in the East, a nity of scholars to join and finding no job announcements in their area of
nuclear reactor disaster in Chernobyl, new auto emissions standards, fam- expertise.
ines, droughts, floods, hurricanes, a United Nations special conference on
environment and development, a U.S. president declaring the 1990s “the
decade of the environment,” and a world population that topped five bil- BIRTH OF ENVIRONMENTAL LITERARY STUDIES
lion. Browsing through periodicals, you would discover that in 1989 Time
magazine’s person of the year award went to “The Endangered Earth.” Finally, in the mid-eighties, as scholars began to undertake collaborative
In view of the discrepancy between current events and the preoccupa- projects, the field of environmental literary studies was planted, and in
tions of the literary profession, the claim that literary scholarship has re- the early nineties it grew. In 1985 Frederick O. Waage edited Teaching
sponded to contemporary pressures becomes difficult to defend. Until very Environmental Literature: Materials, Methods, Resources, which included
recently there has been no sign that the institution of literary studies has course descriptions from nineteen different scholars and sought to foster
even been aware of the environmental crisis. For instance, there have been “a greater presence of environmental concern and awareness in literary
no journals, no jargon, no jobs, no professional societies or discussion disciplines.”? In 1989 Alicia Nitecki founded The American Nature Writ-
groups, and no conferences on literature and the environment. While re- ing Newsletter, whose purpose was to publish brief essays, book reviews,
lated humanities disciplines, like history, philosophy, law, sociology, and classroom notes, and information pertaining to the study of writing on
religion have been “greening” since the 1970s, literary studies have ap- nature and the environment. Others have been responsible for special envi-
parently remained untinted by environmental concerns. And while social ronmental issues of established literary journals.? Some universities began
movements, like the civil rights and women’s liberation movements of the to include literature courses in their environmental studies curricula, a few
sixties and seventies, have transformed literary studies, it would appear inaugurated new institutes or programs in nature and culture, and some
that the environmental movement of the same era has had little impact. English departments began to offer a minor in environmental literature. In
But appearances can be deceiving. In actual fact, as the publication dates 1990 the University of Nevada, Reno, created the first academic position
for some of the essays in this anthology substantiate, individual literary in Literature and the Environment.
and cultural scholars have been developing ecologically informed criticism Also during these years several special sessions on nature writing or
and theory since the seventies; however, unlike their disciplinary cousins environmental literature began to appear on the programs of annual lit-
mentioned previously, they did not organize themselves into an identifi- erary conferences, perhaps most notably the 1991 MLA special session
 xviii © CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION = xix

organized by Harold Fromm, entitled “Ecocriticism: The Greening of Lit- represented in this sonnet? What role does the physical setting play in the
erary Studies,” and the 1992 American Literature Association symposium plot of this novel? Are the values expressed in this play consistent with
chaired by Glen Love, entitled “American Nature Writing: New Contexts, ecological wisdom? How do our metaphors of the land influence the way
New Approaches.” In 1992, at the annual meeting of the Western Litera- we treat it? How can we characterize nature writing as a genre? In addition
ture Association, a new Association for the Study of Literature and En- to race, class, and gender, should place become a new critical category? Do
vironment (ASLE) was formed, with Scott Slovic elected first president. men write about nature differently than women do? In what ways has lit-
ASLE’s mission: “to promote the exchange of ideas and information per- eracy itself affected humankind’s relationship to the natural world? How
taining to literature that considers the relationship between human beings has the concept of wilderness changed over time? In what ways and to
and the natural world” and to encourage “new nature writing, traditional what effect is the environmental crisis seeping into contemporary litera-
and innovative scholarly approaches to environmental literature, and inter- ture and popular culture? What view of nature informs U.S. Government
disciplinary environmental research.” In its first year, ASLE’s member- reports, corporate advertising, and televised nature documentaries, and to
ship swelled to more than 300; in its second year that number doubled, and what rhetorical effect? What bearing might the science of ecology have
the group created an electronic-mail computer network to facilitate com- on literary studies? How is science itself open to literary analysis? What
munication among members; in its third year, 1995, ASLE’s membership cross-fertilization is possible between literary studies and environmental
had topped 750 and the group hosted its first conference, in Fort Collins, discourse in related disciplines such as history, philosophy, psychology, art
Colorado. In 1993 Patrick Murphy established a new journal, ISLE: Inter- history, and ethics?
disciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, to “provide a forum Despite the broad scope of inquiry and disparate levels of sophistication,
for critical studies of the literary and performing arts proceeding from or all ecological criticism shares the fundamental premise that human culture
addressing environmental considerations. These would include ecological is connected to the physical world, affecting it and affected by it. Ecocriti-
theory, environmentalism, conceptions of nature and their depictions, the cism takes as its subject the interconnections between nature and culture,
human/nature dichotomy and related concerns.”* specifically the cultural artifacts of language and literature. As a critical
By 1993, then, ecological literary study had emerged as a recognizable stance, it has one foot in literature and the other on land; as a theoretical
critical school. The formerly disconnected scattering of lone scholars had discourse, it negotiates between the human and the nonhuman.
joined forces with younger scholars and graduate students to become a Ecocriticism can be further characterized by distinguishing it from other
strong interest group with aspirations to change the profession. The origin critical approaches. Literary theory, in general, examines the relations be-
of ecocriticism as a critical approach thus predates its recent consolidation tween writers, texts, and the world. In most literary theory “the world”
by more than twenty years. is synonymous with society—the social sphere. Ecocriticism expands the
notion of “the world” to include the entire ecosphere. If we agree with
Barry Commoner’s first law of ecology, “Everything is connected to every-
DEFINITION OF ECOCRITICISM thing else,” we must conclude that literature does not float above the ma-
terial world in some aesthetic ether, but, rather, plays a part in an im-
Whar then is ecocriticism? Simply put, ecocriticism is the study of the mensely complex global system, in which energy, matter, and ideas interact.
relationship between literature and the physical environment. Just as femi- But the taxonomic name of this green branch of literary study is still
nist criticism examines language and literature from a gender-conscious being negotiated. In The Comedy of Survival: Studies in Literary Ecology
perspective, and Marxist criticism brings an awareness of modes of pro- (1972) Joseph W. Meeker introduced the term literary ecology to refer to
duction and economic class to its reading of texts, ecocriticism takes an “the study of biological themes and relationships which appear in literary
earth-centered approach to literary studies. works. It is simultaneously an attempt to discover what roles have been
Ecocritics and theorists ask questions like the following: How is nature played by literature in the ecology of the human species.” *The term eco-
 xx © CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION © xxi

criticism was possibly first coined iri 1978 by William Rueckert in his essay departments, but, as environmental problems compound, work as usual
“Literature and Ecology: An Experiment in Ecocriticism” (reprinted in this seems unconscionably frivolous. If we’re not part of the solution, we're
anthology). By ecocriticism Rueckert meant “the application of ecology part of the problem.
and ecological concepts to the study of literature.” Rueckert’s definition, How then can we contribute to environmental restoration, not just in
concerned specifically with the science of ecology, is thus more restrictive our spare time, but from within our capacity as professors of literature?’
than the one proposed in this anthology, which includes all possible re- The answer lies in recognizing that current environmental problems are
lations between literature and the physical world. Other terms currently largely of our own making, are, in other words, a by-product of culture. As
in circulation include ecopoetics, environmental literary criticism, and green historian Donald Worster explains,
cultural studies.
We are facing a global crisis today, not because of how ecosystems function
Many critics write environmentally conscious criticism without needing
but rather because of how our ethical systems function. Getting through the
or wanting a specific name for it. Others argue that a name is important.
crisis requires understanding our impact on nature as precisely as possible,
It was precisely because the early studies lacked a common subject head- but even more, it requires understanding those ethical systems and using that
ing that they were dispersed so widely, failed to build on one another, and understanding to reform them. Historians, along with literary scholars, an-
became both difficult to access and negligible in their impact on the pro- thropologists, and philosophers, cannot do the reforming, of course, but they
fession. Some scholars like the term ecocriticism because it is short and can can help with the understanding.®
easily be made into other forms like ecocritical and ecocritic. Additionally,
they favor eco- over enviro- because, analogous to the science of ecology, Answering the call to understanding, scholars throughout the humani-
ecocriticism studies relationships between things, in this case, between ties are finding ways to add an environmental dimension to their respective
human culture and the physical world. Furthermore, in its connotations, disciplines. Worster and other historians are writing environmental histo-
enviro- is anthropocentric and dualistic, implying that we humans are at ries, studying the reciprocal relationships between humans and land, con-
the center, surrounded by everything that is not us, the environment. Eco-, sidering nature not just as the stage upon which the human story is acted
in contrast, implies interdependent communities, integrated systems, and out, but as an actor in the drama. They trace the connections among envi-
strong connections among constituent parts. Ultimately, of course, usage ronmental conditions, economic modes of production, and cultural ideas
will dictate which term or whether any term is adopted. But think of how through time.
convenient it would be to sit down at a computerized database and have a Anthropologists have long been interested in the connection between
single term to enter for your subject search. ... culture and geography. Their work on primal cultures in particular may
help the rest of us not only to respect such people’s right to survive, but
also to think about the value systems and rituals that have helped these
cultures live sustainably.
THE HUMANITIES AND THE ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS
Psychology has long ignored nature in its theories of the human mind.
A handful of contemporary psychologists, however, are exploring the link-
Regardless of what name it goes by, most ecocritical work shares a com- ages between environmental conditions and mental health, some regard-
mon motivation: the troubling awareness that we have reached the age of ing the modern estrangement from nature as the basis of our social and
environmental limits, a time when the consequences of human actions are psychological ills. |
damaging the planet’s basic life support systems. We are there. Either we In philosophy, various subfields like environmental ethics, deep ecology,
change our ways or we face global catastrophe, destroying much beauty ecofeminism, and social ecology have emerged in an effort to understand
and exterminating countless fellow species in our headlong race to apoca- and critique the root causes of environmental degradation and to formulate
lypse. Many of us in colleges and universities worldwide find ourselves in an alternative view of existence that will provide an ethical and conceptual
a dilemma. Our temperaments and talents have deposited us in literature foundation for right relations with the earth.
 xxii © CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION © xxiii

Theologians, too, are recognizing that, as one book is subtitled, “The broads, and spinsters — and by locating absences, questioning the purported
Environment Is a Religious Issue.” While some Judeo-Christian theolo- universality and even the aesthetic value of literature that distorts or ignores
gians attempt to elucidate biblical precedents for good stewardship of the altogether the experience of half of the human race. Analogous efforts
earth, others re-envision God as immanent in creation and view the earth in ecocriticism study how nature is represented in literature. Again, con-
itself as sacred. Still other theologians turn to ancient Earth Goddess wor- sciousness raising results when stereotypes are identified—Eden, Arcadia,
ship, Eastern religious traditions, and Native American teachings, belief virgin land, miasmal swamp, savage wilderness—and when absences are
systems that contain much wisdom about nature and spirituality® noticed: where is the natural world in this text? But nature per se is not the
Literary ‘scholars specialize in questions of value, meaning, tradition, only focus of ecocritical studies of representation. Other topics include the
point of view, and language, and it is in these areas that they are making a frontier, animals, cities, specific geographical regions, rivers, mountains,
substantial contribution to environmental thinking. Believing that the envi- deserts, Indians, technology, garbage, and the body.
ronmental crisis has been exacerbated by our fragmented, compartmental- Showalter’s second stage in feminist criticism, the women’s literary tra-
ized, and overly specialized way of knowing the world, humanities scholars dition stage, likewise serves the important function of consciousness raising
are increasingly making an effort to educate themselves in the sciences and as it rediscovers, reissues, and reconsiders literature by women. In eco-
to adopt interdisciplinary approaches. criticism, similar efforts are being made to recuperate the hitherto ne-
glected genre of nature writing, a tradition of nature-oriented nonfiction
that originates in England with Gilbert White’s A Natural History of Sel-
SURVEY OF ECOCRITICISM IN AMERICA bourne (1789) and extends to America through Henry Thoreau, John Bur-
roughs, John Muir, Mary Austin, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, Edward
Many kinds of studies huddle under the spreading tree of ecological literary Abbey, Annie Dillard, Barry Lopez, Terry Tempest Williams, and many
criticism, for literature and the environment is a big topic, and should re- others. Nature writing boasts a rich past, a vibrant present, and a promis-
main that way. Several years ago, when I was attempting to devise a brand- ing future, and ecocritics draw from any number of existing critical theo-
ing system that would make sense of this mixed herd, Wallace Stegner— ries — psychoanalytic, new critical, feminist, Bakhtinian, deconstructive—
novelist, historian, and literary critic—offered some wise counsel, saying in the interests of understanding and promoting this body of literature. As
that if he were doing it, he would be inclined to let the topic remain evidence that nature writing is gaining ground in the literary marketplace,
“large and loose and suggestive and open, simply literature and the envi- witness the staggering number of anthologies that have been published in
ronment and all the ways they interact and have interacted, without try- recent years.” In an increasingly urban society, nature writing plays a vital
ing to codify and systematize. Systems are like wet rawhide,” he warned; role in teaching us to value the natural world.
“when they dry they strangle what they bind.” Suggestive and open is Another effort to promulgate environmentally enlightened works ex-
exactly what ecocriticism ought to be, but in order. to avoid confusion in amines mainstream genres, identifying fiction and poetry writers whose
the following brief survey of ecocritical work to date, I am going to do work manifests ecological awareness. Figures like Willa Cather, Robinson
some codifying. Let us hereby agree that the system is not to be binding. Jeffers, W. S. Merwin, Adrienne Rich, Wallace Stegner, Gary Snyder, Mary
Nonetheless, Elaine Showalter’s model of the three developmental stages of Oliver, Ursula Le Guin, and Alice Walker have received much attention,
feminist criticism provides a useful scheme for describing three analogous as have Native American authors, but the horizon of possibilities remains
phases in ecocriticism." suggestively open. Corresponding to the feminist interest in the lives of
The first stage in feminist criticism, the “images of women” stage, is women authors, ecocritics have studied the environmental conditions of
concerned with representations, concentrating on how women are por- an author’s life—the influence of place on the imagination — demonstrating
trayed in canonical literature. These studies contribute to the vital process that where an author grew up, traveled, and wrote is pertinent to an under-
of consciousness raising by exposing sexist stereotypes—witches, bitches, standing of his or her work. Some critics find it worthwhile to visit the:
 xxiv © CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION * xxv

places an author lived and wrote about, literally retracing the footsteps of A strong voice in the profession will enable ecocritics to be influential
John Muir in the Sierra, for example, to experience his mountain raptures in mandating important changes in the canon, the curriculum, and univer-
personally, or paddling down the Merrimac River to apprehend better the sity policy. We will see books like Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac
physical context of Thoreau’s meandering prose. and Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire become standard texts for courses
The third stage that Showalter identifies in feminist criticism is the theo- in American literature. Students taking literature and composition courses
retical phase, which is far reaching and complex, drawing on a wide range will be encouraged to think seriously about the relationship of humans to
of theories to raise fundamental questions about the symbolic construc- nature, about the ethical and aesthetic dilemmas posed by the environmen-
tion of gender and sexuality within literary discourse. Analogous work tal crisis, and about how language and literature transmit values with pro-
in ecocriticism includes examining the symbolic construction of species. found ecological implications. Colleges and universities of the twenty-first
How has literary discourse defined the human? Such a critique questions century will require that all students complete at least one interdisciplinary
the dualisms prevalent in Western thought, dualisms that separate mean- course in environmental studies. Institutions of higher learning will one
ing from matter, sever mind from body, divide men from women, and day do business on recycled-content paper —some institutions already do.
wrench humanity from nature. A related endeavor is being carried out In the future we can expect to see ecocritical scholarship becoming
under the hybrid label “ecofeminism,” a theoretical discourse whose theme ever more interdisciplinary, multicultural, and international. The interdis-
is the link between the oppression of women and the domination of nature. ciplinary work is well underway and could be further facilitated by inviting
Yet another theoretical project attempts to develop an ecological poetics, experts from a wide range of disciplines to be guest speakers at literary
taking the science of ecology, with its concept of the ecosystem and its conferences and by hosting more interdisciplinary conferences on environ-
emphasis on interconnections and energy flow, as a metaphor for the way mental topics. Ecocriticism has been predominantly a white movement. It
poetry functions in society. Ecocritics are also considering the philosophy will become a multi-ethnic movement when stronger connections are made
currently known as deep ecology, exploring the implications that its radical between the environment and issues of social justice, and when a diver-
critique of anthropocentrism might have for literary study. sity of voices are encouraged to contribute to the discussion. This volume
focuses on ecocritical work in the United States. The next collection may
well be an international one, for environmental problems are now global in
THE FUTURE OF ECOCRITICISM scale and their solutions will require worldwide collaboration.”
In 1985, Loren Acton, a Montana ranch boy turned solar astronomer,
An ecologically focused criticism is a worthy enterprise primarily because flew on the Challenger Eight space shuttle as payload specialist. His obser-
it directs our attention to matters about which we need to be thinking. vations may serve to remind us of the global context of ecocritical work:
Consciousness raising is its most important task. For how can we solve
Looking outward to the blackness of space, sprinkled with the glory of a
environmental problems unless we start thinking about them? universe of lights, I saw majesty —but no welcome. Below was a welcoming
I noted above that ecocritics have aspirations to change the profession. planet. There, contained in the thin, moving, incredibly fragile shell of the
Perhaps I should have written that I have such aspirations for ecocriticism. biosphere is everything that is dear to you, all the human drama and comedy.
I would like to see ecocriticism become a chapter of the next book that That’s where life is; that’s where all the good stuff is.!*
redraws the boundaries of literary studies. I would like to see a position
in every literature department for a specialist in literature and the environ-
ment. I would like to see candidates running on a green platform elected to ESSAYS IN THIS COLLECTION
the highest offices in our professional organizations. We have witnessed the
feminist and multi-ethnic critical movements radically transform the pro- This book is intended to serve as a port of entry to the field of ecocriti-
fession, the job market, and the canon. And because they have transformed cism. As ecocriticism gains visibility and influence within the profession,
the profession, they are helping to transform the world. increasing numbers of people have been asking the question, “What ts eco-
 xxvi =§CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION © xxvii

criticism?” Many others who are developing an interest in ecocriticism The book is divided into three sections, reflecting the three major phases
want to know what to read to learn more about this approach to literary of ecocritical work. We begin with theory in order to raise some funda-
studies. Professors who are familiar with ecocriticism and its history never- mental questions about the relationship between nature and culture and to
theless have had difficulty teaching the subject because until now there has provide a theoretical foundation upon which to build the subsequent dis-
been no general introductory text. cussions of literary works. The second section studies representations of
Together, the essays in this anthology provide an answer to the ques- nature in fiction and drama, including reflections on the ecological signifi-
tion, “What is ecocriticism?” These essays will help people new to this cance of literary modes and narrative structures, from Paleolithic hunting
field to gain a sense of its history and scope, and to become acquainted stories to postmodern mystery novels. The final section focuses on environ-
with its leading scholars. These are the essays with which anyone wishing mental literarure in America, encompassing both Native American stories
to undertake ecocritical scholarship ought to be familiar. In addition, this and the Thoreauvian nature-writing tradition.
anthology of seminal and representative essays will facilitate teaching; no
longer will professors have to rely on the dog-eared photocopies that have
1. Ecotheory: Reflections on Nature and Culture
been circulating in the ecocritical underground, nor will they need to worry
about violating copyright laws. Section one opens with a famous essay by historian Lynn White, Jr., en-
This sourcebook, consisting of both reprinted and original essays, looks titled “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis.” White argues that
backward to origins and forward to trends. Many of the seminal works the environmental crisis is fundamentally a matter of the beliefs and values
of ecocriticism—works of the 1970s by Joseph Meeker, William Rueck- that direct science and technology; he censures the Judeo-Christian religion
ert, and Neil Evernden, for example—received little notice when first pub- for its anthropocentric arrogance and dominating attitude toward nature.
lished, and have since become difficult to obtain. One of the purposes of White’s article sparked heated debate and led to increased environmental
this anthology is to make available those early gems, thereby acknowledg- consciousness within the Christian church. Christopher Manes in “Nature
ing the roots of modern ecocriticism and giving credit where credit is due. and Silence” uses the theories of Michel Foucault to consider how both
Another purpose of the anthology is to present exemplary recent essays, literacy and Christian exegesis have rendered nature silent in Western dis-
fairly general in nature, representing a wide range of contemporary eco- course. He contends that nature has shifted from an animistic to a symbolic
critical approaches. presence and from a voluble subject to a mute object, such that in our
In selecting essays for this volume, then, we have sought to include not culture only humans have status as speaking subjects. Harold Fromm in
only the classics but pieces on the cutting edge. In our coverage of theory, “From Transcendence to Obsolescence: a Route Map” speculates on how
we have avoided essays choked with technical jargon in favor of accessible the Industrial Revolution affected humanity’s conception of its relation-
pieces written in lucid prose. In addition, we have chosen what we consider ship to nature, warning that technology has created the false illusion that
to be works of brilliance, those pieces that open doors of understanding, we control nature, allowing us to forget that our “unconquerable minds”
that switch on a light bulb in the mind, that help the reader to see the world are vitally dependent upon natural support systems.
in a new way. In our coverage of criticism, we have avoided essays that While the first three essays discuss versions of alienation from nature,
treat a single author or a single work in favor of general essays, discussing the next two essays analyze how linguistic and aesthetic categories condi-
a variety of texts and representing a range of critical approaches. While tion the ways that we interact with nature. In “Cultivating the American
some of the critical essays are argumentative, others are instructional in Garden,” Frederick Turner directs our attention to the problem of defining
nature, designed to introduce the reader to a body of literature (such as nature. Is the natural opposed to the human? Is the natural opposed to
Native American literature), a genre (such as American nature writing), OF the social and cultural? If everything is natural, then of what use is the
a critical approach (such as Bakhtinian dialogics). In short, we sincerely
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term? He discusses cooking, music, landscape painting, and gardening, as
believe that every selection herein is a “must read” essay. healthy mediators between culture and nature. In “The Uses of Landscape:

peas
 xxviii =§CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION ® xxix

the Picturesque Aesthetic and the National Park System” Alison Byerly argues that ecocritics ought to be asking questions on the order of “What
reveals the way that European aesthetics of the picturesque inform man- has counted as the environment, and what may count? Who marks off the
agement of America’s public lands; park administrators are like publishers, conceptual boundaries, and under what authority, and for what reasons?”
she suggests, whose job it is “to produce and market an interpretation of
nature’s text.”
tl. Ecocritical Considerations of Fiction and Drama
The next three essays of the ecotheory section turn to the science of
ecology to consider how this discipline applies to the literary arts. William Section two opens with a meditation on narrative by novelist Ursula K.
Howarth’s “Some Principles of Ecocriticism” traces the development of Le Guin entitled “The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction.” Le Guin observes
the science of ecology, analyzes traditional points of hostility between the that the (male) activity of hunting has produced a tradition of “death”
sciences and the humanities, and anticipates the ways that ecocriticism will stories having a linear plot, a larger-than-life hero, and inevitable conflict.
help to forge a partnership between these historic enemy cultures. After She urges that an alternative (female) tradition of “life” stories develop,
outlining a theory and history of ecocritical principles, he describes a basic which might look to seed gathering as its model, conveying a cyclical sense
library of thirty books, distilled from years of interdisciplinary reading. In of time, describing a community of diverse individuals, and embracing
“Beyond Ecology: Self, Place, and the Pathetic Fallacy” Neil Evernden ar- an ethic of continuity. The next essay, “The Comic Mode,” is a chapter
gues that discoveries in ecology and cellular biology revolutionize our sense from Joseph W. Meeker’s pioneering work The Comedy of Survival (1972).
of self, teaching us that “there is no such thing as an individual, only an Speaking as both an ethologist and a scholar of comparative literature,
individual-in-context,” no such thing as self, only “self-in-place.” Accord- Meeker in this book regards literary production as an important character-
ingly, literature, via metaphor, should help us to feel the relatedness of self istic of the human species— analogous to flight in birds or radar in bats—
with place. Writing in 1978, William Rueckert (“Literature and Ecology: and he asserts that literature
An Experiment in Ecocriticism”) coins a new term—ecocriticism—to de-
should be examined carefully and honestly to discover its influence upon
scribe his endeavor, proposing to “discover something about the ecology
human behavior and the natural environment—to determine what role, if any,
of literature,” that is, about the way that literature functions in the bio- it plays in the welfare and survival of mankind and what insight it offers into
sphere. Describing a poem as stored energy, Rueckert explains that reading human relationships with other species and with the world around us. (3-4)
is an energy transfer and that critics and teachers act as mediators between
poetry and the biosphere, releasing the energy and information stored in He coins the term literary ecology for this enterprise. In the chapter re-
poetry so that it may flow through the human community and be translated printed here, Meeker considers the literary modes of comedy and tragedy,
into social action. finding that, from an ecological standpoint, comedy promotes healthy,
The final essays of this section posit environmentalist versions of post- “survival” values, while tragedy is maladaptive.
structuralist theory. Whereas some ecocritics condemn poststructuralism While Le Guin and Meeker consider literary modes, the remaining essays
for its seeming denial of a physical ground to meaning, SueEllen Camp- in this section turn their attention to specific literary works in America
bell (“The Land and Language of Desire: Where Deep Ecology and Post- from the colonial period to the postmodern. Annette Kolodny’s The Lay
Structuralism Meet”) finds striking parallels in the fundamental premises, of the Land: Metaphor as Experience and History in American Life and Let-
critical stance, and basic tactics of poststructuralism and ecological phi- ters (1975) is by now a classic critique of male-authored American litera-
losophy. David Mazel’s “American Literary Environmentalism as Domes- ture, exposing the pervasive metaphor of land-as-woman, both mother and
tic Orientalism” draws upon the theories of Jurij Lotman, Michel Fou- mistress, as lying at the root of our aggressive and exploitive practices.
cault, and, most suggestively, Edward Said, to argue that “the construction The excerpts reprinted here present the kernel of Kolodny’s thesis, con-
of the environment is itself an exercise of cultural power.” After demon- cluding that although the land-as:woman metaphor may once have been
strating that “the environment” is a social and linguistic construct, Mazel adaptive, it now must be replaced with a new one. In “Speaking a Word
 #!
100 ®§ CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION © xxxi

for Nature” Scott Russell Sanders surveys much of the same literary ter- storyteller, writes in “Landscape, History, and the Pueblo Imagination”
rain Kolodny does in her book, progressing from Bradford, to Bartram, about the Pueblo people, describing their relationship to the land of the
to Emerson, to Thoreau, to Faulkner, and praising these authors for their American Southwest. Pueblo oral narratives function to explain the world,
strong sense of nature. Sanders finds, however, that contemporary, criti- to help people survive in it, and to transmit culture. Specific features of the
cally acclaimed fiction lacks an awareness of the natural world that exists landscape help people remember the stories, and the stories help them to
outside the “charmed circle” of “the little human morality play,” a myopia live in the land; traveling through the storied landscape corresponds to an
that mirrors the blindness of our culture at large. interior journey of awareness and imagination in which the traveler grasps
The final two essays in this section consider postmodern and “postnatu- his or her cultural identity.
ral” literature, discovering that this literature offers clues to a basic shift in One flourishing form of environmental literature in America is the pre-
American consciousness. In “The Postnatural Novel: Toxic Consciousness viously undervalued genre of nature writing. Nature writing appears as
in Fiction of the 1980s” Cynthia Deitering finds contemporary novels to an “untrampled snowfield,” in the words of one scholar, simply inviting
be littered with references to garbage, signaling a fundamental shift in his- critical exploration. The remaining essays in this section provide a gen-
torical consciousness, a shift from a culture defined by its production to a eral introduction to the genre and represent a broad spectrum of critical
postindustrial culture defined by its waste. In “Is Nature Necessary?” Dana approaches to it.
Phillips maintains that the difference between Hemingway and Hiaasen is In “A Taxonomy of Nature Writing” Thomas J. Lyon, a leading nature-
the difference between modernism and postmodernism. In modernism the writing scholar, describes the genre in quasi-taxonomic terms, based on
roots of culture lie in nature, whereas in postmodernism nature is replaced the relative prominence of three important dimensions: natural history in-
by commodified representation. formation, personal responses to nature, and philosophical interpretation
of nature. Michael Branch’s “Indexing American Possibilities: The Natu-
ral History Writing of Bartram, Wilson, and Audubon” reviews the work
tll. Critical Studies of Environmental Literature
of botanist William Bartram, ornithologist Alexander Wilson, and painter
Section three serves as a refreshing tonic after the pessimistic accounts of John James Audubon to suggest that it is inaccurate to consider Henry
postmodern literature that concluded section two. The lead essay of this David Thoreau the progenitor of American nature writing, that, in fact,
section is Glen A. Love’s “Revaluing Nature: Toward an Ecological Criti- Thoreau is a direct heir of the early romantic natural historians, whose con-
cism,” one of the most influential essays of the current ecocritical move- tributions deserve recognition. Don Scheese’s “Desert Solitaire: Counter-
ment. Love first speculates that literary studies have remained indifferent to Friction to the Machine in the Garden” considers one of Thoreau’s most
the environmental crisis in part because our discipline’s limited humanistic colorful followers, Edward Abbey. Scheese insists that although Abbey
vision has led to a narrowly anthropocentric view of what is consequential resisted the label “nature writer,” he nevertheless falls squarely in the tra-
in life. He then recommends that revaluing nature-oriented literature can dition of nature writing established by Thoreau and carried on by John
help redirect us from ego-consciousness to “eco-consciousness.” Muir and Aldo Leopold, all of whom sought to instill a land ethic in the
The willingness to “revalue” nature-oriented literature has led many American public.
readers to seek wisdom in Native American texts. These well-meaning In order to convey a sense of the tradition of women’s nature writing and
readers are often ignorant of the cultural and historical background neces- to explore the difference between masculine and feminine environmental
sary to understand this literature. In “The Sacred Hoop: A Contemporary ethics, Vera L. Norwood (“Heroines of Nature: Four Women Respond to
Perspective,” Paula Gunn Allen characterizes some distinctive ways of per- the American Landscape”) reviews the work of Isabella Bird, Mary Austin,
ceiving reality and some fundamental assumptions about the universe that Rachel Carson, and Annie Dillard, finding that even as these women defend
inform American Indian literature, making it qualitatively different from wild nature, their attitude toward it is ambivalent, part of them preferring
Western literary traditions. Leslie Marmon Silko, herself a Laguna Pueblo the safe and the tame. Counterbalancing the many critics of nature writ-
 wodi © CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION ® xxiii

ing who appreciate its careful attentiveness to the nonhuman, Scott Slovic NOTES
(“Nature Writing and Environmental Psychology: The Interiority of Out-
door Experience”) claims that the eye of the nature writer is most often 1. Stephen Greenblatt and Giles Gunn, eds., Redrawing the Boundaries: The
turned inward. Nature writers such as Annie Dillard, Edward Abbey, Wen- Transformation of English and American Literary Studies (New York: MLA, 1992)
dell Berry, and Barry Lopez go to nature in order to induce elevated states 1-3.
2. Frederick O. Waage, ed., Teaching Environmental Literature: Materials, Meth-
of consciousness within themselves, he suspects, and in their accounts of
ods, Resources (New York: MLA, 1985) viii.
the phenomenon of awareness they are as much literary psychologists as
3. Special environmental issues of humanities journals include Antaeus 57 (Au-
they are natural historians. tumn 1986), ed. Daniel Halpern, reprint, as On Nature (San Francisco: North Point
The collection concludes with Michael J. McDowell’s consideration of Press, 1987); Studies in the Humanities 15.2 (December 1988), “Feminism, Ecology
what critical approach seems most promising for an ecological analysis and the Future of the Humanities,” ed. Patrick Murphy; Witness 3.4 (Winter 1989),
of landscape writing. In “The Bakhtinian Road to Ecological Insight” “New Nature Writing,” ed. Thomas J. Lyon; Hypatia 6.1 (Spring 1991), “Ecologi-
McDowell argues that because the Russian philosopher and literary critic cal Feminism,” ed. Karen J. Warren; North Dakota Quarterly 59.2 (Spring 1991),
Mikhail Bakhtin incorporates much of the thinking about systems and re- “Nature Writers/Writing,” ed. Sherman Paul and Don Scheese; CEA Critic 54.1
lationships embraced by the hard sciences, his literary theories provide (Fall 1991), “The Literature of Nature,” ed. Betsy Hilbert; West Virginia Univer-
an ideal perspective for ecocritics, particularly Bakhtin’s notions of dia- sity Philological Papers 37 (1991), “Special Issue Devoted to the Relationship Be-
logics, including the “chronotope” and the “carnivalesque.” After review- tween Man and the Environment,” ed. Armand E. Singer; Weber Studies 9.1 (Win-
ter 1992), “A Meditation on the Environment,” ed. Neila C. Seshachari; Praxis 4
ing Bakhtinian dialogics, McDowell offers several suggestions for under-
(1993), “Denatured Environments,” ed. Tom Crochunis and Michael Ross; Georgia
taking “practical ecocriticism.” The end of his essay sounds a perfect final
Review 47.1 (Spring 1993), “Focus on Nature Writing,” ed. Stanley W. Lindberg
note for this book as a whole, and, indeed, for the ecocritical project in
and Douglas Carlson; Indiana Review 16.1 (Spring 1993), a special issue devoted to
general: “Every text, as Bakhtin unfailingly tells us, is a dialogue open for writing on nature and the environment, ed. Dorian Gossy; Ohio Review 49 (1993),
further comments from other points of view. There is no conclusion.” “Art and Nature: Essays by Contemporary Writers,” ed. Wayne Dodd; Theater 25.1
To enable the reader to pursue further study, we have included some (Spring/Summer 1994), special section on “Theater and Ecology,” ed. Una Chaud-
reference material at the back of the book. In order to keep this volume af- huri; Weber Studies 11.3 (Fall 1994), special wilderness issue, ed. Neila C. Seshachari
fordably priced and easy to use, we have resisted the temptation to include and Scott Slovic.
a comprehensive bibliography on literature and the environment, which 4. Information on The American Nature Writing Newsletter, the Association for
would be a book in itself.5 Instead, we have compiled an annotated bib- the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE), and ISLE can be found in the
liography of the most important books in ecocriticism. Selections for the Periodicals and Professional Organizations section at the back of this book.
5. Joseph W. Meeker, The Comedy of Survival: Studies in Literary Ecology (New
bibliography are based on responsesto an electronic-mail survey of 150
York: Scribner’s, 1972) 9. A chapter of Meeker’s seminal work is reprinted in this
ecocritics. Reading these books will provide an excellent grounding in the
anthology.
field. The list of periodicals and professional organizations should help 6. Wendell V. Harris in “Toward an Ecological Criticism: Contextual versus
interested readers stay abreast of ecocritical scholarship and will show the Unconditioned Literary Theory” (College English 48.2 [February 1986]: 116-31)
lone scholar who howls in the wilderness how to become a member of draws upon Saussure’s distinction between langue and parole, defining “ecological”
a growing community of scholars active in ecological literary studies. We theories (he includes speech-act theory, the sociology of knowledge, argumentation
trust that this book, like a good map, will inspire intellectual adventurers theory, and discourse analysis) as those that investigate the individual parole and
to explore the ecocritical terrain. the interactive contexts —the “interpretive ecologies” (129)—that make communi-
cation possible.
Marilyn M. Cooper in “The Ecology of Writing” (College English 48.4 [April
 mciv © CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION © xwov

1986]: 364-75) proposes an “ecological model of writing, whose fundamental tenet York: Simon and Schuster, 1992); Morris Berman, Coming to Our Senses: Body and
is that writing is an activity through which a person is continually engaged with a Spirit in the Hidden History of the West (New York: Bantam, 1989); Paul Shepard,
variety of socially constituted systems” (367). Nature and Madness (San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1982); Theodore Roszak, Mary E.
Harris and Cooper use the science of ecology (specifically its concepts of webs, Gomes, and Allen D. Kanner, eds., Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the
habitat, and community) as an explanatory metaphor to develop a model of human Mind (San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1995).
communicanon, but they do not explore how this human activity interacts with the In philosophy, see the journal Environmental Ethics. An excellent introductory
physical world, and so their studies are not ecocritical as I am proposing that the anthology is Michael E. Zimmerman et al., eds., Environmental Philosoplry: From
term be used. Animal Rights to Radical Ecology (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1993). Also
7. Although this book focuses on scholarship, it is through teaching that profes- good are Carolyn Merchant, Radical Ecology: The Search for a Livable World (New
sors may ultimately make the greatest impact in the world. For ideas on teaching, York: Routledge, 1992); Max Oelschlaeger, ed., The Wilderness Condition: Essays
see Waage, Teaching Environmental Literature; CEA Critic 54.1 (Fall 1991), which on Environment and Civilization (Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1992).
includes a section entitled “Practicum,” 43-77; Cheryll Glotfelty, “Teaching Green: In theology, a fine introduction to the current environmental thinking of a variety
Ideas, Sample Syllabi, and Resources,” and William Howarth, “Literature of Place, of the world’s major religions is Steven C. Rockefeller and John C. Elder, eds., Spirit
Environmental Writers,” both in ISLE 1.1 (Spring 1993): 151-78; Cheryll Glotfelty, and Nature: Why the Environment Is a Religious Issue (Boston: Beacon, 1992). See
“Western, Yes, But Is It Literature?: Teaching Ronald Lanner’s The Pinon Pine,” also Charles Birch et al., eds., Liberating Life: Contemporary Approaches to Eco-
Western American Literature 27.4 (February 1993): 303-10. The Association for the logical Theology (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1990); Eugene C. Hargrove, ed.,
Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE) maintains a syllabus exchange avail- Religion and Environmental Crisis (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1986).
able to its members. For a provocative discussion of the role of higher education 10. Wallace Stegner, letter to the author, 28 May 1989.
in general, see David W. Orr, Ecological Literacy: Education and the Transition to a 11. See Elaine Showalter, “Introduction: The Feminist Critical Revolution,”
Postmodern World (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992). The New Feminist Criticism: Essays on Women, Literature, and Theory, ed. Elaine
8. Donald Worster, The Wealth of Nature: Environmental History and the Eco- Showalter (New York: Pantheon, 1985) 3-17. I first presented these ideas in a con-
logical Imagination (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993) 27. ference paper: Cheryll Burgess [Glotfelry], “Toward an Ecological Literary Criti-
9. 1do not presume to have full command of the range of environmental work in cism,” annual conference of the Western Literature Association, Coeur d'Alene,
these and other related fields, but I can direct the reader to some good introductory Idaho, October 1989.
books and key journals. 12. The following are only some of the most recent nature writing and nature
In environmental history, see the journal Environmental History Review. In addi- poetry anthologies:
tion, see Donald Worster, ed., The Ends of the Earth: Perspectives on Modern En- Adkins, Jan, ed. Ragged Mountain Portable Wilderness Anthology. Camden,
vironmental History (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988); Worster, The Maine: International Marine Publishing, 1993.
Wealth of Nature; Richard White, “American Environmental History: The Devel- Anderson, Lorraine, ed. Sisters of the Earth: Women’s Prose and Poetry about
opment of a New Historical Field,” Pacific Historical Review 54.3 (August 1985): Nature. New York: Vintage, 1991.
297-335; “A Round Table: Environmental History,” Journal of American History Begiebing, Robert J., and Owen Grumbling, eds. The Literature of Nature: The
76.4 (March 1990), which includes a lead essay by Donald Worster and respond- British and American Traditions. Medford, N.J.: Plexus, 1990.
ing statements by Alfred W. Crosby, Richard White, Carolyn Merchant, William Finch, Robert, and John Elder, eds. The Norton Book of Nature Writing. New
Cronon, and Stephen J. Pyne. York: Norton, 1990.
In anthropology, see Marvin Harris, Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures Halpern, Daniel, ed. On Nature. San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987.
(New York: Vintage, 1991); Mark Nathan Cohen, Health and the Rise of Civilization Knowles, Karen, ed. Celebrating the Land: Women's Nature Writings, 1850-1991.
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989). Flagstaff, Ariz.: Northland, 1992.
In psychology, see Irwin Altman and Joachim F. Wohlwill, eds., Behavior and the Lyon, Thomas J., ed. This Incomperable Lande: A Book of American Nature Writ-
Natural Environment (New York: Plenum Press, 1983); Rachel Kaplan and Stephen ing. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989.
Kaplan, The Experience of Nature: A Psychological Perspective (New York: Cam- Lyon, Thomas J., and Peter Stine, eds. On Nature's Terms: Contemporary Voices.
bridge University Press, 1989); Theodore Roszak, The Voice of the Earth (New College Station: Texas A8¢M University Press, 1992.
 xxxvi ©§ CHERYLL GLOTFELTY INTRODUCTION © xxxvii

Merrill, Christopher, ed. The Forgotten Language: Contemporary Poets and Na- Kelley, Kevin W., ed. The Home Planet. New York: Addison-Wesley, 1988.
ture. Salt Lake City: Gibbs M. Smith, 1991. Meeker, Joseph. The Comedy of Survival: Studies in Literary Ecology. New York:
Morgan, Sarah, and Dennis Okerstrom, eds. The Endangered Earth: Readings for Scribner’s, 1972.
Writers. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1992. Rueckert, William. “Literature and Ecology: An Experiment in Ecocriticism.” lowa
Murray, John A., ed. American Nature Writing 1994. San Francisco: Sierra Club, Review 9.1 (Winter 1978): 71-86.
1994. Showalter, Elaine, ed. The New Feminist Criticism: Essays on Women, Literature,
. Nature's New Voices. Golden, Colo.: Fulcrum, 1992. and Theory. New York: Pantheon, 1985.
Pack, Robert, and Jay Parini, eds. Poems foraSmall Planet: Contemporary Amert- Waage, Frederick O., ed. Teaching Environmental Literature: Materials, Methods,
can Nature Poetry. Hanover: University Press of New England, 1993. Resources. New York: MLA, 1985.
Ronald, Ann, ed. Words for the Wild: The Sierra Club Trailside Reader. San Fran- Worster, Donald. The Wealth of Nature: Environmental History and the Ecological
cisco: Sierra Club, 1987. Imagination. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.
Sauer, Peter, ed. Finding Home: Writing on Nature and Culture from Orion Maga-
zine. Boston: Beacon, 1992.
Slovic, Scott H., and Terrell F. Dixon, eds. Being in the World: An Environmental
Reader for Writers. New York: Macmillan, 1993.
Swann, Brian, and Peter Borrelli, eds. Poetry from the Amicus Journal. Palo Alto,
Calif.: Tioga, 1990.
Walker, Melissa. Reading the Environment. New York: Norton, 1994.
Wild, Peter, ed. The Desert Reader. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1991.
13. For a promising first step in international collaboration, see The Culture of
Nature: Approaches to the Study of Literature and Environment, ed. Scott Slovic and
Ken-ichi Noda (Kyoto: Minerva Press, 1995).
14. This quote, and many others from astronauts and cosmonauts around the
world, is printed in The Home Planet, ed. Kevin W. Kelley (New York: Addison-
Wesley, 1988) 21. 1am proud to say that Loren Acton is my father.
15. For a reasonably comprehensive bibliography of critical studies of literature
and the environment, see Alicia Nitecki and Cheryll Burgess [Glotfelty], eds., “Lit-
erature and the Environment: References,” The American Nature Writing Newsletter
3.1 (Spring 1991): 6-22. An excellent annotated bibliography of nature writing and
scholarship appears in Lyon, This Incomperable Lande 399-476. The Association
for the Study of Literature and Environment (ASLE) publishes an annua! bibli-
ography, available to ASLE members; see Association for the Study of Literature
and Environment, ASLE Bibliography 1990-1993, ed. Zita Ingham and Ron Steffens,
which is 12.0 pages in length, describing 700 works, with annotations and subject
divisions.

WORKS CITED

Greenblatt, Stephen, and Giles Gunn, eds. Redrawing the Boundaries: The Transfor-
mation of English and American Literary Studies. New York: MLA, 1992.