Seeking Awareness in American Nature Writing: Henry Thoreau, Annie Dillard, Edward Abbey, Wendell Berry, Barry Lopez.

Movement, immigration, and pilgrimage have long been keynotes of American experience. Following the opening chapter’s attention on the spiritual inscape of home dwellings, this chapter concerns itself with the spirituality of motion, re-placement, and pilgrimage as reflected in American works of literary imagination. Lead characters in this story include travelers, explorers, and would-be pilgrims as well as resettlers—that is, those who leave their place of birth to adopt another as their own. The religious implications of these peregrinations and adoptions are considered in relation to prose texts by Carolyn Servid, Barry Lopez, John Muir, N. Scott Momaday, Gary Snyder, and others. These texts often associate their spirituality of place with reverence for what’s found in the going there rather than in the getting there. Developing the theme of localism versus globalism, this chapter concludes by assessing two versions of globally engaged localism as represented in works by Wendell Berry and David Haskell.

Download Full-text

Where the Twin Oceans of Beauty and Horror Meet: An Aesthetic Analysis of Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek // Donde los océanos gemelos de belleza y horror se encuentran: Un análisis estético de Pilgrim at Tinker Creek de Annie Dillard

Ecozon@: European Journal of Literature, Culture and Environment ◽

10.37536/ecozona.2016.7.2.1013 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 7 (2) ◽

pp. 85-97

Author(s):

Anastasia Cardone

Keyword(s):

Aesthetic Experience ◽

Nature Writing ◽

Annie Dillard ◽

Natural Signs ◽

Letting Go ◽

The Subject ◽

Modern Vision ◽

The Aesthetic ◽

Concept Of Beauty ◽

Aesthetic Concepts

Although Annie Dillard's masterpiece Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974) has conventionally been analyzed as a piece of Nature writing embedded in the Thoreauvian tradition, little has been said about the aesthetic concepts that underlie the text and Dillard's entire take on Nature. This research applies the concepts of Baumgarten's “science of sensible knowledge” to the narrator's perceptions in order to demonstrate that Dillard's ultimate message is the acceptance of Nature, even in its seemingly inhuman places. The study begins with the analysis of the structure of the book, which outlines two types of experience of Nature. Thevia positivais related to the aesthetic concept of beauty and to an active participation of the subject in the aesthetic experience of seeing as a verbalization, whereas the via negativais linked to the concept of the sublime and the experience of seeing as a letting go. Furthermore, the analysis employsand develops Linda Smith's valid conclusions (1991) to show how these two paths join in a third mystical and aesthetic path, the via creativa. By leaving the interpretation of natural signs open-ended, Dillard's modern vision enables the author's total acceptance of Nature's freedom, which fosters its beautiful intricacy as well as its horrible fecundity. Thus, Nature's creativity becomes the basis for an aesthetics of Nature's wholeness, which leadshuman beings to embrace the true essence of Nature, freed from anyprejudices.Resumen A pesar de que Pilgrim at Tinker River (1974), obra maestra de Annie Dillard, ha sido analizada convencionalmente como una pieza de literatura y medio ambiente incrustada en la corriente Thoreauviana y ha sido estudiada extensivamente, poco atención se le ha prestado a los conceptos estéticos que subyacen la obra y que pueden servir para comprender mejor la opinión de Dillard sobre la naturaleza. Por lo tanto, esta investigación aplica los conceptos de “ciencia del conocimiento sensible” de Baumgarten a la percepción del narrador con el fin de demostrar que el mensaje final de Dillard es la aceptación de la naturaleza, incluso en sus lugares aparentemente inhumanos. El estudio comienza con el análisis de la estructura del libro, que describe dos tipos de experiencia de la naturaleza relacionados con caminos místicos que llevan a Dios, dentro de la teología Neoplatónica. La vía positiva está asociada al concepto estético de la belleza y a la participación activa del sujeto en la experiencia estética de ver, la cual es definida como una verbalización. Por otra parte, la vía negativa está vinculada con el concepto de lo sublime y la experiencia de ver como un dejar ir. Además, el análisis emplea y desarrolla las válidas conclusiones de Linda Smith (1991) para mostrar cómo estos dos caminos se unen en un tercer camino místico y estético, la vía creativa. Al dejar la interpretación de signos naturales abierta, la visión moderna de Dillard permite al autor la total aceptación de la libertad de la naturaleza, lo que fomenta su hermosa intrincación, así como su horrible fecundidad. Así, la creatividad de la naturaleza se convierte en la base para la estética de la naturaleza en su totalidad, lo que lleva a los seres humanos a aceptar y respetar la verdadera esencia de la naturaleza, libre de cualquier prejuicio.

Download Full-text

Anthropocentric Nature Lover: Annie Dillard and the Transcendentalist Tradition in American Nature Writing

American Studies in Scandinavia ◽

10.22439/asca.v39i2.4606 ◽

2007 ◽

Vol 39 (2) ◽

pp. 29-40

Author(s):

Fredrik Chr. Brøgger

Keyword(s):

Nature Writing ◽

Annie Dillard

Download Full-text

The Gospel According to this Moment: Thoreau, Wildness, and American Nature Religion

Religion and the Arts ◽

10.1163/156852911x580793 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 15 (4) ◽

pp. 460-485 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Alan D. Hodder

Keyword(s):

Sierra Club ◽

John Muir ◽

Edward Abbey ◽

Annie Dillard ◽

Literary Expression ◽

The World ◽

Nature Religion ◽

In The Wild

AbstractEver since the Sierra Club adopted the slogan, “In wildness is the preservation of the world,” the text from which it was drawn—Thoreau’s 1862 essay “Walking”—has been construed as a tribute to wild places. To some extent this reading keeps faith with sentiments expressed in the essay. At the same time, a closer look suggests that the essay as a whole is really more about the life of the spirit than life in the wild. Despite the popular appropriation of “Walking” as a manifesto of environmentalist advocacy, some critics have questioned the usual view of “Walking.” Such observations also have a bearing on Thoreau’s legacy as a progenitor of the literary expression of American nature spirituality. The purpose of this essay is to elucidate a particular experiential orientation to this spiritually-inflected notion of wildness, beginning with Thoreau and extending into the work of three literary exemplars of American nature religion—John Muir, Edward Abbey, and Annie Dillard.

Download Full-text