Nature writing

DEFINITION: Nonfiction writing about the natural environment

Since the nineteenth century, nature writers have been highly influential contributors to environmentalism, often raising public awareness of such issues as the dangers to human health of pollution, the negative impacts of the loss of wilderness and of animal species, and the potential harms of various human activities for the long-term health of the planet.

Nature writing celebrates wilderness or other aspects of the natural environment while simultaneously discouraging environmental exploitation. The field of nature writing includes environmental writing, environmental journalism, and ecocriticism (or ecological criticism), an interdisciplinary study of the environment and literature combining all the sciences to develop solutions for environmental problems.

Since the first Earth Day in 1970, nature writing has increased dramatically in popularity. Nature writing is heavily based on scientific information, research, and facts about the natural world, but the style in which it is often presented provides a unique and broad perspective that reaches a diverse audience. Nature writers frequently write in the first person, a feature that contributes to the emotional and inspirational tone of their work.

Personal observations and philosophical reflections on nature and the environment make up a large portion of nature writing. Among the many types of nature writing, the most basic form is writing that simply conveys information about the natural world, such as through a field guide or other factual or natural history reporting. Natural history essays include important facts about nature and the environment but also incorporate literary elements and meaning or interpretation. Another form of nature writing is based on the personal experiences of the author in nature and tends to be very emotional and personal. Some forms of nature writing include philosophical interpretations of nature and tend to be abstract and scholarly in tone.

Role in Environmental Awareness

For centuries, writers have explored connections between human beings and the natural world. Early nature writers focused on the environment as secondary to humanity’s needs and human progress, but by the middle of the nineteenth century this began to change. Nature writers such as Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson began to reinterpret the significance of nature and the relationship of humans to nature, initiating a movement that led to a dramatic evolution in environmental thought and ethics. The viewpoint shifted toward one in which the environment was recognized as more than simply a natural resource.

The writings of Thoreau, for example, increased public awareness that the natural environment had considerably more value to human beings than simply the natural resources it offered for exploitation; Thoreau emphasized that nature and the environment could be sources of spiritual truth and support. Together with other prominent nature writers such as John Muir and Aldo Leopold, Thoreau and Emerson served to educate the public about nature and the environment.

Prominent Nature Writers

The beginning of modern nature writing can be traced to natural history works popular in the second half of the eighteenth century through the nineteenth century, including writings by Gilbert White, William Bartram, John James Audubon, and Charles Darwin. Other explorers, collectors, and naturalists also contributed to these collections. Thoreau, who wrote many volumes on natural history and the environment, is often considered the father of American nature writing, although his writings were preceded by those of John Bartram and his son William. Many environmental historians consider Thoreau’s Walden: Or, Life in the Woods, his 1854 memoir, as the beginning of a critical movement in environmental thinking and writing.

Emerson was considered a nature essayist; his writings in the late nineteenth century inspired the works of John Muir, who wrote about his personal experiences in nature, particularly in California’s Sierra Nevada. In subsequent years, this movement flourished and included notable contributions by John Burroughs, John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, and Edward Abbey. Leopold's A Sand County Almanac (1949), for example, eventually became a best seller.

Among the most influential works was Rachel Carson’s 1962 book Silent Spring, which proved critical in raising environmental awareness and fueling public concern about pollution. The book documented the environmental impacts of the uncontrolled spraying of the insecticide dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) and questioned the rationale that led to the of substantial amounts of chemicals into the environment when their potential ecological and health impacts were unknown. Silent Spring fueled the modern environmental movement by exposing the dangers of indiscriminately used pesticides and fertilizers. It catalyzed a new way of looking at the use of chemicals, industrial practices, and pollution and how they affect the environment and human health, and raised questions about the long-standing belief that scientific progress is, without exception, good for humanity. Although Silent Spring was challenged by the pesticide industry, the public reaction to Carson’s book eventually led to the establishment of a presidential commission charged with studying the effects of pesticides; the use of DDT was banned in the United States in 1972.

In 1989, Bill McKibben, a prolific nature writer, environmental commentator, and historian, also altered public perceptions with his book The End of Nature. By addressing such environmental issues as pollutants, acid rain, the greenhouse effect, and depletion of the ozone layer, McKibben raised awareness of the impacts of human activities on the earth’s atmosphere and climate. Other notable works of the late twentieth century include the Pulitzer Prize–winning Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974) by Annie Dillard, The Snow Leopard (1979) by Peter Matthiessen, Cadillac Desert (1986) by Marc Reisner, The Control of Nature (1989) by John McPhee, Earth in the Balance (1992) by future US vice president Al Gore, Naturalist (1994) by E. O. Wilson, and Guns, Germs and Steel (1997) by Jared Diamond. Many of these authors continued writing important works into the twenty-first century.

The field of nature writing continued to grow and broaden in the 2000s and 2010s, with important contributions from writers such as Elizabeth Kolbert (Field Notes from a Catastrophe, 2006), Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dilemma, 2006), Alan Weisman (The World without Us, 2007), Helen Macdonald (H Is For Hawk, 2014), and many others. A sub-movement also arose seeking to bring more cultural diversity to nature writing and environmentalism in general, as seen in the Lauret E. Savoy and Alison Hawthorne Deming 2011 anthology The Colors of Nature and Carolyn Finney's 2014 work Black Faces, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors.

Writers such as Robert Macfarlane continued to publish works that aimed to change the way readers perceived and related to the natural world around them. His 2015 book Landmarks strives to reconnect people with nature by reestablishing a lexicon for natural landscapes, and his 2019 book Underland: A Deep Time Journey chronicles his numerous journeys to explore below the surface of the earth to enlighten readers about the profound impact that the connection between humans and nature has on the environment. At the same time, Fiona Reynolds's The Fight for Beauty: Our Path to a Better Future (2016) encourages readers to move away from a focus on material matters and place a higher value on the beauty of the natural world to live a healthier lifestyle. In 2019, critically acclaimed environmental writer Terry Tempest Williams also published Erosion: Essays of Undoing, which explores more recent examples of environmental damage and how politics have changed and influenced humans' relationship with nature.

Nature writing continued to evolve through the early 2020s. Many works reflected upon global climate change and the impact environmental shifts are having on the natural environment. Elizabeth Kolbert's work Under A White Sky (2022) examines both the world's environments and the paths that humanity might take to maintain them. Planta Sapiens: The New Science of Plant Intelligence, (2023) by Paco Calvo, hailed by critics as the best nature book of the year, purports that while they do not have brains, plants can learn and think. In Nature's Ghosts: The World We Lost and How to Bring It Back (2024), award-winning journalist Sophie Yeo draws on human experiences over thousands of years to show how we can fix our broken relationship with our planet.

Bibliography

Buell, Lawrence. The Future of Environmental Criticism: Environmental Crisis and Literary Imagination. Malden: Blackwell, 2005. Print.

Buni, Catherine. "Toward a Wider View of 'Nature Writing.'" Los Angeles Review of Books, 10 Jan. 2016, lareviewofbooks.org/article/toward-a-wider-view-of-nature-writing/#!. Accessed 22 July 2024.

Finch, Robert, and John Elder, eds. Nature Writing: The Tradition in English. New York: Norton, 2002. Print.

Lyon, Thomas J. This Incomparable Land: A Guide to American Nature Writing. Rev. ed. Minneapolis: Milkweed, 2001. Print.

McKibben, Bill, ed. American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau. Des Moines: Library of America, 2008. Print.

Pritchett, Laura. "What 'Nature Writing' Means Now: New Paradigm Shifts in America's Oldest Writing Tradition." Writer's Digest, 18 July 2024, www.writersdigest.com/be-inspired/what-nature-writing-means-now-new-paradigm-shifts-in-americas-oldest-writing-tradition. Accessed 22 July 2024.

Robinson, Deena. "25 Inspiring Climate Change Books to Read in 2024." Earth.org, 12 Mar. 2024, earth.org/climate-change-books/. Accessed 22 July 2024.

Williams, Terry Tempest. "Terry Tempest Williams on Nature Writing: 'My Heart Is Very Deep in These Wild Lands.'" Los Angeles Times, 5 Apr. 2019, www.latimes.com/books/la-ca-jc-fob-terry-tempest-williams-mini-interview-20190405-story.html. Accessed 22 July 2024.