Ecological Discourse in Craig Childs's The Secret Knowledge of Water

Abstract

This essay analyzes the ecological discourse used by Craig Childs in his creative non-fiction work The Secret Knowledge of Water. Childs attempts the tricky rhetorical approach of translating nature’s “voice” into text, while trying not to personify or idealize the environment. He uses ecological discourse not as an end, but as a means to give readers a biocentric perspective. Childs describes the non-verbal “conversations” between humans and nature, to help his readers locate themselves within the landscape and begin to understand the role they play as a part of a dynamic natural system.