Nurturing the "Right" Nature: Environmental Poetics and Pedagogies

Abstract

Recent British and American nature writing guides and exercises have prescribed approaches to writing poetry on the environment from various political and ecological perspectives. By grouping these diverse approaches to writing the environment (such as urban realism, sensory concentration and modes of estrangement) within the context of green issues such as conservation, waste-control and the use of technology this paper interrogates the intentions and potential effects of these exercises. By exploring the moral and philosophical arguments behind such literary guides it is possible to gain an insight into how future nature writing could awaken, if not change, society’s consciousness of natural and built environments.