Rewriting America – Towards the Literature of Places

By Barry Lopez – Rewrite America – Towards Literature of Places – Wild Project Editions, October 2020 – 96 pages

We begin by reading this little book with the “rediscovery of America”: the story of the brutal destruction of indigenous peoples and their cultures as the founding event of modernity and the march of the environmental crisis. Re-reading is important and instructive, as proposed by the French writer and critic Twotten Dodorov The victory of America. “But it is not good for the world to forget how Buchenwald destroyed the Armenians in Turkey twenty-five years ago, and not to look honestly at what happened. If we tell ourselves, yes it is true, it is we, and if the pattern continues, how do we understand it? How can we clarify what went wrong? We are not different, but how can we look at what happened next to our actions and now argue that we should go in a different direction? “

It is a statement that creates the poetic and narrative beliefs of this generation Nature writers Who owns Barry Lopez. He proves it. ” Our problem with the new world is to provide an old world that has experienced some kind of decay – which we imposed from the beginning, not proposed. We never say people, animals, plants, rivers or mountains: “What do you think about it? We have said what we think and bend to our will anything that can oppose it. »

“It’s not about seeing the earth as an owner, but as a friend. “

« When we step into the landscape to learn something, we are forced to focus, rather than constantly asking questions. Open the intelligent conversation and approach the earth like a person. […]“.” If we look at the love of land in a philosophy of space – I do not mean love here, but what Edward Wilson calls biophilia, the love of being alive and the physical environment in which it lives. […].

An interview with Oren Lyons, Native American leader and defender of Native Rights, the Seneca tortoise of the Iraqi Confederation, illustrates the reluctance of world leaders and the inability to question the economic forces that are cutting people off around the world. And the earth itself.
He especially quotes the words of the ambassador: ” You have to be tolerant (when faced with harsh criticism) and understand, without responding in the same way [leur peur] Be prepared to take everything, as not everything will come from your enemies. It will come from your friends and family. You can expect this.

On page 57, Barry Lopez raises the question of “the desire to be the deputy of a place, but not its owner or owner. “To him,” The survival of the human race today may be more important in love than in power. It may be more important today to enter into an ethical and reciprocal relationship with everyone around us, than to continue to try to take control of the fiery world as we have until recently. A collection to colonize our territories and fantasies.

[Born1945[1945இல்பிறந்தார்Barry Lopez Is a big one Nature writers Contemporary Americans. Recipient of prizes, especially from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Cugenheim Foundation, and the National Science Foundation, he worked on discovering new literature of places.