In the essay “Unnatural Writing,” Gary Snyder proposes a few topics for a “New Nature Poetics.” Consider the following recommendation for an “art of the wild” — “That it study mind and language—language as wild system, mind as wild habitat, world as a ‘making’ (poem), poem as a creature of the wild mind” (p. 172, essay / p. 127 course anthology).
How can we relate Snyder’s invitation with Linda Hogan’s assertion in “Walking” — “I never learned the sunflower’s golden language or the tongues of its citizens. (…) But they knew what to do, how to live.” (p. 157, book / p. 115 course anthology).
We can relate these two parts based on the language used, which shifts the reader’s focus from simple observation to active participation. For both Hogan and Snyder—through the sunflower’s 'golden language' on one hand and 'language as a wild system' on the other—nature creates its own form of communication that stands apart from human understanding. Human beings, in turn, respect this mechanism, even though it remains foreign to them, because it seems to teach them how to live. Hogan’s sunflowers, in fact, know what to do: they create their own world. This act can be linked to the poetic act of survival and presence that is central to Snyder’s essay. These natural actions take away human beings' power of decision and will; they are left only to see and listen to a system that already existed long before human consciousness. This consciousness, then, stands in contrast to the human 'wild mind'—that part of the brain that cannot be controlled.
ReplyDeleteIn conclusion, both writers decenter the human being in their vision of a system and a language that do not belong to them and do not necessarily need to, as the human role shifts to that of a mere spectator and listener of a poem seen as a 'creature' and a sunflower understood as a 'citizen.'
In order to understand the connection between Snyder’s and Hogan’s assertions, we must first delve a little deeper in Snyder’s suggestion.
ReplyDeleteSnyder does something interesting in his proposal. He propounds a paradoxically beautiful conundrum, inviting us to view the mind – the seat of reason – as a “wild habitat,” and language – a stable structure which enables the articulation of reason – as a “wild system.” Although, at first glance, this claim might seem counterintuitive and even excessively subversive, it actually offers a solution to the destructive Western and Eurocentric logic that puts humanity on a pedestal and the rest of the natural world at its disposal. It enables Snyder to realign the mind, language and reason, categories which have allowed “the developed world to displace Third and Fourth World peoples and overexploit nature globally,” with chaos and nature. In this way, the borders drawn between civilization and the “wild abyss” of nature topple and people and nature get leveled.
It is in this context that I want to introduce Hogan’s writing. It is important to note that the narrator in “Walking” “never learned the sunflower’s golden language,” and has only “a small understanding” of the operating principles of the natural world. This lack of knowledge stands in stark contrast to the Romantic tradition, which aggrandizes the poet, arguing that it is only the sensitive and sensible who have the ability to appreciate the beautiful wonders of nature. Although the Romantics sing a myriad of praises to nature, at the end of the day, their poetry is still first and foremost about their ability to witness and understand the grandness of nature. Nature is but a mere subject. However, by insisting that “ they – [the flowers, insects, and birds] – knew what to do, how to live,” Hogan returns the subjectivity to nature that was long ago taken away, and in that way succeeds in leveling the human and natural. She puts in practice what Snyder proposes in theory.