This page was created by Alison Morgan. 

Can Books Save the Earth?: A digital anthology of green literature

Article Summary by Alex H.

           Sue Walsh, in her article, Nature Faking and the Problem of the “Real,” analyzes a series of critical documents and literary articles centered upon a debate that is commonly known as the “Nature Faker” controversy.  The idea of the Nature Fakers came about in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries with a genre knows as “Realistic Wild Animal Story” (Walsh 132).  The authors, Ernest Thompson Seton, Charles G.D. Roberts, William J. Long, Mabel Osgood Wright, and Jack London, were all accused of producing false natural history accounts.  Walsh’s article primarily focuses on William J. Long who is the most vocal of the authors to speak out against John Burroughs and Theodore Roosevelt who are the primary accusers.  Walsh writes, “the issue of how we view animals, how we articulate that “vision” in language, and how we understand that linguistic articulation, in turn, continue to be of crucial importance today, on both a theoretical and ethical level” (133). She maintains that the importance of this debate is concerned not only with the development of literature, but also with our responsibility toward nature.
          Determined, Burroughs asserts accusations against the validity of the accounts depicted in writing by the Nature Fakers concluding that the authors “…become what he writes about” (136).  Thus, Roosevelt and Burroughs assumed that nature was not open to any for or interpretation or personalization, but rather it just was the way it was, the truth.  However, abiding an ethical code, “real” animals could be interpreted and discussed through observation.  As a nature writer Long writes on the “…un-analyzable, unclassifiable… individuality and implied interiority and even spirituality of the animal” (137), which he regards and the “true” and the “real”.  Moreover, Burroughs and Roosevelt repeatedly write that knowledge is a matter of seeing, which takes away from their accusations against personal testimony being false.  Walsh looks to June Howard’s Form and History in American Naturalism for a definition of realism.  She concludes, “…the whole notion of realism constitutes a claim as to the nature of reality, which involves an assumption about its pre- or extra-discursive existence that can then be re-presented in language with greater or lesser accuracy” (135).  This, perhaps, allows for questioning of the entire debate regarding the controversy.
          Roosevelt discredits the writing of the Fakers, claiming that they are “’unable to see at all’” or they “‘see superficially’” (138). Long responds to Roosevelt in idealist terms, arguing that Roosevelt, a hunter, knows no more of the animal than Long. In fact, Roosevelt is only concerned with the exterior proportions and the skin of the animal, whereas Long and other nature writers are determined to understand the heart of the animal. With that said, for Long the “true-real” is classified by the distinctness of one animal from the other. Long continues to assert that although his view is different from Roosevelt’s opinion, personal perspective is unavoidable.  As a hunter, Roosevelt looks at nature with one frame of mind, but as a writer Long views nature with another lens. This distinction, derived through Long’s response, lies at the heart of the Nature Faker debate, and concurrently gaining modern relevance through animal rights.
          A final accusation that is made against the Nature Fakers is on their style. Burroughs argues that “making too much of what we see and describe” (142) is a constant threat for the nature writer. Wright, a fellow nature writer and an author accused of faking her writing criticizes Long for his “‘verbosity of detail and palpable word painting’” and asserts that his writing is “‘too much worked out’” (142). Ultimately, Roosevelt demands that the works of writing that the authors produce be prefaced stating that the works are fictional leaving the reader with the knowledge that there is something more, that they are only reading at surface level. However, Burroughs does not agree with this reconciliation. Burroughs intends to keep style and reality different form each other. He says, “The real is the content to which style is an addition of ‘charm’ on the one hand…” (145). Walsh concludes on this accusation by stating that style is detracting from the real. Style adds an element to the reader’s conception that is not verifiably accurate and fictional. She continues to assert that style is not a form of knowledge, and one cannot add something to the natural and still perceive it as truth.
          Many critics, some who have written tremendous publications detailing the accounts in an attempt to apply the historical relevance to future generations, have discussed this popular and public debate.  Ralph H. Lutts has collected many major documents concerning the issue into one anthology titled, The Wild Animal Story, and he has also written his own piece on the controversy called, The Nature Fakers: Wildlife, Science and Sentiment.  Other scholarly journals have been published like, Thomas R. Dunlap’s Saving America’s Wildlife and Lisa Mighetto’s Wild Animals and American Environmental Ethics. These accounts, all written in the late twentieth century, serve as a documented comparison between human systems and the ecological environment while maintaining relevance in current ethical and environmental debates. Notably, each author discusses the relevancy of the key term “realistic” in the title of the genre, which is at the heart of issues and controversies of the Nature Fakers.


Walsh, Sue. "Nature Faking and the Problem of the “Real”.  " Isle: Interdisciplinary Studies In Literature And Environment 22.1 (2015): 132-153.  MLA International Bibliography.  Web. 26 Feb. 2016.
 

This page has paths: