Literature and the Environment, Spring 2012


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Online Readings
last update: March 15,  2012

 

Notes: 

- Here are various texts and sites that will interest students in the course. 

- These are not necessarily assigned readings.  For week-by-week reading assignments, see "Calendar," above. 

- I will update this site periodically throughout the semester.  If you have any suggestions for additional links, please send me an email. -- KOD, instructor --odonnell@etsu.edu

 

I.  Book Reviews

- "Book Review: 'The Big Burn' by Timothy Egan: A compelling look at the biggest forest fire in American history."  By Michael Joseph Gross.  The Los Angeles Times, October 25, 2009.  www.latimes.com/entertainment/news /la-ca-timothy-egan25-2009oct25,0,7852974.story

- "Couple Creates an Empire by Felling Trees and Anyone in Their Way" [review of Serena] by Janet Maslin, New York Times, October 5, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/06/books/06masl.html

- Flesh of Your Flesh: Should you eat meat? [rev. of Foer's Eating Animals], by Elizabeth Kolbert.  The New Yorker, November 9, 2009.  www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2009/11/09/091109crbo_books_kolbert

- "The Homer of the Ants" [rev. of Anthill: A Novel, by E. O. Wilson], by Margaret Atwood.  The New York Review of Books 57, 6 (April 8, 2010).  www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/apr/08/the-homer-of-the-ants/

- "Hosed: Is there a quick fix for the climate?" [rev. of Levitt and Dubner's SuperFreakonomics and Al Gore's Our Choice], by Elizabeth Kolbert.  The New Yorker, November 16, 2009.  www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2009/11/16/091116crbo_books_kolbert

- "Solar by Ian McEwan: McEwan excels at climate science but his one-dimensional protagonist makes you shudder."  By Jason Cowley.  The Observer [Arts magazine of the Manchester, UK Guardian].  Saturday 13 March 2010.  www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/mar/14/solar-ian-mcewan

 

II.  Related to Course Texts

- GLOBAL WARMING AND FLOWERING TIMES IN THOREAU'S CONCORD: A COMMUNITY PERSPECTIVE.  Abraham J. Miller-Rushing and Richard B. Primack. Ecology 89, 2 (February 2008): p332-341.  www.esajournals.org/doi/abs/10.1890/07-0068.1

 

- "Serena: The Story Behind the Book" [Ron Rash's comments on how he wrote the book, posted at the site of his literary agent; no date], http://www.rusoffagency.com/authors/rash_r/serenat/behind_serena.htm

- Carolina Panthers.  By Dan Lazar, Director of Education, Western North Carolina Nature.  2010.  www.wildwnc.org/education/naturalists-notes/carolina-panthers

- "Ron Rash Feature."  Ten poems by Rash, a western North Carolina poet who will read at ETSU on Tuesday evening, Feb 7, 2012.  Story South dot com, Summer 2002.  www.storysouth.com/summer2002/rashfeaturepoems.html.  Accessed January 2012. 

 

- Rehabilitating Carson: Why do some people continue to hold Rachel Carson responsible for millions of malaria deaths? by John Quiggen and Tim Lambert, Prospect May 2008

- ''Rachel Carson, Mass Murderer?: The creation of an anti-environmental myth.'' Aaron Swartz, ''Extra!'' [F.A.I.R.], September/October, 2007.

- RachelWasWrong.org. "Uncovering Silent Spring's Deadly Consequences," by the Competitive Enterprise Institute

 

- In Florida, Despair and Foreclosures, by Damien Cave, NY Times online, Feb 7, 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/us/08lehigh.html

- Restoration of the Everglades, Wikipedia article, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everglades_restoration

 

- Julia Butterfly Hill profile on NBC Dateline News Magazine, Feb 14, 1999 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFRdy7o3DPE&feature=related

 

-  "The Danger of Cosmic Genius [on Freeman Dyson]."  By Kenneth Brower.  The Atlantic Magazine.  December 2010.  www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/12/the-danger-of-cosmic-genius/8306/

 

III.  Authors Online

- Horace Kephart: Revealing an Enigma.  Hunter Library Special Collections and the Mountain Heritage Center, Western Carolina University.  http://www.wcu.edu/library/digitalcoll/kephart/

 

- "John Muir Writings" at Yosemite Online, an unofficial Yosemite website.  http://www.yosemite.ca.us/john_muir_writings/

- "A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf," by John Muir, at sierraclub.org

 

- The Canons of the Colorado (first paper: Down the Green River), by John Wesley Powell, Scribner's Monthly 9, 3 (January 1875): 293-311

- The Canons of the Colorado (second paper), by John Wesley Powell, Scribner's Monthly 9, 4 (February 1875): 394-409

 

IV. Environmental Writing

- "The Story of Stuff."  20-minute animated video/ lecture by Annie Leonard.  About extraction/ manufacture/ disposal cycle.  www.storyofstuff.com/

- Climate Progress. "A liberal blog on the science, solutions, and politics of climate change. Also offers related links."  Edited by Joseph Romm.  climateprogress.org

- Grist.org.  Environmental journalism. 

- Orion Magazine.  One of America's premier venues for nature writing and environmental policy essays.