An Ecological Interpretation Of Annie Proulx’s That Old Ace In The Hole

Economic globalization brings earth-shaking changes to humans’ life, but it results in a series of environmental problems as well. In 1970 s, the global crisis was increasingly serious; eco-criticism was born aiming to discuss the relation between literature and natural environment. Eco-criticism arises in America and spreads all over the world rapidly. The deterioration of the ecological environment draws more scholars’ attention to eco-criticism; ecological literature embodies a large amount of ecological ideas, it analyzes the cause of ecological crisis from the perspective of the relationship between humans and nature. Ecological literature expounds the survival home and spiritual home, and discusses the relationship between humans and nature.Annie Proulx is an American ecological writer, who is a later bloomer. She began her writing from the 1980 s, and has won the worldwide recognition in the literary world. She had won almost all the famous awards in America: The Pulitzer Prizes, National Book Award, Faulkner Award, O. Henry Award. Most of Annie Proulx’s novels are ecological ones.She was interested in the regional ecological environment and revealed to us her profound thinking of the uniqueness of the regional geography and history.This thesis tries to analyze this novel from the perspective of home consciousness, society ecology and ecological restoration. This thesis includes six parts. The introduction part touches upon Annie Proulx’s life story and her major works; the researches at home and abroad on That Old Ace in the Hole; the research significance of this novel.Chapter One is the brief introduction to the three ecological theories: home consciousness, social ecology and ecological restoration.Chapter Two examines this novel from the perspective of home consciousness. It is an analysis of the Panhandlers’ home consciousness. Panhandlers’ home consciousness. was revealed when the agribusiness invades their home and the protagonist’s acquirement of sense of belonging.Chapter Three explores the causes of the environmental deterioration of the ecological environment in Panhandle; the author strongly criticizes the agribusiness’ domination and exploitation represented by the Global Pork Rind.Chapter Four analyzes the residents’ fighting against the agribusiness under the leadership of Ace and their union to restore the ecological system in Panhandle. The Panhandlers hope that they can restore their ecological balance through their endeavors.Based on the above analysis, this thesis comes to a general conclusion: the economic globalization leads to severe ecological crisis and the ecological environment is increasingly deteriorating; humans should take nature’s carrying capacity into account while pursuing economic benefits; in order to establish a balanced relationship with nature, the damaged home should be restored through artificial ecological restoration. There is only one mutual home in the whole world, thus humans should join our hands together to guard our survival home and spiritual home.