An Ecocritical Approach To Arctic Dreams

Barry Lopez is a famous contemporary American non-fiction writer.He is the author of six works of nonfiction and eight works of fiction.In 1986 National Book Award for non-fiction was granted to Barry Lopez's Arctic Dreams: Imagination and Desire in a Northern Landscape.It may be said that Arctic Dreams is not only the representative work of Lopez's,but also that of American nature non-fiction in the 1980 s.The Arctic Dreams has 9 chapters,besides the prologue and epilogue.The first five chapters mainly describe the Arctic animals and plants,and the following four chapters chiefly discuss Barry Lopez's opinions on how westerners see the Arctic.In Arctic Dreams Lopez brings his talent for close observation,empathy,freshness and wonder to a major effort north of treeline.His focus upon the ocean,ice,skyscapes,landscapes and wildlife is extraordinary.Moreover,the Arctic Dreams embodies quite a lot of ecological ideas.Therefore,this thesis is intended to use ecocriticism to analyze the ecological consciousness in Arctic Dreams.This thesis consists of seven parts ?5 chapters besides the Introduction and the Conclusion.The Introduction touches upon Barry Lopez and his Arctic Dreams.Moreover,the literature review reveals in detail the study of Barry Lopez's Arctic Dreams both in China and overseas.In addition,it also analyzes the shortcomings and limitations of the previous studies.Chapter One is an overview of ecocriticism.It contains two aspects: the development of ecocriticism in the west and the object of ecocriticism.The first aspect introduces the beginning,the gradual development and the maturity of ecocriticism.The second part states that the aim of ecocriticism is to cope with the social problems which cause the ecological crisis and change people' assumed thinking mode.In addition,it points out the direction of ecocriticism and the way how to analyze various different literary works from the ecocritical perspective.Chapter Two mainly explores the ecological holism in Arctic Dreams.The work embodies the close relationship between humans and animals in the Arctic,the mutual reliance between wild animals and wild plants,and humans' use of the Arctic wild plants for daily living and hunting tools in the Arctic.Chapter Three examines the harmful anthropocentrism and the Westerners' utilization and exploration of the Arctic.Lopez criticizes the negative effects brought by anthropocentrism to the Arctic,including the uncountable damage to the Arctic's whole ecological chains and the fatal outcomes to Eskimos' daily living habit and Eskimos' traditional culture.He also criticizes humans' wrong concept of dichotomy because that's just the reason why the Westerners aspire to use the Arctic to satisfy their own desires but only to bring about more pains,sufferings and even death to themselves.Chapter Four discusses Lopez's view of living simple a life and valuing the spiritual life in Arctic Dreams.Lopez describes Eskimos' way of living,their culture and their content attitude to being just alive.He also reproaches the Westerners' excessive material desires and modern society's excessive consumption.Moreover,he emphasizes the essential role spirit plays in humans' daily routine and advocates that people who live in the modern society should attach great importance to the growth and enrichment of their spiritual life.Chapter Five emphasizes the reconstruction of ecological awareness in Arctic Dreams.Lopez advocates that humans should respect the Arctic just as it is,especially the Arctic's natural ecology.In addition,the modern people must abandon their wrong ideas about the Arctic to reconstruct their ecological awareness to strike the ecological balance in the Arctic;moreover,humans should shoulder their necessary responsibilities for the Arctic to develop a healthy and ecological attitude.In Conclusion,the writer points out that the Arctic in Arctic Dreams is intrinsically an ecological whole,humans should leave it untouched,that is to say,the Westerners' exploration of the Arctic should be stopped;furthermore,humans should give up the harmful anthropocentrism and materialism to lead a peaceful,content and satisfied simple material life and more colorful spiritual life in the modern society.In addition,the Westerners must cultivate their own ecological awareness and regard the ecological awareness as a basic and essential attitude of life.The global environmental problems become worse and worse,and the Chinese Dream is rich and strong country,national development and people's happiness.However,to achieve the Chinese Dream requires the ecological civilization.