The Countryside In American Nature Writing:Aesthetic Sensibility And Ecological Ethic

The countryside takes a particular position in nature writing since the beginning of this genre of literary form.As one of the earliest representatives of nature writing,The Natural History of Selborne wrote in 1789 portrays the fauna and flora around the small English country town Selborne with precise narrative and prose style.Compared with wilderness,countryside is a place where people live and work,with sorrow and happiness.Different from the metropolitan artificial landscapes and gardens,countryside is rustic,uncivilized and wild characteristics which are the significances of rural writing.The aesthetic sensibility people gain from rural environment is irreplaceable.Rural writing focuses on the human behavior in natural environment,with recording the history and story of human and nature,and self-exanimating its relationship.With the high-pressure relationship between nature and people,it is necessary to pay attention on the aesthetic sensibility and ethic opinion.This thesis mainly compared the difference of pastoral literature and rural writing,and introducing the history of rural writing whose characters are ethical and truthful.The present study aimed to answer the question that what are the common qualities of rural writing;what are the individual preferences of the rural writers.With the aesthetic value and ethical perspective,my research based on the analysis of three books as the study text,Rural Hours,Northern Farm,A Sand County Almanac.Based on the close reading and the theoretical frame of “Topophilia”,“Land Ethic”,the meaning of this thesis is arousing people's attention to the realistic natural environment and reflection about people's sentiments and obligation of nature.