Ecocriticism and Ecological Writing in Chile

Abstract

Ecocritical theory has very recently begun to receive some attention in Chilean academia. This does not mean, however, that there has not been a literary production that represents the relationship between society and the physical world, nor does this mean that there have not been any academics exploring these connections. In fact, there is a long tradition of what Jorge Tellier called “ poesía de la tierra ” (poetry of the land) or “ poesía lárcia ” (poetry of the hearth) in 1965—poetry that celebrates nature and tends to recover sense of place—as well as a conscious production of “ ecopesía ” (ecopoetry), by “ antipoet ” Nicanor Parra—ironic poetry that is aligned with the apocalyptic discourse— to mention only two examples from the second half of the twentieth century. Just as well, there have been many poets who would not have regraded themselves as ecopoets, though they have foregrounded the environment in their compositions. Nonetheless, when examining the trajectory of the representation of the natural environment in local literary productions, from a current ecocritical perspective, categories such as “ novela de la tierra ” (novel of the land) are not convincing given that the Latin American imaginary of the land was framed by a European standard of progress which was imposed over the native relationship.