Nature Writing

In this course we will both study American nature writing in the tradition of Henry David Thoreau and pursue our own journal-based writing practice. Nature writing is a genre centered on personal, narrative essays-informed by an appreciative awareness of science and at the same time open to the spiritual, emotional, and aesthetic significance of the natural world. Among the authors to be read will by Edward Abbey, Annie Dillard, Barry Lopez, and Terry Tempest Williams. Field trips will allow us to explore the environment around Middlebury.