What we Leave Behind: Exploring Multiple Environmental Legacies in Leslie Marmon Silko’s Gardens in the Dunes

Authors

  • Ruth Marion Blair University of Queensland

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.60162/swamphen.2.10593

Keywords:

Ecocriticsm, bioregionalism, environmental justice, Native American studies,

Abstract

Leslie Marmon Silko's novel Gardens in the Dunes (1996) is unlike her earlier novels both in its reliance to a considerable degree on straegies of the traditional European realist novel and in its inclusion of a variety of global locations. Once again, it is a deeply political novel concerning abuses of indigenous peoples at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. But it is also a novel about gardens and in this essay I approach its issues from an ecocritical perspective, exploring its depiction of a range of gardening and horticultural practices and its valuing of ancient legacies. I attempt to evaluate the ability of the Gardens in the Dunes to offer a visionary view of sustainable agriculture.

Author Biography

  • Ruth Marion Blair, University of Queensland
    Ruth Blair is an Honorary Research Consultant, University of Queensland

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Published

2013-04-10