勃拉恩特：一位早期的美國環境作家

William Cullen Bryant as Early American Environmental Writer

盧莉茹(Li-Ru Lu)

《臺大文史哲學報》 62期 (2005/05) Pp. 485-500

https://doi.org/10.6258/bcla.2005.62.17

摘要

在十九世紀的時空下，勃拉恩特（William Cullen Bryant）廣被認為是最卓越、最負盛名的作家之一。然而二十世紀以降，他卻早已被忽略－他的生平、著作仍被收錄於文學選集中，但卻是以「爐旁詩人」（The Fireside Poet）之稱號而被輕輕帶過。二十世紀末，少數學者開始挑戰勃拉恩特溫和遁世的「爐旁詩人」形象，改由政治角度探討其作品，分析他如何藉由刻劃那群注定被西進擴張（The Westward Expansion）運動所征服的印第安人及原始荒野環境來做為國族、文化認同之基礎，順便合理化其對於傑克森總統的「印第安遷移法案」（The Indian Removal Act）之支持。本文完全不同於以上的解讀。此文試圖指出勃拉恩特在其許多文本（特別是在其向來被忽略的散文書寫）中，並非以征服荒野，而是以保存荒野之環境論述與生態認同（ecological identity）策略來做為美國國族主體建構之基礎。藉此觀察，此文意圖勾勒出勃拉恩特在美國文學史中其實扮演著環境（自然）書寫之先驅者（a precursor of American environmental writing or nature writing）的重要角色。

關鍵字

勃拉恩特 ； 自然荒野環境 ； 美國國族主體建構 ； 荒野保存 ； 早期環境作家

並列摘要

In the nineteenth century, William Cullen Bryant was ranked the first and foremost among American poets. He was well beloved by both general readers and literati in his own day. In the twentieth century, however, Brant was viewed as a poet of minor rank and was designated by contemporary literary criticism as a dispensable ”fireside poet,” a writer of merely historical importance whose writings often urged to escape daily cares by plunging into natural landscape. In the late twentieth century, some critics began to challenge such a ”fireside poet” image. Contending that Bryant's political mission proved him not so gentle and mild as traditionally imagined, these critics examined how Bryant in his verses justified President Andrew Jackson's the Indian Removal Act in 1830 and how he celebrated the conquest of the ”wild” Indians and wilderness environment to construct American national subjectivity.Completely different from these readings, this paper attempted to argue that as a magazine and newspaper journalist, Bryant was aware that wilderness environment could accomplish the work of constructing national subjectivity not through its conquest, but through its protection. Advocating forest protection and environmental preservation in many of his prose writings, Bryant helped legitimize an alternative communion of nature and nation and became a precursor of American environmental writer (or nature writer).

並列關鍵字

William Cullen Bryant ； wilderness environment ； the construction of American national subjectivity ； wilderness preservation ； early environmental writer

參考文獻

Branch, Michael P.(1998).William Cullen Bryant: The Nature Poet as Environmental Journalist.The American Transcendental Quarterly.12,179-197.

Brodwin, Stanley,Michael D''Innocenzo(1983).William Cullen Bryant and His America: Centennial Conference Proceeding, 1878-1978.New York:AMS.

Bryant, William Cullen(1964).Prose Writings of William Cullen Bryant.New York:Russell & Russell.

Bryant, William Cullen(1935).William Cullen Bryant: Representative Selections, with Introduction, Bibliography, and Notes.New York:American Book.

Catlin, George(1989).North American Indians.New York:Penguin.