TY - JOUR
T1 - Alert, but not Alarmed
T2 - Emotion, Place and Anticipated Disaster in John Kinsella’s ‘Bushfire Approaching’
AU - Bristow, Thomas
AU - Moore, Grace
PY - 2015/1/1
Y1 - 2015/1/1
N2 - This essay examines John Kinsella’s prize-winning poem “Bushfire Approaching.” Drawing on Brian Massumi’s work on anticipated disaster—in particular his attention to trauma-survivors haunted by “the smoke of future fires”—we analyze Kinsella’s treatment of debates surrounding climate change in Australia. Fire in ‘Bushfire Approaching’ is both symbolic and real, representing burning in the past, present and future. The poem’s articulation of place, space and time captures oppositions between the willed amnesia attributed to many fire survivors, along with a vision of a future punctuated by repeated climatic catastrophes. Deploying affect theory and close reading through an ecocritical lens, we interpret the bushfire as a signifier of the complex relationship between climate change and custodianship of the land. This approach situates Kinsella’s poetry within a broader discussion of the bushfire as a natural phenomenon, while we also consider the poet’s deep respect for fire and its role in Australian ecology
AB - This essay examines John Kinsella’s prize-winning poem “Bushfire Approaching.” Drawing on Brian Massumi’s work on anticipated disaster—in particular his attention to trauma-survivors haunted by “the smoke of future fires”—we analyze Kinsella’s treatment of debates surrounding climate change in Australia. Fire in ‘Bushfire Approaching’ is both symbolic and real, representing burning in the past, present and future. The poem’s articulation of place, space and time captures oppositions between the willed amnesia attributed to many fire survivors, along with a vision of a future punctuated by repeated climatic catastrophes. Deploying affect theory and close reading through an ecocritical lens, we interpret the bushfire as a signifier of the complex relationship between climate change and custodianship of the land. This approach situates Kinsella’s poetry within a broader discussion of the bushfire as a natural phenomenon, while we also consider the poet’s deep respect for fire and its role in Australian ecology
UR - https://english.uiowa.edu/philological-quarterly/abstracts-volume-93-number-3-2014
M3 - Article
SN - 0031-7977
VL - 93
SP - 343
JO - Philological Quarterly: devoted to scholarly investigation of the classical and modern languages and literatures
JF - Philological Quarterly: devoted to scholarly investigation of the classical and modern languages and literatures
IS - 3
M1 - 6
ER -
