Collaborative Co-existence: Human-Animal Bodies and Nature in Sara Baume’s Spill, Simmer, Falter, Wither
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.18485/philologia.2020.18.18.6Keywords:
contemporary Irish fiction, body, animal, landscape, language, Anthropocene, narrativeAbstract
The following paper focuses on contemporary Sara Baume’s, Irish novelist’s debut novel, Spill, Simmer, Falter, Wither (2015). It examines how Baume’s uses language to create an experimental narrative that doesn’t revolve around a fast-moving and dramatic plot yet forces the reader into the middle of the experience. Her meticulously descriptive language allows the reader to become closely tied to the experiencing body and see the landscape, the animal world, and the visceral means that it delivers to the body. The essay also analyses the innovative ways through which the novel reexamines the animal-human bond, urging a newly imagined co-existence in our current Anthropocene era. Baume touches upon crucial ethical topics and raises important questions about the possibility of a more harmonious bond between humans and the natural world.
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