Crisis Of Nature And Identity

Richard Powers is known as a humanist writer with a rich scientific background. His ninth novel named The Echo Maker won a National Book Award in2006and was a finalist Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in2007. This work is generally regarded as an information-loaded fiction as well as a veritable eco-fiction. In the novel, Richard Powers depicts the beauty and divinity of nature represented by Sandhill Cranes and exposes their possible destruction caused by human activities. At the same time, the story reveals severe identity crisis of the protagonists, reflecting that the crisis of human spirit is a deeper ecological crisis. The thesis intends to analyze the crisis of nature, society and spirit from the perspective of the relationship between man and nature, man and man, as well as man and self.There are six chapters in this thesis. Chapter One briefly introduces the author Richard Powers, summarizes the story of The Echo Maker, reviews the studies on the novel abroad and at home in recent years, and outlines the kernel of ecocriticism. Chapter Two analyzes The Echo Maker from the perspective of natural ecology, tries to discover the divinity and beauty of nature, and discuss the antagonism and reconciling of man and nature embodied in the novel. Chapter Three interprets the novel from the perspective of social ecology and points out that the crisis of social ecology is a result of the alienation and indifference between individuals in technologically advanced modern society, what’s more, the identity crisis of American society is becoming more serious after the9/11Event. Chapter Four analyzes the work from the perspective of spiritual ecology and focuses on the identity crisis of three main characters:Mark, Karin and Weber. Chapter Five tries to detect Richard Powers’s opinion of ecological holism reflected in the novel and possible final solutions to various ecological problems. The thesis concludes in Chapter Six, pointing out the research value of The Echo Maker and the contribution of the author to the development of modern American literature.