Review
The field of "ecocriticism" has become trendy in college English Departments across the country, but
Anthill is the first time in popular culture that ecocriticism has been placed in the hands of a scientist.
Anthill will excite bibliophiles and bookworms with its interdisciplinary, multi-genre approach to storytelling. The concerns addressed in
Anthill are timely, representing popular environmental buzzwords such as "going green," "eco-friendly," and the use of the word "green" as a verb. In this sense, E. O. Wilson has "greened" the novel, not in the form of the paperless iPad, but in the theoretical manner of an "ecowriter."
In environmental terms,
Anthill cross-pollinates literature and natural science, and as with many past attempts at trying to merge the science and the humanities, the blending is sometimes lopsided and awkward. The...
Beyond the Book
One of the aspects that makes
Anthill unique is author E. O. Wilson's long career in biology and entomology.
Anthill merits recognition for its literary merits alone, but the author's unique qualifications for the novel's subject matter deserve attention as well.
E. O. Wilson's long career as a natural scientist began in the late 1950s at Harvard University, where he received his Ph.D. While most of Wilson's work has concentrated on the classification and ecology of ants in New Guinea, other Pacific islands, and the American tropics (where
Anthill takes place), he has also played prominent roles within the fields of chemical...
