Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. The bush, and the taming of wilderness through infrastructure and suburban development, is an undercurrent in many of these stories. How do you think the concept of the wilderness functions in literature? Why is it a powerful symbol in our lives?

Teaching Suggestion: The bush in The Turning is presented as an implacable, dangerous place that it might be folly to tame (and in stories like “Aquifer,” humanity’s taming of the wilderness involves writing over old traumas with what’s presented as a false suburban ideal). However, it’s also the place Bob Lang goes to escape from society and conquer his alcoholism. Priming students to think about wilderness as an inherently meaningful concept will help them see the thematic subtext at work in these stories and leads into discussions of The Sins of the Father and The Influence of Class and Race (particularly the exploitation of Aborigine people).

• American Wilderness Philosophy – This Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry unpacks the broad history of modern concepts of wilderness in America and presents some dominant ideas about our modern relationship with wild spaces.