Edgar Allan Poe's "The Domain of Arnheim" and Issues with Terminology

A good literary piece to ground a discussion of the differences and difficulties of the terms ‘artificial’ and ‘natural’ landscapes is Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Domain of Arnheim”, published in 1847. In this short story, one paragraph in particular stands out as worthy of examination through an ecocritical lens. The infinitely rich protagonist Mr. Ellison explains to his friend that

there are properly but two styles of landscape-gardening, the natural and the artificial. One seeks to recall the original beauty of the country, by adapting its means to the surrounding scenery; cultivating trees in harmony with the hills or plain of the neighbouring land; detecting and bringing into practice those nice relations of size, proportion and colour... The result of the natural style of gardening, is seen rather in the absence of all defects and incongruities... The artificial style has as many varieties as there are different tastes to gratify… Whatever may be said against the abuses of the artificial landscape-gardening, a mixture of pure art in a garden scene adds to it a great beauty. This is partly pleasing to the eye, by the show of order and design, and partly moral. 

This assertion – which sees the practice of gardening affect only the local environ and only in two distinct ways – illuminates an understanding of human relations with the nonhuman other that emerged during the Romantic Movement and has continued into the present. In reading terms such as “original beauty”, immediately images of unsocialised land are conjured; land that has never been manipulated by humans and exists outside any kind of human realm. One of the roles of ecocriticism is to point to instances in literary texts where such understandings are articulated and explain them in their historical contexts and also in the present global context of growing ecological crises. For instance, in an American or Australian context, to suggest that areas of native forest or bush are ‘wildernesses’ or ‘untouched’ is it is to deny the thousands of years of indigenous land cultivation, which involved human contribution to and manipulation of ecosystems. Thus, Mr Ellison’s belief that some ‘original’ state of land can be recreated is to ignore the dynamic and ever-changing nature of local and global ecologies, and the role of humans within these intricate and complex systems.

Likewise, Mr Ellison’s idea of altering a piece of land specifically to make it “pleasing to the eye” is troubling in that it silences the nonhuman participants of the land and has the potential to disrupt systems that sustain the health of the land and waterways. Ellison’s view is that swathes of beautifully coloured, exotic flowers and foliage are preferable to self-sewn or arranged indigenous plantings, as the former lends itself to “pure art”, “order and design”. In this short story, the “impenetrable walls of foliage” and “long plume-like moss” of the river entrance to the Arnheim property are not denigrated; however, the untamed nature of this winding waterway sees it pale in comparison to the gated “Paradise of Arnheim”, which invites the readership in with “a gush of entrancing melody”, “strange sweet odour”, and “dream-like intermingling to the eye of tall slender Eastern trees”. It can be said that, within Ellison’s frame of mind, this land exists purely for the aesthetic enjoyment of the wealthy human. As a result, the nonhuman other receives no mention throughout the course of the short story, asides from the “flocks of golden and crimson birds”; however, they serve only as another layer of colour in the imagery of “meadows of violets, tulips, poppies, hyacinths, and tuberoses” that so pleases the artificial landscaper. 

Whilst it cannot be forgotten that this short story was written before the social movements that colour twenty-first century understandings of land use, the premise of ‘natural’ and ‘artificial’ landscaping provides the ecocritic with the opportunity to explain how neither of these terms are particularly useful and in fact, are damaging in that they can silence other groups, including indigenous peoples and the flora and fauna that make up local and global environs.  

In a post to come I will endeavour to explain why the term 'landscape' is problematic in and of itself.