Eco-Grief Induced Crisis: Resilience of Eco-Trauma and Sense of Ending in Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom

Role of nature is undoubtedly undeniable in literature. Due to environmental crises, addressing environmental dilemmas in literature is crucial. This research investigates eco-grief and eco-apocalypse in Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom (2010). It is based on the interrelation of natural environment and eco-trauma and by focusing on apocalyptic feeling, it examines Freedom. This novel is a practical work depicted to enlighten humans to save the nature. This interdisciplinary article is relied on the correlation of ecocriticism, trauma, and apocalypse and to do so, Lawrence Buell’s views on eco-apocalypse have been utilized. According to Buell eco-apocalypse is the only master metaphor of the currant age as people have not understood the fact that the environment is under complete destruction and do not realize the seriousness of this crisis. Reflection of eco-grief in Freedom proves that Franzen is endeavoring to alter the attitude of humans towards nature to play an effective role in saving nature. His unity with the natural environment mirrors ecological issues in Freedom. Franzen informs and convinces humans to save the creatures that are unable to save themselves. Background of the Study: This study intends to show Franzen’s eco-traumatic and eco-apocalyptic views. Franzen (1959- ) is one of eco-aware American novelists and essayists whose attentiveness for the environment has been reflected in his life and works. He devoted his time to birds and their life. By publishing Purity in 2015 and Crossroads: A Novel in 2021, he highlighted his name as a great author who portrays family life. Franzen is known for the vividness of characters with breadth of social insight. He has been introduced to a new universe by birdwatching and manifesting the importance of natural surroundings.

This research applies an interdisciplinary approach that integrate ecocriticism, trauma, and apocalypse. The discussions will be conducted around eco-trauma, that according to Narine Anil, encompasses traumas that humans impose to nature or vice versa, the harms and traumas that are inflicted to humans by nature. Human beings have stood at a critical period in which the use of technology has resulted in possibility of human extinction and catastrophic end of the environment. By using a qualitative approach based on theory, this article will focus on ecocriticism as its core building block. Although the risk of catastrophe is not so high, people should act consciously to change their behavior toward nature to avert calamity as the disaster will result in traumatic condition for human beings’ psyche. Humans should take sufficient action to ameliorate the condition of the environment to improve human psyche; those, who are traumatized due to environmental crisis, try to help the nature to restore itself. Hence, Franzen reflects his concern for such an environment in the postmodern apocalyptic world

Franzen expands human’s knowledge of the surrounding world in Freedom by representing eco-trauma and sense of ending. Ongoing environmental problems have turned the nature into an apocalyptic end and Franzen gets human’s attention to the traumatic ecological apocalypse. He hints at the capacity of the earth to recover from its ecological trauma and grief due to apocalyptic end of the benevolent nature. Franzen investigates the role of nature in causing anxiety due to the catastrophic state of the nature; however, he is careful to explore this role in rehabilitating the ecological grief in humans. He portrays a hopeful future for the environment and humans’ awakening for taking care of it, and suggests that humans can take refuge in the nature to heal their own traumatic wounds.