Tales from the Wild: The power of storytelling in conservation writing.

I recently attended the MPhil student conference at the University of Cambridge, where I will be studying for a master’s this autumn. This event involved current students of my future course presenting their work and answering questions from the audience. One such presentation was titled: ‘Storytelling can help save the Earth: The power of film for environmental change.’ It analysed four films: Cow, An Inconvinent Truth, My Octopus Teacher and Kiss the Ground, all of which are unified by their engagement in a shared theme: environmental threats to our planet.

The presentation argued that something we all have in common is power. As humans, we are all storytellers, and stories reflect our worldview. In the book Sapiens, Yuval Noah Harari argues that the success of humans to collaborate, as we do so successfully, is due to stories.¹ We are storytellers, and we view history as an extended story – one of heroes, villains, climaxes and resolutions. The presentation then cited cognitive psychologist Jerome Bruner, who argued that we are 22 times more likely to remember a story than a fact.²

The presented argued that through storytelling, as seen in the chosen films, films can bring about environmental change by engaging and persuading audiences more so than simply listing facts. In particular, she highlighted how films can change our mind, elucidating things that often go unnoticed, and can retrain our perception.

Anthropocentrism vs ecocentrism

As an English undergraduate, I first came across the idea of anthropocentrism when writing about animal films and books. This is a human-centred view of the world, where humanity is positioned at the top of the hierarchy of living things. My essay on this topic, and anthropomorphism (the attribution of human qualities to animals, as we often do to pets), can be read on my academic literature page, The Ventriloquist. By contrast, an ecocentric world view sees humans as interconnected components of the environment.

Hope

Unless we have solutions and plans to solve problems, such as the climate crisis, humans tend to feel hopeless and not actually do anything about a problem. Therefore, it is better to give audiences hope, rather than paralyse them with negative fear. Identifying the problem, then identifying what action plans we can take to deal with it, is the best solution.

As I was hearing this lecture, I couldn’t help but notice this similarity throughout the many wildlife documentaries and books I’d absorbed over the past year. There are certainly some authors who seem to lean more towards the ‘hopeless’ side. They complain about the state of nature, write incessantly about how terrible humanity is, and offer a very negative view. When I read such work, I tend to feel powerless and negative about the situation.

However, two figures who I noticed lean more towards the other side – identifying problems facing nature but remaining hopeful and offering solutions – are Steve Backshall and Sir David Attenborough. Both, especially the former, have been highly influential in shaping my wildlife interests during my adolescence.

I recently read Deep Blue: My Ocean Journeys by the naturalist and explorer Steve Backshall. I found this book both powerful and informative. It acknowledged, with strong evidence of research, the harsh reality of what our oceans face. At the same time, it offered hope, and devised realistic and applicable solutions for how we can help bring biodiversity back to our marine systems.

Sir David Attenborough’s 2020 book A Life on Our Planet accompanied his Netflix programme of the same name. Using the desolate aftermath of Chernobyl as a metaphor in the opening chapter (and opening scenes of the documentary), Attenborough offers a stark prediction for the future of our planet. Chernobyl was once a thriving, populous city. The human error that lead to the nuclear disaster is compared to the current human error that is leading to environmental destruction and climate change. He predicts that in the 2030s, the Amazon rainforest will degrade to such an extent that it can no longer recycle water, turning the area into an arid savanna. He also suggests that there will be ice-free summers in the Arctic. By the 2050s, he predicts that ocean warming and acidification will cause the bleaching and death of the world’s coral reefs, alongside the crashing of fish populations and subsequent food shortages. By the 2100s, he suggests that large parts of Earth will be uninhabitable, with millions displaced due to flooding, drought and famine.

In spite of this all, the book does offer hope. The deciding factor with these morbid predictions is unless we make a change. Attenborough posits several ways that humanity, both on a government and individual scale, can work to halt these threats. These include global population stabilisation, rewilding (restoring biodiversity), shifting to renewable energy sources, eating a plant-based diet and changing land use methods (such as financial incentives to reward equatorial countries for not deforesting).

What both books have in common is their use of storytelling. In Deep Blue, Backshall weaves his science-backed arguments with anecdotal prose. He elucidates first the wonders of our blue planet, and then the harsh reality of what will happen if we fail to make change. By detailing his experiences with such infectious, vivid clarity, the book shows us just how much we have to lose if we fail to protect our oceans. From swimming with leopard seals, crocodiles, anacondas, great white sharks, whales, and even a hippopotamus, Backshall’s underwater wildlife experiences are awe-inspiring, thanks to his more than twenty years in television. The chapter on Japan’s whaling industry was particularly powerful. Backshall deftly acknowledged the difficulties with criticising the practices of another culture. However, he discussed his own experiences in Japan with the undercover filming of whale slaughter (and almost getting arrested), to offer a resounding and unwavering argument for why whaling should be banned. Everywhere. For good.

Similarly, Attenborough recalls many of his incredible wildlife sightings. This begins with his work on the Zoo Quest series in the 1950s. He writes: “As a young man, I felt I was out there in the wild, experiencing the untouched natural world – but it was an illusion. The tragedy of our time has been happening all around us, barely noticeable from day to day – the loss of our planet’s wild places, its biodiversity.” The book is subtitled My Witness Statement and a Vision for the Future. This reflects how the book both tells a story of his own experiences, and offers a realistic solution for how we can tackle this problem.

The point is that by telling a story alongside giving facts, science and evidence, the books become more convincing. By writing in this way, these works show us why we should protect our planet, and exactly what we have to lose (these amazing encounters that the authors recall). A book that simply lists all the threats to nature is less convincing than one that simultaneously stimulates our wonder for it.