Will & Co-Evolution and the Nature Writing Genre (and maybe Biography)

I am especially intrigued by the particular way Pollan introduces “the will” into the scheme of evolution, not by first beginning with “will” at the human level, but instead, like Traill, by confronting will at ground-level (plant level). Using this idea and Pollan’s explanation of co-evolution, I am interested in thinking about how we could think of co-evolution and the series of the unwilled event (I’m avoiding using the word narrative here—I’m not sure it “works” due to the teleological connotation) to think about the genre of nature writing (particularly the non-teleological structure of “nature writing” texts themselves) and perhaps also biography (though biography, it seems, often follows the usual birth-life-death, framework, so maybe it doesn't hold up the same way).

Pollan reminds us, “Evolution doesn’t depend on will or intention to work; it is, almost by definition, an unconscious, unwilled process. All it requires are beings compelled, as all plants and animals are, to make more of themselves by whatever means trial and error present” (xxi). Pollan’s use of language in the phrase “to make more of themselves” is fascinating here. Is he “only” talking about reproduction, or is he talking about something “more,” in the way that Thoreau might make “more” of himself? Is he saying that “making more” of ourselves is an unwilled process? (Is Thoreau compelled to acquire knowledge, or un-knowledge, because of his own willed intentions—or because of some other unconscious mechanism at work?) Will seems to enter at the register of desire and ensuing reciprocation. Further embedded within Pollan’s explanation of the presence of will is the nesting of artificial and natural selection. The notion of “artificial,” he says, is derived from the word “artifact: a thing reflecting the human will” (xxii). Natural selection, on the other hand, encompasses the “no teleology” idea (see last paragraph).  Artificial selection incorporates both willed and un-willed processes (humans might choose how to further “engineer” an orange, but the genetic material available for that engineering is a result of previous “natural” selection). (I hope I'm getting this right. Correct me if I'm not...this stuff is really still confusing to me.)

I really like the fact that even though Botany of Desire is at face-value a biography of plants, it must also be a biography of the human & animal desires that allowed the plants “to make more of themselves.” The structure of Pollan’s biography, we might say, is co-evolutionary. I’m wondering if we could also say that biography and nature writing are literary spaces where, metaphorically speaking, “artificial” and “natural” selections (/decisions) co-evolve alongside one another. For example, nature writers have reasons for writing and arranging their writing just-so, reasons influenced by preceding random encounters and preferences (these would be the metaphoric “artificial” selections), but at the same time, the genre seems to be hinged the “chance” of the woods—the happening upon the cinnamon bear or the water lily (this idea could perhaps also be applied to the notion of the biographical archive—the structure or “revelation” of the biographical narrative often depends upon the “chance” of the archive—what we happen to find when we aren’t looking).

This strange exchange of content and desire seems to me like it could partly account for the lack of a teleological structure that we are more likely to find in a novel, for instance. (Maybe certain types of poems also follow this “no-teleology” line? I’m not sure.) It seems to me that all of the texts we’ve read so far this semester are partly willed and partly un-willed. Traill, for instance, seems almost “unconsciously” compelled to provide scientific fact & description (including tips for how to use plants medicinally)—okay, this idea is partly problematic, but if the purpose of the book is to provide information to immigrants, then it seems like in some respects we could say that she is not “choosing” her genre—but on the other hand (the willed hand), the structure of the text is also driven by what her readers want for their gift book (poems, pretty pictures, etc.).

Disclaimer: While I was never “against” evolution in the way that many of my religious middle and high school classmates were, I never really understood it until taking a “History of” class during one summer in college. We read a bunch of books on the subject, including a huge chunk of On the Origin of Species and some other stuff like Darwin’s Dreampond.  It was during that class that I finally learned about the “no teleology” idea (in probably too simplistic but hopefully not erroneous terms: birds did not evolve feathers in order to fly but instead as a consequence of the genes carried forth through natural selection). I still consider this the first big turning point in my intellectual development—finally “sort of getting” evolution. Anyway, I’m still totally fascinated by the idea of “no teleology” (the reason for this post).