Idyllic Nature/Savage Nature in an Ecofeminist Study of The Isle of Passion (1989) by Laura Restrepo

Abstract

The ecofeminist approach explores a link between an idyllic nature of the western philosophical aesthetic and an aggressive nature inherent in its apocalyptic and monstrous side. This approach serves as a bridge between two competing forces to model and negotiate the potentiality represented by political ecology and the quest for social justice. This study examines the costs of aggression, domination and competition by reclaiming a story from Mexican history and reformulating it in the alternative narrative, The Isle of Passion, written by Colombian novelist Laura Restrepo. The novel discovers both the power of nature and women to dismantle social and natural hierarchies and recreate more open systems relying, in their place, on their inherent values. This transformation is ironically achieved on an almost deserted island, which was ignored by the Mexican government but desired by numerous multinational powers since the beginning of the twentieth century. It is here in this microcosm of society where the two worlds of savage and idyllic nature collide to yield a figure of nature as partner and collaborator that aides in the battle against the decaying of the earth and human moral life.