Narrative Trees: Arboreal Storytelling and What It Means for Reading

Abstract

Abstract: Interest in "new" tree narratives is rising, both in science and beyond. This calls into question what "story" and "narrative" mean in different contexts, whose story is told by whom, and how these stories are related to their material base. By comparing how dendrochronologist Valerie Trouet's Tree Story (2020) and anthropologist Eduardo Kohn's How Forests Think (2013) relate to trees and storytelling respectively, this paper aims to explore the theoretical prerequisites for "the stories trees tell" and the ways in which trees are empowered and instrumentalized by narrative means to tell (not only) their own story.