“If a Tree Falls …” : Posthuman Testimony in C. D. Wright’s Casting Deep Shade

Abstract

During a period marked by profound ecological transformations, there has been surprisingly little consideration of how testimony may operate as a mediating discourse between human and nonhuman. Based on a close reading of C. D. Wright's "memoir" Casting Deep Shade, this article reconsiders the subject positions of witnessing in posthuman terms. KEYWORDS testimony; witnessing; posthumanism; nonhuman Witness tree, graffiti tree, tattoo tree, autograph tree, trysting tree, avenue tree, arborglyph, CMT (culturally modified tree), Presidents' Tree (for the one in Takoma Park carved with presidents from Washington to Lincoln in 1865; blown down in 1997). They say it really doesn't hurt the tree, all that carving. But harm and hurt are different. Beech bark is a tender thing.