Journals (Nottingham Trent University)

Book review of \u27Braiding Sweetgrass\u27 by Robin Wall Kimmere

Van Eaton, Jaydene

Reciprocity and Gratitude in \u27Braiding Sweetgrass\u27

Bergfast, Felicia

Evolution of Fairy Tales

Grix, Ellen

Bittersweet, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 2, 2023 
Ellen Grix, Nottingham Trent University 
 
he jungle was once a beautiful and 
bountiful land, teeming with plants 
and animals of all shapes and sizes. 
But something had changed in the jungle, 
something that Mowgli could feel in the air. 
Everywhere he looked, the foliage was 
thinner, the trees shorter, the animals fewer 
and farther between. Sometimes he could 
hardly recognise his home, and he feared for 
what would become of the jungle and those 
he lived amongst if nothing was to be done 
about it. 
The cause of this change was no mystery to 
Mowgli. Everywhere he went, he saw signs 
of humans' trespassing - from tree stumps 
that told of logging operations, open air 
garbage dumps, and habitations that had 
slowly encroached on the jungle. He wished 
they would leave himself and his friends in 
peace! The air was getting hotter, and the 
rains were less frequent and less plentiful. 
The creatures of the jungle were struggling 
to adapt to the changing climate, which 
meant that food sources were far scarcer and 
more unpredictable. He grew concerned, 
and his stomach growled in hunger. Mowgli 
understood that if these matters were not 
addressed, the jungle he loved so dearly 
would eventually be cut down- the trees that 
Bagheera rested amongst, and King Louie 
swung in would be gone with no hope of 
growing back. 
The thought made Mowgli feel sick. The 
villages were replaced with big cities that 
were strange and scary to him. He wanted to 
be in the jungle and refused to let his life be 
robbed from him like it had from so many of 
the other animals. With the help of his 
friends, he set out to teach the people of the 
jungle the importance of preserving their 
environment. He worked tirelessly to 
encourage sustainable practices, maintaining 
biodiversity by replanting trees and 
balancing out their diets. Educating the 
people that surrounded the jungle on the 
importance of conservation so that the 
beautiful place he called home would 
remain for generations to come. He begged 
the sky for hope, for change, for everyone to 
love and respect the jungle as he did. The 
sky gave no indication it heard his cries, but 
he knew he had to keep his faith in the 
future of the jungle and for society to wake 
up and see that they are destroying peoples' 
homes. Everybody and everything must all 
exist in harmony in order to survive.  
T 
The Jungle Book Retold 
Ellen Grix 
“The reason the beasts give 
among themselves is that Man is 
the weakest and most defenceless 
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English

The Jungle Book Retold

Bott, Layla

Bittersweet, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 2, 2023 
Layla Bott, Nottingham Trent University 
first read Winnie the 
Pooh when I was a 
young girl and if you 
told me that Tigger had 
ADHD, or that Eeyore 
had depression, I would 
have looked at you with a 
blank face. Yet, now as 
an adult, it is a lot more 
convincing.  
A. A. Milne was inspired 
to write the tale from his 
son's, Christopher Robin, 
teddy bear.  
The idea that the 
characters’ exaggerated 
personalities were 
representations of mental 
health issues came from 
the Canadian Medical 
Association Journal, 
‘Pathology in the 
Hundred Acre Wood: A 
Neurodevelopmental 
Perspective on A. A. 
Milne’ in 2000. Not only 
3 Milne, p.35. 
did it analyse characters’ 
behaviours, but it also 
stated the treatment each 
needed. 
To start, Piglet appears to 
be very shy but when 
further examining his 
character he represents 
Generalised Anxiety 
Disorder (GAD). This can 
be seen through his 
constant worry about 
unthreatening situations, 
causing him to have a 
stutter: ‘it’s awfully hard 
to be b-b-b-brave…’.  
Piglet even goes as far as 
to fake headaches and 
illnesses in order to 
escape situations. These 
are all signs of GAD, 
which children only need 
one symptom of to be 
diagnosed. 
As a child I always 
thought Eeyore just 
wanted to be alone, and I 
could never understand 
why he was not happy. 
Now I understand that he 
represents Major 
Depressive Disorder, 
which is characterised by 
his slow movements, lack 
of energy, and his 
pessimism.  
He is described as a ‘sad’ 
and ‘melancholy’ donkey 
and even his name has 
influenced the world, so 
now the word ‘eeyoreish’ 
can be found in the 
Oxford Dictionary, 
meaning pessimistic and 
gloomy.3  
Eeyore seems to be 
experiencing depression 
when he says, ‘I don’t 
seem to have felt at all 
now for a long time.’ His 
sadness has overcome 
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Bittersweet, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 2, 2023 
Layla Bott, Nottingham Trent University 
him, and he feels as 
though he has lost all 
emotions, similar to those 
who suffer from 
depression. Despite this 
feeling, Eeyore always 
wants his friends to be 
happy even if it means 
him being alone. 
We all know the 
bouncing, happy, joyful 
Tigger, however, what we 
might not have known is 
that his personality shows 
clear signs of Attention 
Deficit Hyperactivity 
Disorder (ADHD).  
Stephanie Watson claims 
that ADHD often leads 
people to get into trouble 
and chaotic situations, 
which is something 
Tigger certainly does. He 
climbs trees and then 
becomes unable to get 
down. He tries large 
amounts of food just to 
discover he doesn’t 
actually like it after 
earlier declaring that it is 
his favourite.  
Along with his fidgeting, 
bouncing, interrupting 
and impulsive behaviour, 
Tigger clearly has 
ADHD.  
His impetuous behaviour 
is also seen as he 
swallows Roo’s medicine, 
which could have been 
dangerous for him but, as 
we established, he does 
not learn from his actions 
even when he could cause 
harm to him or his 
friends. 
 
I also remember thinking 
to myself as a child ‘wow, 
Rabbit is really clean’ but 
his fear of dirt, constant 
cleaning and perfectly 
organised items are all 
symptoms of Obsessive 
Compulsive Disorder 
(OCD).  
I believed Rabbit could be 
rude to his friends but 
now, I understand that  
this rudeness was more 
than likely because of the 
stress caused by his OCD. 
Some examples of 
Rabbit’s OCD include his 
books being organised 
alphabetically. However, 
he later reorganises this 
by length instead as 
alphabetically is not 
aesthetically pleasing. He 
then changes the order 
back to alphabetical 
again, all of this causing 
him a great deal of stress.  
Similarly, Rabbit’s plants 
in his garden are all 
placed symmetrically but 
he later panics when they 
grow so that they are not 
presented in the way that 
he wants them to be.  
 
Eating fast, eating when 
not hungry, eating until 
far past being full, feeling 
guilty about eating and 
eating vast amounts in 
very little time all 
accumulate into a Binge 
eating disorder, which is 
represented in Pooh. At 
one point, Pooh eats so 
much that he cannot fit 
through Rabbit’s door. 
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© Hong Kong Disneyland 126 by Jeremy Thompson, CC BY 2.0 < 
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rollercoasterphilosophy/5465328806 
> 
© Teddy beer Illustration by Mohit Pareek, CC0 < 
https://pixahive.com/photo/teddy-beer-illustration/ > 
Bittersweet, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 2, 2023 
Layla Bott, Nottingham Trent University 
So, is this psychoanalysis 
reaching for something 
innocent or is it insightful 
to view the world of 
Winnie the Pooh through 
this lens?  
Even though Milne did 
not intend to write the 
characters to represent 
mental illnesses, it is clear 
that each character is a 
representation of a 
disorder. 
In an interview with Brian 
VanHooker, psychology 
professor Caleb Lack 
commented that ‘with any 
representation, it helps 
people to realise that 
they’re not alone,’
meaning that children 
experiencing symptoms 
similar to the characters 
in Winnie The Pooh have 
someone to relate to.  
We must remember that 
this book was intended to 
be enjoyed as a form of 
entertainment. This gives 
us the pleasure to enjoy 
the book as kids, but as 
adults, we instead realise 
something that something 
might have been 
overlooked.  
© Torn from a book by theirhistory, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 < https://www.flickr.com/photos/22326055@N06/6855475905 > 


The World of Winnie the Pooh

Book review of \u27This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs The Climate\u27 by Naomi Klei

Bartram, Sofia

Land in Literature, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 1, 2023 
Sofia Bartram, Nottingham Trent University 
THIS CHANGES 
EVERYTHING: 
CAPITALISM VS THE 
CLIMATE 
 
 
BOOK REVIEW 
Sofia Bartram 
 
N0934535@my.ntu.ac.uk 
Nottingham Trent University, Student, 
Creative Writing 
 
 
 
n short, we have not responded to 
this challenge because we are locked 
in—politically, physically, and 
culturally. Only when we identify 
these chains do we have a chance of 
breaking free.’1 
 
When thinking about Climate Change, it is 
easy to think about the physical affects it 
will have on the planet. Yet, there is 
concerns about what actions we are taking 
part in to worsen the Earth, and what things 
we can do to prevent them from happening. 
Naomi Klein acknowledges both in her 
2014 novel, This Changes Everything: 
Capitalism vs The Climate. However, as the 
title of her book suggests, Klein focuses on 
the far more sinister social side of Climate 
Change, focusing her arguments on one 
simple premise: how ignorance towards the 
changes to our environment is profitable. 
 
1 Naomi Klein, This Changes Everything: 
Capitalism vs the Climate (London: Penguin 
Publishers, 2014) p. 61. 
While this statement continues to be true, 
things will just get worse. As Klein so aptly 
puts it, ‘our economic system and our 
planetary system are now at war.’ Klein’s 
book explores the geopolitical issue of 
climate change and discusses various 
practices and methodologies that could 
have been implemented to sooner help 
prevent climate change and the danger it 
poses. 
 
The theme of the book is to question why so 
little has been done regarding the damage 
humanity is causing on planet Earth, and 
Klein makes a continuous point to bring it 
back to politics. A more right-winged 
reader may not enjoy reading this work, 
however, for those already in line with 
Klein’s views, this book is a fascinating and 
educational read in getting to know the 
societal issues behind Climate Change a 
little better. This Changes Everything 
doesn’t focus on the science behind Climate 
Change, and Klein states that she’s not 
interested in having arguments with 
Climate Change Deniers, as their own 
solutions threaten her ideals.2 With 97% of 
the scientific community accepting that 
Climate Change is real – and have many 
studies to show as such – she takes their 
word and simply focuses on the economic 
and political motives behind this incredible 
delay in doing anything at all to fix it, 
despite evidence showing that it is 
necessary. 
 
Klein’s book is separated into three 
sections, making it easier to put down and 
pick back up again if it all gets a bit too 
heavy for the reader. The chapters in the 
2 Klein, This Changes Everything, p. 57. 
‘I 
Land in Literature, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 1, 2023 
Sofia Bartram, Nottingham Trent University 
sections are not too long, making it the type 
of book that is easy to engage with. 
Personally, I think that Part Two, named 
‘Magical Thinking’, is probably the most 
interesting to read. As someone who is 
curious about why it takes moving 
mountains to get something done about a 
matter so crucial regarding the well-being 
on our planet, it’s intriguing – and a little bit 
terrifying – to read about the ulterior 
motive: greed. Klein makes the argument 
that Billionaires and Philanthropists are 
attempting to solve the issue on their own 
terms; to benefit to them alone, but ignorant 
to those that would suffer. Klein makes sure 
to write on the struggles in Part Three 
‘Starting Again’, where she touches on the 
impact made on Indigenous peoples, as well 
as how communities come together to 
combat local struggles. 
 
There may be arguments towards this 
book’s agenda. Klein has made her political 
opinion public and This Changes 
Everything can easily be interpreted as a 
way to demonise the rich and right-wing 
parties. Due to this, the book has been 
considered by some as ‘propaganda’.3 But 
for those who share similar views, this can 
offer a more in-depth explanation of the 
problems in politics, economy and the 
issues linked to the climate. 
 
Overall, this is a good book for those who 
want to learn more about behind the scenes 
work when it comes to efforts in preventing 
catastrophes linked to Climate Change. Will 
it change anyone’s minds? Doubtful. 
However, the book is not catered for those 
who do not agree with Klein’s views. It is a 
 
3 John Bellamy Foster, ‘The liberal attack on 
Naomi Klein and This Changes Everything’ in 
Climate and Capitalism, 
difficult read, but with those concerned 
about the ‘why’ in this scenario, this novel 
is a fascinating read. 
 
<https://climateandcapitalism.com/2015/02/01/liber
al-attack-on-naomi-klein-and-this-changes-
everything/> [Accessed 10 November 2022]. 


This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs The Climate

Book review of \u27The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial is Threatening our Planet, Destroying our Politics and Driving us Crazy\u27 by Michael E. Mann and Tom Toles

Land in Literature, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 1, 2023 
Felicia Bergfast, Nottingham Trent University 
THE MADHOUSE 
EFFECT 
 
 
BOOK REVIEW 
Felicia Bergfast 
 
N1008151@my.ntu.ac.uk 
Nottingham Trent University, Student, 
English (BA) Hons 
 
 
 
limate scientist, Michel E. Mann, 
and cartoonist, Tom Toles, have 
teamed up to present us with a witty, 
creative, and unique attempt at 
averting the near-future catastrophe that is 
climate change with their book: The 
Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change 
Denial Is Threatening Our Planet, 
Destroying Our Politics, and Driving Us 
Crazy.  
 
Michael E. Mann is a Presidential 
Distinguished Professor of Earth & 
Environmental Science at the University of 
Pennsylvania and the author of numerous 
climate activist books, including his newest 
addition, The New Climate War1. 
Tom Toles is a now retired, Pulitzer-Prize 
winning political cartoonist who used to 
work for the Washington Post. He is largely 
known for his ‘biting sociopolitical 
commentary.’2 
 
 
1 ‘Home’, Michael E. Mann 
<https://michaelmann.net> [Accessed 11 November 
2022] 
2  Michael E. Mann and Tom Toles, The Madhouse 
Effect: How Climate Change Denial Is Threatening 
The preface explaining why they decided to 
come together, sets the tone and style for the 
rest of the book. They highlight the 
continuous battle of trying to get the public 
to recognize the possibility of the 
permanent damage we are doing to the 
Earth and every living organism on it. They 
explain the reason for climate change denial 
in the words of Upton Sinclair: ‘It is 
difficult to get a man to understand 
something, when his salary depends on his 
not understanding it.’3 They continue by 
explaining that the battle to preserve the 
forests, lakes, mountains, and the ocean of 
the planet is not like any other battle, 
meaning that time is no longer on our side: 
‘time will not be healing wounds but instead 
will be inflicting more and more of them if 
we don’t stop shambling around like 
confused zombies.’4 
 
The book consists of nine chapters guiding 
the reader through chapter one: ‘Science: 
Hot It Works’, where they discuss science 
in terms of scepticism, all the way to the last 
chapter: ‘Return to the Madhouse: Climate 
Cange Denial in the Age of Trump’. They 
lighten the mood with Toles’ applicable 
cartoons strategically placed throughout the 
book. The first half of the book discusses 
the basics of climate change, such as the 
change in temperatures, sea-levels, and 
weather conditions, ‘why should we 
bother’, where they bring up many valid 
reasons, such as security, food, water, land, 
health, etc, and the stages of climate change 
denial. Whereas the other half of the book 
focuses on the more complicated aspects, 
such as the hypocrisy of climate change 
Our Planet, Destroying Our Politics, and Driving 
Us Crazy (New York: Columbia University Press, 
2016) p. x. 
3 Mann and Toles, The Madhouse Effect, p. xi. 
4 Mann and Toles, The Madhouse Effect, p. xi. 
C 
Land in Literature, Literary Cultures, Volume 6, Issue 1, 2023 
Felicia Bergfast, Nottingham Trent University 
denial by politicians, geoengineering, and 
finishes with some politics.  
 
There is a very thin line between 
oversimplification and an explanation 
written in a way the average person can 
understand when addressing scientific 
subjects such as climate change. However, 
the two succeed in creating informative and 
convincing arguments for non-specialist 
readers, with admirable writing, and 
cartoons with a satirical attitude.  
 
However, the book possesses some small 
shortcomings. For readers outside the US, 
the biggest issue would be that the book is 
focused on lies in American politics. 
Nonetheless, the leadership of the US, with 
the world’s largest economy and the 
second-largest emitter, are an essential part 
when it comes to solving the climate crisis.  
Furthermore, in chapter four where they 
take on the stages of climate change denial, 
they introduce a concept, most likely 
foreign to many, which is geo-engineering. 
The problem does not lie in the concept, but 
in the decision to not further expand on it 
until two chapters later. Having introduced 
this concept, they should have followed it 
through directly but, they left the readers 
confused for 47 pages. 
 
Nevertheless, this is a well-made and 
educative book. Addressing a subject this 
heavy but still being able to create a hopeful 
narrative is quite impressive. Despite all the 
political discussion and the dire 
consequences presented if we do not strive 
for change, the two have succeeded in 
creating a crucial, informative, and hopeful 
view of the science, politics, and solutions 
 
5 Mann and Toles, The Madhouse Effect, p. 175. 
to the climate crisis, all while still being able 
to make it entertaining.  
 
They continue to highlight the urgency of 
the situation and finish off by illuminating 
the beautiful aspects of this world, and what 
we will lose if we continue this path. The 
book closes with the inspiring line, ‘our 
attention to climate calamity can be the 
beginning of a new era in which people 
once again not only notice nature and 
protect it but also treasure it. We are coming 
to understand at a late hour what a 
magnificent natural home we have on this 
planet. It’s time to save our inheritance.’5 
 


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Reciprocity and Gratitude in \u27Braiding Sweetgrass\u27

Evolution of Fairy Tales

The Jungle Book Retold

The World of Winnie the Pooh

This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs The Climate

The Madhouse Effect

Matilda the Musical Review

Creative Retelling

Reworking Roald Dahl classics

Individualism in Adventure Time

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