Crossings of the living world

“Living things form complex, ambivalent relationships, sometimes involving opposition, sometimes antagonism, sometimes mutualism. This allows us to imagine differently the rich range of relationships we can have with the rest of living things.” (Baptiste Morizot, interview in Reporterrepublished May 11, 2023)

In a world that is becoming less and less habitable, and whose modes of sustenance for human life are increasingly under threat, philosopher Baptiste Morizot argues for the establishment of new relationships between human∙e∙s and the rest of the living – or the living. The key, he believes, lies in founding new alliances between humans and non-humans and exploring “life through us”.

Ecotopiales 2025

It’s to explore these possible alliances that the second edition of the research-creation festival of ecological imaginaries, the Écotopiales, is dedicated, organized from October 31 to November¹, 2025, on the campus of the University of Lausanne and in the city of Lausanne. During these two days and the pre-festival (October 23-30), more than 60 artists and researchers∙euses will take turns to animate the 25 all-public events in the program.

Active∙ves in seven forms of artistic expression – fiction writing, poetry, film, artivism, comics, role-playing and dramaturgy – and from∙e∙s all faculties of the University of Lausanne, they will introduce us to their understanding of the living. You’ll find portraits of some of the guests∙e∙s on the BCUL blog on October 29. In the meantime, let’s mention a few Ecotopiales highlights:

• Timothée Parrique and Christian Arnsperger discuss degrowth issues on Tuesday, October 28 at La Grange ;
• The international colloquium dedicated to the “ecopoetics of the imaginary”, organized from October 29 to 31 at the University of Lausanne, will give the floor to authors Antoine Jaquier, Antoinette Rychner and Hélène Zimmer , among others;
• A workshop on the controversial presence of the wolf, led by biologist and ethologist Jean-Marc Landry and anthropologist Claire Galloni d’Istria, on Friday October 31;
• The dance show Holobiontes at La Grange, followed by a meeting with biologist Olivier Hamant, closing the day on October 31;
• A workshop dedicated to animating animals in cinema, on Saturday November¹ at the Cinématographe ;
• The closing evening of the festival on Saturday, November¹ at the Théâtre de Vidy, where the voices of lawyer Marine Yzquierdo, writer Camille de Toledo and philosopher Gérald Hess will intersect, inviting us to explore the profound link between jurisdiction, environmental awareness and the poetics of life.

The living through us

Echoing the Ecotopiales, BCUL offers you a selection of documents exploring multiple ways of resonating with the living, of thinking about relationships between human∙e∙s and non-human∙e∙s, and of inhabiting the world together. This selection is online and to be discovered as part of an exhibition on Unithèque until November 2.

The quest for new ways of terrestrial coexistence and cohabitation involves, first and foremost, developing a way of thinking that goes beyond the “culture” versus “nature” dichotomy, a way of thinking “beyond nature and culture” to paraphrase Philippe Descola. Such thinking is the prerequisite for considering human beings∙e as part of the earth’s ecosystem and in resonance with other species, and thus extricating ourselves from a logic of enslavement, exploitation and extraction.

Based on this paradigm, we can then define the means to act. Faced with a disintegrating world, accelerating destruction and climate emergency, it’s tempting to resign ourselves to waiting for the end. However, (re)finding the living through us allows us to draw an enviable future and open up prospects for the “good life”. Some∙e∙s, like Baptiste Morizot, propose “rekindling the embers of the living”, that is, finding ways for human beings∙e∙s to extinguish the fires they have lit. Others place their hopes of saving the world in art and in the education of future generations. For others, finally, the state of necessity and political inaction authorize civil disobedience.

Living stories

And then there’s literature, poetry and fiction in particular. Because it shapes our imaginations, literature is capable of changing our relationship with living things and expanding our sensibilities. The field of ecopoetics is so rich that it would be illusory to attempt to circumscribe it. Some “philofictions” describe alternative habitable worlds, while apocalyptic narratives “fabricate the end of the world” to better prepare us for it. Poetry, on the other hand, attempts to translate the voices of nature or embody animal consciousness to evoke new feelings in the reader. Here’s a small selection of these eco- and zoopoetic fictions, fromAlain Damasio to Wazem, via Kathleen Jamie and Ursula K. Le Guin.

The latter, a major and prolific writer of literatures of the imaginary and a pioneer of ecofeminist thought, already invited us, in a text published in 1986 – a translation of which is available at Terrestres – to revise our traditional narrative schemes, built essentially on the representation of a (male) heroic figure and founded on warlike and bloodthirsty values, to write “living stories”; that is, the story of people evolving in harmony in and with the living, far removed from any desire for domination:

“Sometimes it seems that this story is coming to an end. There are many of us who think, from our corner of wild oats amidst alien corn, that rather than give up telling stories, we’d better start telling another one, one that people might be able to continue when the old one comes to an end. Maybe they will. The trouble is, we’ve all let our selves become part of the story-that-kills, and we may well die out with it. So it’s with a certain sense of urgency that I seek the nature, subject and words of the other story, the one that was never told, the living story.” (Ursula K. Le Guin, “The Theory of Basket Fiction” in Dancing on the Edge of the World)