Mittuniversitetet

This essay focuses on Claire, the time-travelling female protagonist of Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander, and her choosing to stay in the historical time and place into which she is transported in the novel. In a general reading, her falling in love with the eighteenth-century male protagonist will be understood as the main, and only, reason for her choice. This study instead takes an ecocritical approach and explores the significance Claire’s relationship to nature has in her deciding not to go back to her own time. The analysis, applying the concepts of biophilia, place and place attachment, reveals that she is deeply connected with nature and therefore finds a sense of place in the pre-industrial, nature-centred time that forms the historical setting of the story. Consequently, Claire’s nature connectedness and her finding a sense of place can be argued to have a strong influence on her decision to stay in the past. This challenges the general view – that Claire relinquishes all the positive aspects of a modern life solely for the sake of love – by offering a wider perspective on the reasons behind her choosing to make the past her future.