By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Columnist

Hawai'i residents will join Mainland writers next week in a blending of the environment and literature called "Language of the Land 2002: A Celebration of Place Through Writing, the Arts and Malama 'Aina—Caring for the Land."

The program aims to bring together people from all disciplines—writers, artists, politicians, business folks, community groups, students and more — but the lens they'll be looking through is literature.

"The hope is that they're going to hear something that is different to them," said Maile Meyer, president of Native Books and an organizer of the workshop.

The written word has long been a crucial part of the movement to protect and cherish natural resources, from Henry David Thoreau's "Walden", through Aldo Leopold's "A Sand County Almanac" to modern work like David Quammen's "The Song of the Dodo."

Language of the Land will bring to the Islands several top national writers who write on environmental themes: Robert Michael Pyle, who wrote "Where Bigfoot Walks: Crossing the Dark Divide"; Richard Nelson — "Heart and Blood: Living With Deer in America"; Annick Smith — "In This We Are Native: Memoirs and Journeys"; William Kittredge — "Southwestern Homelands"; and David Abram — "The Spell of the Sensuous."

They will be joined by Hawai'i literary figures Pualani Kanahele, who wrote the hula stage play "Holo Mai Pele," and W.S. Merwin, poet and author of "The Folding Cliffs."

The program is sponsored by the Pacific Writers Connection, the Hawai'i Island Writers Association and The Orion Society, which supports writers and conservationists and for 10 years has run its "Forgotten Language Tours" for nature writers and poets.

The writers will give free public readings from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Oct. 2 at the Paliku Theatre at Windward Community College, Oct. 3 at Halau O Haumea in the University of Hawai'i Center for Hawaiian Studies, and Oct. 4 at Kilauea Theater in Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island.

There is also a free public day from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Oct. 6 at the Kilauea Military Camp with readings, discussions and environmental displays.

For Hawai'i residents who want a more thorough connection with the program, there is a fee-based workshop Oct. 1 to 6 on O'ahu and Hawai'i.

Meyer suggested that the Mainlanders will also take something away from the program.

"We've got a strong writing and oratory tradition here. That's what's so intriguing —we listen to the land on a different level. If you recognize land in your genealogy, you've got a different relationship," she said.

Jan TenBruggencate is The Advertiser's Kaua'i bureau chief and its science and environment writer. Reach him at (808) 245-3074 or e-mail jant@honoluluadvertiser.com.