I'm not sure that Nietzche got the Stoic philosophy quite right, but his words address a strain of thinking that absolutely does exist. One which considers the

I'm not sure that Nietzche got the Stoic philosophy quite right, but his words address a strain of thinking that absolutely does exist. One which considers the natural world an almost sacred good, a model or standard which humans fail to live up to, instead wallowing in our industrial creations. One of the best meditations on this view of the world, which is neither unfair to it nor, ultimately, particularly kind, is Annie Dillard's "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek". It is non-fiction, but undoubtedly counts as literature, and won a Pulitzer prize in 1975. It meditates on precisely the fruitfulness, desolation, and transcendence in nature.