As in the Heart, So in the Earth: Reversing the Desertification of the Soul and the Soil

Told entirely as a parable about a fictional African village undergoing crisis through the intrusion of modern agricultural methods, this odd volume, translated from a French work of 1996, marries ecology, agriculture, and spirituality in an unconvincing mix. Rabhi, a French-Algerian agroecologist, narrates the volume as a fictional anthropologist mining the untold history of the ""Batifon"" community, located somewhere in generalized North Africa. The story reads like a genuine ethnography, complete with local customs, history, and a sagacious village elder, Tyemoro, who passes on wisdom and lore. The lessons point towards the need for harmony between humans and nature to prevent desertification. The Batifons prove less interesting to read about than a real community, as the relationships here are less Rabhi's point than the ecology. And it's hard to latch on to a fictional elder's disquisitions on, say, composting. No doubt much of this book is the result of Rabhi's sustained and important work in Saharan African agriculture, but the form and language of the book limit its effect.