ABSTRACT

Ecocriticism has steadily gained footing within the larger arena of early modern scholarship, and with the publication of well over a dozen monographs, essay collections, and special journal issues, literary studies looks increasingly ’green’; yet the field lacks a straightforward, easy-to-use guide to do with reading and teaching early modern texts ecocritically. Accessible yet comprehensive, the cutting-edge collection Ecological Approaches to Early Modern English Texts fills this gap. Organized around the notion of contact zones (or points of intersection, that have often been constructed asymmetrically-especially with regard to the human-nonhuman dichotomy), the volume reassesses current trends in ecocriticism and the Renaissance; introduces analyses of neglected texts and authors; brings ecocriticism into conversation with cognate fields and approaches (e.g., queer theory, feminism, post-coloniality, food studies); and offers a significant section on pedagogy, ecocriticism and early modern literature. Engaging points of tension and central interest in the field, the collection is largely situated in the 'and/or' that resides between presentism-historicism, materiality-literary, somatic-semiotic, nature-culture, and, most importantly, human-nonhuman. Ecological Approaches to Early Modern English Texts balances coverage and methodology; its primary goal is to provide useful, yet nuanced discussions of ecological approaches to reading and teaching a range of representative early modern texts. As a whole, the volume includes a diverse selection of chapters that engage the complex issues that arise when reading and teaching early modern texts from a green perspective.

section I|33 pages

Theoretical Approaches

chapter 3|12 pages

Is It Really Ecocritical If It Isn't Feminist?

The Dangers of “Speaking For” in Ecological Studies and Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus

section II|93 pages

Reading Ecologically: Texts and Methodologies

chapter 4|10 pages

Roses in Winter

Recipe Ecologies and Shakespeare's Sonnets

chapter 7|10 pages

Shakespeare and Slime

Notes on the Anthropocene

chapter 8|8 pages

Queerly Green

From Meaty to Meatless Days and Nights in Timon of Athens

chapter 9|10 pages

“Bare and desolate now”

Cultural Ecology and “The Description of Cookham”

chapter 11|10 pages

The Bastard Bomb

Illegitimacy and Population in Thomas Middleton's A Chaste Maid in Cheapside

chapter 12|12 pages

Ecocritical Milton

section III|61 pages

Approaches to Teaching Ecologically: Texts and Methodologies

chapter 13|10 pages

Spenser's Moral Economy as Political Ecology

Teaching the Bower of Bliss

chapter 14|14 pages

Reprocentric Ecologies

Pedagogy, Husbandry and A Midsummer Night's Dream

chapter 15|12 pages

Teaching Timon of Walden

chapter 16|12 pages

“Th'Earth's Great Altar”

Teaching Milton's Spiritual Ecology

chapter 17|12 pages

Marvell's “Upon Appleton House” and Tree-Felling

A Political Woodpecker

chapter 101|14 pages

Afterword

Post-script