Literary Theory and
Methodology
Session Four: Green Reading
Agenda
• Summary
• Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• Wordsworth, ”Tintern Abbey”
Summary: key oppositions
• Literary theory
• Postcolonialist theories
• Gay, lesbian, and queer theories
Literary theory: key oppositions
• Theory and literature
Theory
--------literature
Literature
-----------theory
Literature-theory
Postcolonialist theories: key
oppositions
•
•
•
•
Western – non-western
The Occident – the Orient
White – black
Center – periphery
Gay, lesbian, and queer theories:
key oppositions
• Heterosexuality – homosexuality
• Normal – queer
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• Culture – nature
• Human – non-human
• Rationality, reason – animality, nature
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• Mind – body
• Reason – emotion
• Freedom – necessity
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• Civilised – primitive
• Master – slave
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• Male – female
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• A continuum of related ideas
Mind
body
Civilised
primitive
Male
female
Culture
Nature
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
O my America! My new-found land,
My kingdom, safliest when with one man manned,
My mine of precious stones, my empery,
How blest I am in this discovering thee!
(John Donne, ”Elegy XIX. Going to Bed”, ll. 25-30)
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
•
•
•
•
•
•
Nature on the agenda:
Global warming
Deforrestation
Pollution
Decimation of species
Animal rights
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• What does nature have to do with
literature and art and how?
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• ”the study of the relationship between literature
and the physical environment” (Cheryll Glotfelty)
• ”the study of explicitly environmental texts by
way of any scholarly approach or, conversely,
the scrutiny of ecological implications and
human-nature relationships in any literary text,
even texts that seem, at first glance, oblivious of
the nonhuman world” (Scott Slovic)
Green reading and ecocriticism: an
introduction
• ”a person who judges the merits and faults
of writings that depict the effects of culture
upon nature with a view toward celebrating
nature, berating its despoilers, and
reversing their harm through political
action” (William Howarth)