Greenery: Ecocritical readings of late medieval English literature

Gillian Rudd

doi:10.7765/9781847793843

Humankind has always been fascinated by the world in which it finds itself, and puzzled by its relations to it. Today that fascination is often expressed in what is now called ‘green’ terms, reflecting concerns about the non-human natural world, puzzlement about how we relate to it, and anxiety about what we, as humans, are doing to it. So-called green or eco-criticism acknowledges this concern. This book reaches back and offers new readings of English texts, both known and unfamiliar, informed by eco-criticism. After considering general issues pertaining to green criticism, it moves on to a series of individual chapters arranged by theme (earth, trees, wilds, sea, gardens and fields) that provide individual close readings of selections from such familiar texts as Malory's Morte D'Arthur, Chaucer's Knight's and Franklin's Tales, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Langland's Piers Plowman. These discussions are contextualized by considering them alongside hitherto marginalized texts such as lyrics, Patience and the romance Sir Orfeo. The result is a study that reinvigorates our customary reading of late Middle English literary texts while also allowing us to reflect upon the vibrant new school of eco-criticism itself.

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Greenery

Ecocritical readings of late medieval English literature

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Contents

Front matter
pp i-iv

Contents
pp v-vi

Acknowledgements
pp vii-viii

Introduction: Green reading
pp 1-20

1 - Earth
pp 21-47

2 - Trees
pp 48-90

3 - Wilds, wastes and wilderness
pp 91-132

4 - Sea and coast
pp 133-164

5 - Gardens and fields
pp 165-206

References
pp 207-216

Index
pp 217-221

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Greenery

Ecocritical readings of late medieval English literature

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