Few terms have garnered more attention recently in the sciences, humanities, and public sphere than the Anthropocene, the proposed epoch in which a human "signature" appears in the lithostratigraphic record. Anthropocene Reading considers the implications of this concept for literary history and critical method.

Entering into conversation with geologists and geographers, this volume reinterprets the cultural past in relation to the anthropogenic transformation of the Earth system while showcasing how literary analysis may help us conceptualize this geohistorical event. The contributors examine how a range of literary texts, from The Tempest to contemporary dystopian novels to the poetry of Emily Dickinson, mediate the convergence of the social institutions, energy regimes, and planetary systems that support the reproduction of life. They explore the long-standing dialogue between imaginative literature and the earth sciences and show how scientists, novelists, and poets represent intersections of geological and human timescales, the deep past and a posthuman future, political exigency and the carbon cycle.

Accessibly written and representing a range of methodological perspectives, the essays in this volume consider what it means to read literary history in the Anthropocene.

Contributors include Juliana Chow, Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Thomas H. Ford, Anne-Lise François, Noah Heringman, Matt Hooley, Stephanie LeMenager, Dana Luciano, Steve Mentz, Benjamin Morgan, Justin Neuman, Jennifer Wenzel, and Derek Woods.

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Yes, you can access AnthropoScene by Tobias Menely, Jesse Oak Taylor, Tobias Menely,Jesse Oak Taylor in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Literature & Literary Criticism Theory. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Information

Publisher

Penn State University Press

Year

2017

ISBN

9780271080390

Topic

Literature

Subtopic

Literary Criticism Theory

Index

Literature

COVER front
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
Introduction
Notes to Introduction
Chapter 1: Anarky
Notes to Chapter 1
Chapter 2: Enter Anthropocene, Circa 1610
Notes to Chapter 2
Chapter 3: The Anthropocene Reads Buffon; or, Reading Like Geology
Notes to Chapter 3
Chapter 4: Punctuating History Circa 1800: The Air of Jane Eyre
Notes to Chapter 4
Chapter 5: Romancing the Trace: Edward Hitchcock’s Speculative Ichnology
Notes to Chapter 5
Chapter 6: Partial Readings: Thoreau’s Studies as Natural History’s Casualties
Notes to Chapter 6
Chapter 7: Scale as Form: Thomas Hardy’s Rocks and Stars
Notes to Chapter 7
Chapter 8: Anthropocene Interruptions: Energy Recognition Scenes and the Global Cooling Myth
Notes to Chapter 8
Chapter 9: Stratigraphy and Empire: Waiting for the Barbarians, Reading Under Duress
Notes to Chapter 9
Chapter 10: Reading Vulnerably: Indigeneity and the Scale of Harm
Notes to Chapter 10
Chapter 11: Accelerated Reading: Fossil Fuels, Infowhelm, and Archival Life
Notesto Chapter 11
Chapter 12: Climate Change and the Struggle for Genre
Notes to Chapter 12
Chapter 13: Ungiving Time: Reading Lyric by the Light of the Anthropocene
Notes to Chapter 13
Contributors
Index