Poetry and Animals : Blurring the Boundaries with the Human / Onno Oerlemans.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Oerlemans, Onno, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Animals in literature.

Exempla in literature.

Anthropomorphism in literature.

Human-animal relationships in literature.

Animal welfare in literature.

Animals--Symbolic aspects.

Animals.

Poetry, Modern--History and criticism.

Poetry, Modern.

Poetry, Medieval--History and criticism.

Poetry, Medieval.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (253 pages)

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Columbia University Press, [2018]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Why do poets write about animals? What can poetry do for animals and what can animals do for poetry? In some cases, poetry inscribes meaning on animals, turning them into symbols or caricatures and bringing them into the confines of human culture. It also reveals and revels in the complexity of animals. Poetry, through its great variety and its inherently experimental nature, has embraced the multifaceted nature of animals to cross, blur, and reimagine the boundaries between human and animal.In Poetry and Animals, Onno Oerlemans explores a broad range of English-language poetry about animals from the Middle Ages to the contemporary world. He presents a taxonomy of kinds of animal poems, breaking down the categories and binary oppositions at the root of human thinking about animals. The book considers several different types of poetry: allegorical poems, poems about "the animal" broadly conceived, poems about species of animal, poems about individual animals or the animal as individual, and poems about hybrids and hybridity. Through careful readings of dozens of poems that reveal generous and often sympathetic approaches to recognizing and valuing animals' difference and similarity, Oerlemans demonstrates how the forms and modes of poetry can sensitize us to the moral standing of animals and give us new ways to think through the problems of the human-animal divide.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

INTRODUCTION

1. THE ANIMAL IN ALLEGORY: FROM CHAUCER TO GRAY

2. POEMS OF THE ANIMAL

3. POETRY AS FIELD GUIDE: THE SPECIES POEM

4. THE INDIVIDUAL ANIMAL IN POETRY

5. OF HYBRIDITY AND THE HYBRID

CODA

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 16. Mai 2019)

ISBN:

9780231547420

0231547420

OCLC:

1029298064