Waste and the wasters : poetry and ecosystemic thought in medieval England / Eleanor Johnson.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Johnson, Eleanor, 1979- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

English literature--Middle English, 1100-1500--History and criticism.

English literature.

Environmental degradation in literature.

Climatic changes in literature.

English literature--Middle English.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Physical Description:

220 pages ; 23 cm

Other Title:

Poetry and ecosystemic thought in medieval England

Place of Publication:

Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 2023.

Biography/History:

Eleanor Johnson is associate professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University.

Summary:

"Eleanor Johnson corrects some commonly held (mis)assumptions concerning what the average medieval English person might've thought about what we now call the natural environment or the ecosystem. Reading both well-studied fourteenth- and fifteenth-century works (Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Pearl, and the Canterbury Tales), and lesser-known ones (Winner and Waster and Mum and the Sothsegger), as well as legal and municipal documents, sermons, moral and penitential tracts, practical and medical guides, plague narratives, and historical chronicles from the period, Johnson describes how poets used the resources of poetic language-meter, rhyme, alliteration, metaphor, simile, personification, characterization, plot, dramatic staging, repetition, and other literary devices-to think and feel their way into the problems of ecological peril, even though they lacked the science and scientific vocabulary we have today. Johnson explores how these writers combined multiple discourses from their particular, if narrow, vantage point to comment on ecological disasters, inventing their own "ecosystemic" language and commentary. As Johnson reminds us, the English Middle Ages had their share of environmental problems-air pollution, soil depletion, deforestation, Little Ice Ages, famines, and plagues-similar to the ones we face in the twenty-first century. Focusing on the word "waste" in its original usage across various texts, ranging from the literary to the legal, from the theological to the psychological, Johnson puts twenty-first-century concerned citizens in touch with kindred spirits in medieval England, fully aware of-and interested in-how human (mis)behavior might be connected to the natural world; how resource allocation, use, and pollution by one person might affect another; how environmental damage was linked to urbanization; and how one person's choices might affect the next generation. The book will be read primarily by those interested in medieval English literature, medieval historians, and literary scholars working in later periods, but Johnson also invites conversation with anyone working more broadly in the environmental humanities today"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction : thinking and talking ecosystemically

The five disasters facing medieval ecosystems

The laws of waste : the bible and the common law

Waste in sermons and penitential manuals : the unjust steward

Winner and waster : the imperilment of the land

Wasters and workers in Piers plowman : famine and food insecurity

Chaucer's Yeoman's wasting body : pollution and contagion

The wasted lands of the green knight, and the wasting of Camelot : climate change, climate revenge

Gardens, bees, and wastours : political waste and the fantasy of sustainability

Aftermath : from wasting to waste matter. : Thinking and Talking Ecosystemically

The Five Disasters Facing Medieval Ecosystems

The Laws of Waste: The Bible and the Common Law

Waste in Sermons and Penitential Manuals: The Unjust Steward

Winner and Waster: The Imperilment of the Land

Wasters and Workers in Piers Plowman: Famine and Food Insecurity

Chaucer's Yeoman's Wasting Body: Pollution and Contagion

The Wasted Lands of the Green Knight, and the Wasting of Camelot: Climate Change, Climate Revenge

Gardens, Bees, and Wastours: Political Waste and the Fantasy of Sustainability

Aftermath: From Wasting to Waste Matter.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 177-212) and index.

Other Format:

Online version: Johnson, Eleanor, 1979- Waste and the wasters.

ISBN:

9780226830162

0226830160

9780226830179

0226830179

OCLC:

1373011084