Letteratura inglese 1 - Appunti

Literature and ecology

Romantic poets and nature

Romantic poets were already in touch with nature, marking the start of this relationship. This became important in 1962 with Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, an American biologist. It starts with "A Fable for Tomorrow," which is about the death of nature and especially birds, and was written for the general public.

Structure of "Silent Spring"

• Pastoral text: Description of wild and unspoilt nature, harmony, no mankind.
• Apocalyptic style: Arrival of humanity changing as if nature is hit by an evil spell.
• No more singing birds: It is not a spell, it's because of humans.
• This place is not a specific one but it can exist.

This book had a great impact on American citizens, inspiring a law against DDT pesticides. For the rest of the book, the author accuses pesticides with scientific evidence, mixing science and literature.

Ecocriticism

Ecocriticism is the study of the relationship between nature and environment with a critical and an earth-centered approach. It uses a sociocultural, sociopolitical, and literary-cultural analysis. It expands beyond the limits of nature, searching for environmental ideas in literature and is interdisciplinary. Ecological problems, which can be analyzed by mankind, are different than problems in ecology, analyzed by science.

An important text is Literary Theory, an Introduction by Terry Eagleton.

Definitions of literature

• Literature = fiction writing, but not a discriminant as literature can also speak of reality and ordinary life.
• Literature = the way in which the writer uses language, transforming and intensifying it; the language attracts attention to itself.
• Signifier: word as it is / Signify: meaning of a word. An unbalanced relationship giving importance to the signifier sees literature in a formal way (formalism = study of rhythm, sound, rhetorical figures), which means it is made of words and not ideas, leading to estrangement. Thus, literature is what produces estrangement, but this is not a discriminant.
• Literature = any writing that someone values highly, but this is not a discriminant as one can give big value to a post-it for a friend on the fridge.
• Literature = "fine writing," but this is not discriminant as what is fine for one can be not for another; time changes, so what is considered literature in one time can also not be in another (e.g., comics).

Conclusion: it is not possible to define form (use of language) and context (fact vs fiction). A literary canon happens when a piece is recognized as important.

Ecocriticism and contemporary literary theories

Ecocriticism is the theory (my perspective of a text), while literature and environment is the topic (text). A guideline for Heart of Darkness: focus on the environment, relationship between the environment and protagonist. Literary theory involves ideas and methods used for explaining or interpreting literary texts according to one's perspective. It is the tools by which we understand literature, and literary criticism (study and interpretation of literature) is based on literary theory. It emerged in Europe in the 19th century. Literary theory (abstract, interpretation) is different than literary criticism (practical, reading and critiquing a text).

How to interpret a literary text: Connect it with the context, author's life. For this reason, literary theory is often called "cultural theory."

Heart of Darkness

Some critics say it is a racist novel due to the contrast between civilized (EN) and wild (AFRICA) society. Others say it is against racism; the author shows this world to criticize it. In the context in which the novel was written, the colonization of Africa was seen as a right and a good thing.

Contemporary literary theories

1. Traditional literary criticism (19–20 century; today at schools)
   • Track influences of the time
   • Historical contextualization
   • Author’s biography
   • Tendency to exclude "non-standard" texts
   • Establishment of a canon (works of literature considered important in a specific place and time)
2. Formalism and new criticism (born 1920–1940)
   • Focus on literary form (rhetorical figures, rhymes, etc.)
   • More interest in poems
   • Interest in used language
   • Beauty from the formal point of view, breaking with the past
3. Marxist theory
   • Representation of class conflicts
   • Not formal aspect; important is social and political meaning
   • Mass culture; see a work of art as a product for the mass (economic/consumeristic perspective)
   • Literature can be interpreted from different points of view
4. Structuralism (relationship between words and objects) and narratology (how narrative creates meaning)
   • Distinction between signifier and signified
   • Between plot (intreccio) = way in which events are ordered, with flashbacks and flashforwards, and story (fabula) = chronological sequence of events

   Heart of Darkness: is a "story of someone telling us a story" using the technique of "framed narrative."

5. Post-structuralism (or deconstruction)
   • Deconstructs the possibility of coherence; "language is so complex we can never understand the true meaning of a text because there are too many meanings."
   • Psychoanalytic approach

   Heart of Darkness: the Heart of Darkness is both physical (Africa) and psychological (inside the protagonist/antagonist).

6. New historicism
   • Focus on the historical/social context
   • Literary text is influenced and influences the historical context in which it is read

   Heart of Darkness: power = opposition black-white; the other = blacks are different.

7. Postcolonialism
   • Critique on colonialism (cause of racism, imperialism, etc.)
   • Power struggles
   • Against binary opposition (black/white, bad/good, etc.) because reality is much more complex

   Heart of Darkness: Is Conrad pro or against colonialism?

8. Gender studies
   • Started from the feminist movement but it's about the difference between genders in general
   • Against masculinity and femininity
   • Queer theory: according to it, the difference between male and female comes from society (certain behaviors, certain clothes, etc.); it promotes the abolition of stereotypes.
9. Cultural studies (born 1960; peak in 1990)
   • Movement that encloses different disciplines (philosophy, politics, science, law, etc.) to have different tools to analyze a work as a product of a certain culture
   • Refuses high/low culture
   • For example, it analyzes TV series and advertisements

What is ecocriticism?

Ecocriticism is an interdisciplinary literary theory involving anthropology and economics. It examines the relationship between humans and the environment, criticizing the binary opposition of "environ" (to surround) meaning "what surrounds us" with humans at the center, promoting an anthropocentric perspective. It focuses on place, setting, and nature, providing answers to questions like "how would an ecological approach change the situation?" or "in what way does the narrator interpret the environment?" "Eco" comes from "oikos," the Greek word for "house," thus ecology is the study of house (environment). It was born in 1978 with "Literature and Ecology: an Experiment in Ecocriticism" by Rueckert, marking the start of ecology's presence in literature.

Environmentalism and "Silent Spring"

The relationship between literature and environment is ancient, but its expansion started in the 1990s. Environmentalism in general was born in 1962 in the USA with Silent Spring by R. Carson. "A Fable for Tomorrow" in Silent Spring starts as a poetic fairy tale, proposes pastoral images, and ends with an apocalyptic scenario. There is a presence of natural and supernatural worlds ("evil spell"). It has a moral and political orientation, criticizing the world we live in, but using a fable to do so indirectly.

Silent Spring links the science of ecology and literature, with the rest of the book providing scientific evidence and being concrete. It negotiates between nature and culture (another binary opposition), showing humanity is no longer in contact with nature. The book turned a "problem in ecology" (pesticides, from a scientific perspective) into an "ecological problem" (how pesticides damage the environment, from a cultural and political perspective).

Why did "Silent Spring" have such a great impact?

• R. Carson makes people feel a silent alarm.
• R. Carson creates the idea of distance between common people and government (which does nothing about the situation).
• R. Carson uses an indirect reference to the atomic bomb (Hiroshima and Nagasaki are still fresh in the memory of citizens).
• R. Carson creates fear: pollution could expand.
• R. Carson creates fear: pollution could poison humans and the environment over years.

This strategy produces shock and terror in the readers, using apocalyptic rhetoric.

Environmental rhetoric

• Rhetoric = "art of discourse"; a persuasive speech to persuade about something.
• Production, reproduction, and transformation of large-scale metaphors; the technical term is literary trope.
• Literary trope (tropo letterario) refers to rhetorical devices repeated over and over, being the most used form in ecocriticism. It uses figurative language and rhetorical devices (metaphor, hyperbole, etc.).
• The most used tropes are pollution, pastoral, wilderness (of nature), apocalypse.

Ecocritical approaches

Cornucopia approach

Cornucopia or "the horn of plenty" symbolizes abundance. The "cornucopian" position is anti-environmentalism, claiming environmental threats are exaggerated and seeing the world as an endless cornucopia of wealth and production. It supports economic growth and endless progress, evaluating nature only for its usefulness for humans and not caring about resources, asserting that nature and human progress will always provide what humanity needs.

Environmentalism

• Moderate "mainstream" position includes recycling, buying biological food, and green consumerism.
• Considers human participation through technological solutions, such as using technology to improve, for example, solar energy.
• Opposes the "nature knows best" approach (life back in nature).

A radical form of environmentalism is deep ecology, which argues nature must be protected because it has intrinsic value, not just for human advantage. It advocates for a smaller population to live better, with the concept of mother Earth.

Environmentalism (human-centered or anthropocentric, preservation of nature for humans) contrasts with deep ecology (nature-centered or ecocentric, valuing nature in itself).

Ecofeminism

• Opposes androcentric dualism: women equated with irrationality and nature, while men are linked to reason and culture (literature can challenge or reinforce this binary opposition, as seen in Heart of Darkness).
• Challenges the logic of domination.
• Advocates acceptance of otherness and its role in the community (the ecosystem includes humans too).

A radical form of ecofeminism reverses the terms: it exalts nature and emotions against culture and reason, reinforcing the opposition between culture and nature, and claims women are superior to men, returning to the logic of domination. It criticizes the concept of otherness and community.

Social ecology

Linked to the eco-Marxist view, social ecology argues environmental problems are caused by systems of domination and exploitation, with the capitalistic system being responsible. It adopts an anthropocentric perspective, but unlike previous views, it opposes individual actions like recycling or buying green, instead proposing a "community solution" which entails changing the socio-political structure of society. The theme of "environmental justice" involves eliminating the difference between rich and poor countries, as the third world is affected by environmental problems caused by industrialized countries.

Recurring tropes in environmental literature

Pastoral

• Typical of romanticism, emerging after the industrial revolution.
• Not a literary genre (play or novel) but a "mode of writing" that portrays or evokes rural life, usually idealizing it, contrasting the country with industrialized cities.
• Agricultural life, usually nostalgic, representing a simpler time and life.
• Harmony with nature, without contrasts.
• Example: advertisements for "Mulino Bianco" products.

Wilderness

• Typical of the "new world."
• Describes uncontaminated, unspoilt, unexplored nature, lacking civilization and agriculture.
• A call to return to nature.
• The most important trope in Heart of Darkness describing Africa.
• Contrasts between the beautiful (pastoral, delicate, balance between human and nature) and the sublime (great, infinite, obscure, transmitting pleasure but also terror).

Apocalypse

• Focuses on the end of the world and/or humanity.
• Includes violent, grotesque elements, with struggles between good and evil.
• Responds to and produces crisis.
• A "strange blight" falls upon a pastoral scene, with warnings against something being done wrong, creating an evil material threat, leading to a catastrophic scenario because humans did not react to the warning.
• In Heart of Darkness, this refers to the imminent end of western civilization, symbolized by getting lost in the Heart of Darkness of Africa.

Heart of Darkness historical and political context

1. 1899: First published as a three-part story.
2. 1902: Published as a proper book.
3. Acts as a bridge between Victorianism and modernism:
   • Victorianism: Focus on conventions, strict Christian values (family, role of women in the house, etc.). Realistic representation of reality, chronological order, omniscient narrator.
   • Modernism: 20th century (time of discoveries and innovations), breaking conventions in both society and literature, with new forms (e.g., non-chronological order) and themes.

   Heart of Darkness: Takes elements from modernism (non-chronological order) but is not too experimental like Joyce, for example. It is part of "colonial literature," as Conrad is a European writing about colonialism, with the novel set in Africa.

Victorian age (1832-1901)

• Key words:
  • Progress (technical, industrial, political).
  • Expansion (of the British empire worldwide).
  • Mobility (railway in Britain and steam engine for sea travel, marking the start of travels).
• Queen Victoria (1837-1901): Long reign of relative peace (no economic issues, no succession problems).
• Imperialism: Expansion of the British empire had started before Queen Victoria, but during her reign, there was the greatest expansion, embodying British technological and political domination and making travels accessible to common people.
• Free and quicker circulation of books due to increased mobility.
• 1863: Opening of the London Tube (first underground system).
• Improvements in roads, communication via telegraph and telephone (enabling transatlantic communication).
• Industrialism.

During this period, civilizing "inferior" populations was seen as both a duty and a way to demonstrate the superiority of white people. While this idea was common among European powers, Britain was the most important empire (New Zealand, Australia, Caribbeans, etc.).

Heart of Darkness: Shows civilization's workings but also highlights its madness and brutality, exemplifying the ambiguousness of literature. Post-colonial critics have accused Heart of Darkness and other novels of using a western perspective of colonization, therefore giving no voice to the natives.

Victorian literature

1. Proliferation of print: It was called the "print culture age" as books became cheaper and thus accessible to a larger public. Common people could also buy magazines (containing serialized stories) or borrow books.
2. Serialized fiction: Introduced the idea of stories divided into different numbers of magazines.
3. Pickwick Papers (monthly):
   • Cheaper books in series made literature more "democratic," reaching a larger public.
   • Rich in illustrations, which helped attract people.
   • Critics and the public discussed the story and speculated on future developments from month to month.
4. Themes: Social problems, industrialism, urban landscapes (think of Dickens). Initially, stories focused on a moral representation of society.
5. Introduction of new tropes: Colonialism and imperialism. Previously, if these subjects were touched, it was mainly to tell "adventurous stories." However, Heart of Darkness is not just an adventure but also psychological (from Marlow's perspective) and rich in experimentations (framed narration given by two narrators: the omniscient one and Marlow). This change wasn't fully appreciated at first.
6. Heart of Darkness also portrays the moral degradation of people (white colonists), their corruption, and their egotism, as they are only interested in personal profit.

The early 20th century: from 1901 (death of Queen Victoria) to 1913

There were continuities and discontinuities with the Victorian Age:

• Industrial growth and economic progress; Britain became an urban nation.
• Change in industries, now based on electricity.
• Fertility for new ideas.
• Great scientific and philosophical innovation (think of Darwin).