Exhausted Ecologies: Modernism and Environmental Recovery (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781108477918)

This book evaluates twentieth century British and Global Anglophone literature in relation to the growth of ecological thinking in the United Kingdom. Restless modernists such as D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, Djuna Barnes, and Jean Rhys developed a literary aesthetic of slowness and immediacy to critique the exhausting and dehumanizing aspects of modern urban and industrial life. At the same time, environmental groups such as the Society for the Promotion of Nature Reserves and the Smoke Abatement League moved from economic registers of 'value' and 'trust' to more cultural terms of 'recovery' and 'regeneration' to position nature as a healing force in the postwar era. Through a variety of literary, scientific, and political texts, an environmental movement emerged alongside the fast, fragmented, and traumatic aspects of modernization in order to sustain place and community in terms of lateral influence and ecological dependence.

Author: Andrew Kalaidjian
ISBN-10: 1108477917
ISBN-13: 9781108477918
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Language: English
Published: 03/12/2020
Pages: 342
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.00lbs
Size: 9.10h x 6.40w x 0.70d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 10/01/2020