The Nature of Modernism: Ecocritical Approaches to the Poetry of Edward Thomas, T. S. Eliot, Edith Sitwell and Charlotte Mew

233 Pages·2017·3.15 MB·English

by  Elizabeth Black

The Nature of Modernism
This books presents the first extended study of the relationship between
British modernist poetry and the environment. Challenging reductive
associations of modernism as predominantly anthropocentric in char-
acter and urban in focus, the book’s central argument is that within
British modernist poetry there is a clear and sustained interest in the
natural world which has yet to receive adequate critical attention. Whilst
modernist studies continue to emphasise the plurality of the movement
and the breadth of voices and concerns within it, the environmental
consciousness of modernist literature and its response to changes to
human/nature relations following the experience of war and modernity
remain largely unexamined. Exploring British modernist poetry from
an ecocritical perspective offers a fresh approach to the movement and
its context, and produces original readings of both canonical and more
marginalized modernist voices. This book opens by discussing the rela-
tionship between modernism and ecocriticism and the benefits of creat-
ing a dialogue between the two. It then presents new readings of Edward
Thomas, T. S. Eliot, Edith Sitwell, and Charlotte Mew that reveal a
shared preoccupation with environmental issues and a common desire
to find new ways of achieving physical, psychological and artistic recon-
nection with nature. Building on the continuing growth of ecocriticism,
this book demonstrates how green approaches to modernist studies
can produce new insights into both individual poets and the modernist
movement as a whole, making it an essential resource for students of
modernism, ecocriticism and early-twentieth-century literature.
Elizabeth Black is a Writing Tutor and Associate Lecturer at Manchester
Metropolitan University, UK
Routledge Studies in Twentieth-Century Literature
For a full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com.
36 British Spy Fiction and the End of Empire
Sam Goodman
37 Jorge Luis Borges, Post-Analytic Philosophy,
and Representation
Silvia G. Dapía
38 Silent Film and U.S. Naturalist Literature
Time, Narrative, and Modernity
Katherine Fusco
39 Situationist International in Britain
Modernism, Surrealism, and the Avant-Garde
Sam Cooper
40 Surreal Beckett
Samuel Beckett and Surrealism
Alan Friedman
41 Modernism and Latin America
Transnational Networks of Literary Exchange
Patricia Novillo-Corvalan
42 New Perspectives on Community and the Modernist Subject
Finite, Singular, Exposed
María J. López, Paula Martín Salván,
and Gerardo Rodriguez Salas
43 Reading London in Wartime
Blitz, the People and Propaganda in 1940s Literature
William Cederwell
44 The Nature of Modernism
Ecocritical Approaches to the Poetry of Edward Thomas,
T. S. Eliot, Edith Sitwell and Charlotte Mew
Elizabeth Black
The Nature of Modernism
Ecocritical Approaches to the
Poetry of Edward Thomas, T. S. Eliot,
Edith Sitwell and Charlotte Mew
Elizabeth Black
First published 2018
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
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Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an
informa business
© 2018 Taylor & Francis
The right of Elizabeth Black to be identified as author of this
work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections
77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted
or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
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including photocopying and recording, or in any information
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the publishers.
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trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for
identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
CIP data has been applied for.
ISBN: 978-1-138-24409-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-23212-6 (ebk)
Typeset in Sabon
by codeMantra
For Jonny
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Contents
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction 1
1 Critical and Theoretical Contexts 10
Modernism 10
Georgian Poetry and the Impact of the First World War 14
The Countryside and the City 16
Modernity 19
Ecocriticism 22
Deep Ecology 26
Social Ecology 28
Urban Nature 29
British Ecocriticism 31
2 Modernism in Ecocritical Thought 40
3 Edward Thomas: The Path to Ecological Modernism 52
Relationship to Modernism 52
Ecocritical Importance 57
The British Countryside 62
Examination of Self through Nature 68
War 71
Edward Thomas and the Anthropocene 78
‘All Roads Lead to France’ 80
4 T. S. Eliot: The Waste Land 87
Reasserting the Real 89
The Crisis in Human/Nature Relations 94
Mythology, History and Ritual 101
The Desert 106
viii Contents
5 T. S. Eliot: Four Quartets 112
Critical Discussion 113
Eliot and Englishness 118
Eliot and the City 121
Readings 122
‘Burnt Norton’ 122
‘East Coker’ 126
‘The Dry Salvages’ 129
‘Little Gidding’ 133
6 Edith Sitwell 140
Critical Response 141
Poetic Aims 146
Façade 153
The Sleeping Beauty 157
Later Poetry 160
7 Charlotte Mew 168
The City 170
The Countryside 176
Nature, Otherness and Trauma 183
The First World War 190
Conclusion 198
Bibliography 203
Index 219
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Laurence Coupe for his kindness, wisdom and
support throughout my research. I am grateful to Sarah Dobbs for her
sustaining and inspiring friendship and to my parents, David and Mary
Harris, for all their love and support. I also want to thank my husband,
Jonny, for far too many things to mention.
Extracts from Charlotte Mew’s works are copyrighted and reprinted
by kind permission of Carcanet Press Limited, Manchester, UK. Extracts
from Façade, ‘Rain’, ‘Bells of Grey Crystal’, ‘When Cold December’ and
‘Dark Song’ from Bucolic Comedies: ‘Spring’ and ‘Green Geese’, ex-
tracts from The Sleeping Beauty, and from ‘Invocation’, ‘Green Song,
‘The Canticle of the Rose’ and ‘Dirge for the New Sunrise’ by Edith
Sitwell reprinted by permission of Peters Fraser & Dunlop (www.
pertersfraserdunlop.com) on behalf of the Estate of Edith Sitwell.
Extracts from the works of Edward Thomas are reprinted with the
agreement of Rosemary Vellender.