Pastoral

by Terry Gifford

Pastoral is a succinct and up-to-date introductory text to the history, major writers and critical issues of this genre. Terry Gifford clarifies the different uses of pastoralthe history of the genre from its classical origins to Elizabethan drama, through eighteenth-century pastoral poetry to contemporary American nature writing the pastoral impulse of retreat and return, beginning with constructions of Arcadia and using a combination of close reading of quoted texts, cultural studies and eco-criticism post-pastoral texts with a look at writers, who Gifford argues, have discovered ways of reconnecting us with our natural environment.

Genres: Criticism, Nonfiction, Literary Criticism, Theory

208 pages, Paperback

First published May 8, 1999

About the author

Visiting Scholar, Research Centre for Environmental Humanities, Bath Spa University

Profesor Honorifico, Filologia Inglesa,
Universidad de Alicante, Spain.

t.gifford2@bathspa.ac.uk

Reviews

[Skrivena stranica · Rating 4 out of 5]

More skim-read it than anything else, will have to return to it.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very readable (just one morning, really) and pretty useful. Sort of makes you want to read Ted Hughes, which -- with my generation as an audience -- represents quite an accomplishment really.

Appreciated especially the slight bits on Tom Stoppard, old love, and Carol Churchill, recent fan. Was a bit hurt that my young flame, Robert Haas, was described as saccharine.

But the Ovid & Theocritis->Virgil->Sidney,Spenser,Shakespeare, Johnson->Wordsworth and Blake tradition is what I dipped into this for & was particularly satisfied with. The Postpastoral final chapter made me feel very out of touch but with a terrific, I think, bibliography.

[Erika · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was short, easy-to-read and super informative. Uses tons of examples from the renaissance to today! I am starting to read it again.

[Evan Streeby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent survey with plenty of examples and well argued theses