Greenery: Ecocritical readings of late medieval English literature

by Gillian Rudd

Humankind has always been fascinated by the world in which it finds itself, and puzzled by its relations to it. Today that fascination is often expressed in what is now called ‘green’ terms, reflecting concerns about the non-human natural world, puzzlement about how we relate to it, and anxiety about what we, as humans, are doing to it. So called green or eco-criticism acknowledges this concern.

Greenery reaches back and offers new readings of English texts, both known and unfamiliar, informed by eco-criticism. After considering general issues pertaining to green criticism, Greenery moves on to a series of individual chapters arranged by theme (earth, trees, wilds, sea, gardens and fields) which provide individual close readings of selections from such familiar texts as Malory’s Morte D’Arthur, Chaucer’s Knight’s and Franklin’s Tales, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Langland’s Piers Plowman. These discussions are contextualized by considering them alongside hitherto marginalized texts such as lyrics, Patience and the romance Sir Orfeo. The result is a study which reinvigorates our customary reading of late Middle English literary texts while also allows us to reflect upon the vibrant new school of eco-criticism itself.

Genres: Academic

232 pages, Hardcover

First published February 5, 2008

Reviews

[Kay Daniels · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great overview, lots of valid information, and a good starting point to the genre.

[Pearl · Rating 5 out of 5]

holy moly I love everything about this

[Karl Steel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Greenery's general approach is to decry works that seek to separate humans from the world, to grant only humans sentience, or to value the world only in terms of its use to humans, whether for practical or allegorical ends. Val Plumwood is Rudd's standard reference for critical support; James Lovelock her standard site for critique (and, in the forest chapter, Corinee Saunders). However, rather than hewing closely to an overarching argument, it instead keeps close to the ground by offering a succession of close readings of works common to hundreds of Middle English literature surveys: lyric poetry (eg, 'When the turuf is thy tour' and 'The Former Age'), all the Pearl-poems, the Orpheus story in both Henryson's and Sir Orfeo's accounts, Malory (praised for his attention to 'actual woodland' (86), the Knight's and Franklin's Tale (the first for its trees, the second for its rocks and sea), and Piers Plowman. Rudd's chapters successively cover Earth, Trees, Wilds/Wastes/Wilderness, Sea and Coast, and Gardens and Fields. Like a lot of works on Middle English, it ahistorically projects the monolingualism of modern English departments into the medieval past by not giving much attention to either Anglo-French or Latin literature.

Highly recommended for giving to undergrads for training in close reading.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rudd's volume is an excellent application of ecocritical concerns to major Middle English texts. Rudd is well versed in this critical field, and shows the power of a savvy and (mostly) levelheaded use of ecocritical concepts. Her readings demonstrate the fruitfulness of ecocritical reading for literary study as she expands the range of meanings possible in such texts as Chaucer, Langland, and ME lyrics. As one of the few forays of ecocriticism into medieval literature, Greenery will no doubt be a standard text for the foreseeable future.