ECOLOGY AND LITERATURE

The course is part of:
- the Interdisciplinary activities [C] for the the English Studies curriculum of the Master's Degree Programme in European, American and Postcolonial Languages and Literatures (LLEAP) degree and the Joint European Master Degree in English and American Literary and Cultural Studies.
- the Interdisciplinary activities [C] for the Master’s Degree in Environmental Humanities (EH).
- the Core educational activities [B] of the Master's Degree Programme in Language and Civilisation of Asia and Mediterranean Africa (LICAAM - South Asian Curriculum)

The main objective of the course is to enable students to address the relationship between literary/cultural texts and ecological issues from a theoretical perspective in a largely self-directed or autonomous manner.

Advanced reading, speaking and writing knowledge of English.

Situated in the context of a planetary environmental crisis, this course examines the multiple ways in which literature represents, illuminates, mediates the relationship between the human and the waters, in the critical perspective of the Blue Humanities. This emerging interdisciplinary field, in Steve Mentz’s definition: “explore[s] the many ways humans engage with water, utilizing literary, cultural, historical, and theoretical connections and ecologies to introduce students to the history and theory of water-centric thinking.” Our starting point will be the works of William Shakespeare, filled with oceans, seas, rivers, rainstorms and vapours. The main text under scrutiny will be The Tempest, to show how a classic author – continuously adapted and reinvented by every time and culture in multiple cultural forms (theatre, film, poetry, fiction, visual arts, dance, memes, etc.) – can become our contemporary in an age of environmental crisis. Other plays will include The Merchant of Venice, Othello, Twelfth Night, Hamlet, Antony and Cleopatra.
We will be examining the main concepts of the Blue Humanities and take advantage of the resources of NICHE – The New Institute Center for the Environmental Humanities, with its unique water-focused research activities and lectures.
The course will also have a crucial creative, material component: we aim at producing a collective book on Shakespeare’s waters. Students will be expected to join a group of four or five members, in a mandatory mix of Italian and international students. Each group will have to make its contribution to the book, containing a variety of written, visual, and material contents reflecting the themes of the course and the group’s discussions. Shakespeare and the Blue Humanities will illuminate one another, and we will be looking for memory and vision, fear and hope, diagnosis and transformation, community and activism. We will discuss modern ecocritical interpretations of the water imagery and dynamics in his and the strategies used by modern directors and actors to bring environmental concerns on the Shakespearean stage.

Primary texts:
W. Shakespeare, THE TEMPEST, Arden Shakespeare Third series, eds. Alden T. Vaughan and Virginia Mason Vaughan, 2014.
S. Mentz, INTRODUCTION TO THE BLUE HUMANITIES, Routledge, 2023.

Please note that Shakespeare editions are many and very different from one another, with different lengths and line numbers. So while you are certainly welcome to use additional versions (even with parallel texts and translations in your language of choice), it is indispensable that students are all equipped with this version.

Additional critical materials will be made available on the Moodle page.

The final exam will be based on group-based continuous assessment system and an individual final written exam. Students unable to attend and engage in team work will have a more extensive final written exam based on supplementary readings.

written

Lectures, class discussion and participatory creative work. Students are expected to attend regularly and to complete assigned readings before each class.

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Natural capital and environmental quality" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development