Plant Poetics

Literary Forms and Functions of the Vegetal
Erscheinungsjahr 2025
ISBN: 978-90-04-72781-6
Verlag: Brill

Buch, Englisch, Band 10, 232 Seiten, Format (B × H): 155 mm x 235 mm

Reihe: Critical Plant Studies

Plant Poetics explores the forms and functions of the vegetal across a broad body of literature. From Homer to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and from Jamaica Kincaid to Esther Kinsky, the contributions to this volume trace plants in literary works from around the world. Based on nuanced theoretical and historical groundwork, these readings bring together interdisciplinary perspectives on literary and cultural plant studies. The volume shows how vegetal beings have impacted the ways humans think about narrative time, genre, and writing as a literary practice. Plant Poetics illustrates the capacity of plants to make (literary) worlds and shape their forms.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Weitere Mitwirkende

Jacobs, Joela

Kranz, Isabel

Nitzke, Solvejg

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Philosophie Philosophie: Sachbuch
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literaturtheorie: Poetik und Literaturästhetik

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Figures

Notes on Contributors

Introduction Joela Jacobs, Isabel Kranz, and Solvejg Nitzke

part 1: Vegetal Forms

1 “Imagine a Green Plant Shooting Up from Its Root”: Goethe’s Vegetal Poetics Michael Bies

2 Towards a Literary Botanical Approach: Katrina Kalda’s The Country of Trees without Shadows Rachel Bouvet, Stephanie Posthumus, and Noémie Dubé

3 Tree Trunks in Motion: “Cinematic Style” and Plant Poetics in Alfred Döblin’s “Murder of a Buttercup” and Mountains Oceans Giants Oliver Völker

part 2: Arboreal Poetics

4 The Deep Time of Life: Narrative Speed as Expression of Arboreal Time Scales in Richard Powers’s The Overstory Eva Axer

5 From Tree Talk to Forest Thinking: Richard Powers’s The Overstory and Annie Proulx’s Barkskins Susan McHugh

6 Writing Trees and Chasing Spirits: Marion Poschmann’s and Esther Kinsky’s Third Nature Poetics Helga G. Braunbeck

part 3: Plant Potentials

7 When Plants Attack: Ancient Sallies in the War on Weeds Rebecca Armstrong

8 The Poetics of Plants: Performing Speech, Performing Self, Performing Green Andrée-Anne Kekeh-Dika

9 Vegetal Art and Activism in Frans Krajcberg’s Sculptures Patrícia Vieira

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Joela Jacobs is Assistant Professor of German Studies at the University of Arizona and maintains the Literary and Cultural Plant Studies Network. She works in plant and animal studies, environmental humanities, Jewish studies, the history of sexuality and of science.

Isabel Kranz is Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Applied Arts Vienna. She is currently completing a monograph about plants as figures of knowledge from 1700 to 2000 and co-editing a handbook on cultural theory and the vegetal.

Solvejg Nitzke is Interim Professor for Comparative Literature at Ruhr-University Bochum. Her publications range from catastrophes and climate to village fiction. Her book Making Kin with Trees: A Cultural Poetics of Interspecies Care will appear in 2025.