The Imagined Landscape, 1999 Syllabus

Books to Buy

THE FOLLOWING BOOKS ARE AVAILABLE AT THE JEFFREY AMHERST BOOKSHOP COLLEGE STORE.

(I urge you to buy your books from this local bookseller who has provided excellent service to the college and the town for many years. The amount you’d save by using an alternate source is quite small whereas the economic damage done to our local bookstores by national chains and internet sources is quite large.)

William Cronon, Changes in the Land

Leo Marx, The Machine in the Garden

William Shakespeare, The Tempest (Folger Library edition)

Henry Thoreau, Walden and Other Writings (Modern Library edition)

Rebecca Harding Davis, Life in the Iron Mills

Daniel Botkin, Discordant Harmonies

John McPhee, The Control of Nature


The Imagined Landscape

1. Making Images of the Earth

 

Tues., Sep. 7:    Landscape and Imagination:  Introduction to the Course

 

Wed., Sep. 8:

Film: The Emerald Forest (John Boorman, 1985)

 

Thurs., Sep. 9:     What Do We Bring to a "Landscape"?

Discussion: Movie and your favorite landscape.

 

Tues., Sep. 14:     Cultural Imagery:  Walking "Westward" with Thoreau

Henry Thoreau, "Walking," in Walden and Other Writings, pp. 597-632.

SHORT PAPER (Favorite Landscape)

 

Thurs., Sep. 16:     Mythic Imagery:  Traditions about our Origins

New English Bible, Genesis: "The Creation," "The Flood." (Xerox)

Native American Stories: The World on a Turtle’s Back; Origin of the Creek Confederacy; Corn Mother; Adventure of Great Rabbit (Xerox)

 

Mon., Sep. 20

Film: The Shakespeare Plays:  The Tempest (BBC-TV production) [150 mins.]

 

Tues., Sep. 21:     The Eve of Discovery:  Europe imagines a New World

William Shakespeare, The Tempest

 

Thurs., Sep. 23:     A Historical Perspective:  the Pastoral Design

Leo Marx, The Machine in the Garden, pp. 3-46. (Ch. 1, part of Ch. 2)

Selections from William Bradford and Cotton Mather (Xerox)


2. Different Ways of Seeing

 

Tues., Sep. 28:     New England:  Conflicting Views of Nature

William Cronon, Changes in the Land, pp. 3-6; Ch. 2, Ch. 3 (pp. 19-53)

 

Thurs., Sep. 30:     Conquests:  Political, Economic, and Metaphoric

Cronon, Changes in the Land, Ch. 5 (pp. 82-107); Conclusion (pp. 159-170)

Optional: Ch. 4 (pp. 54-81)

 

Tues., Oct. 5:     Virginia:  A New Political Imagination for a New Landscape

Selections from Jonathan Edwards (Xerox))

Robert Beverley discussed in Marx, The Machine in the Garden, pp. 75-88

Thomas Jefferson, Selections from: Notes on Virginia, Declaration of Independence (Xerox),

Marx, The Machine in the Garden, pp. 116-144.

 

Thurs., Oct. 7:    The Rise Of Technology:  New Images for New Machines

Marx, The Machine in the Garden, pp. 145-169.

PAPER (Cronon)

 

[FALL BREAK]

Thurs., Oct. 14:     From the Technological Sublime to Ralph Waldo Emerson

Marx, The Machine in the Garden, pp. 190-226; 227-246

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Selections from Essays: "Nature,"
"The Young American," and "The Poet" (Xerox)

Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Locomotive poems. (Xerox)

 

Tues., Oct. 19:    Creating a "Middle Landscape":  Thoreau’s Experiment  I

Thoreau, Walden: "Economy," pp. 3-40 only; "Where I Lived and What I Lived For"; "Sounds"

 

Thurs., Oct. 21:    Creating a "Middle Landscape":  Thoreau’s Experiment  II

Thoreau, Walden: "The Bean Field"; "The Ponds"; "Higher Laws"; "Brute Neighbors," pp. 220-223 only

 

Tues., Oct. 26:    Transformation of Imagery:  A Pastoral Resolution?

Thoreau, Walden: "The Pond in Winter"; "Spring"

 

Thurs., Oct. 28:   Ambivalence:  Encounters with the Darker Sides of Nature

Thoreau, Excerpt from Maine Woods (Xerox)

Edgar Allan Poe, Descent into the Maelstrom (Xerox)

Teddy Roosevelt, Selections (Xerox)

 

Tues., Nov. 2:   Nature as a Source of Value:  A Literary Heir of Thoreau

Rebecca Harding Davis, Life in the Iron Mills

Optional: "Afterword" by Tillie Olson

 

Thurs., Nov. 4:   Nature as a Source of Value:  Naturalist Heirs of Thoreau

John Muir, Excerpts. : "First Glimpse of the Sierra," "On the Brink of Yosemite Falls," "The Bear the Fly and the Grasshopper," "Emerson at Yosemite," "The Earthquake." (Xerox)

Aldo Leopold, Sand County Almanac: "The Land Ethic"; excerpts from "The Wilderness"; "Thinking Like a Mountain"; "Marshland Elegy" (Xerox)

PAPER (Thoreau)


3. Challenges to the Contemporary Imagination

 

Tues., Nov. 9:     Back to the Land:  What Price Balance?

Wendell Berry, What are People For? "Damage," "Nature as Measure," "Word and Flesh," "An Argument for Diversity" (Xerox)

Tom Looker, New England Almanac: On the Edge of the Sea [sections with Nancy Pomroy and Ralph Stone: see cue sheet] (radio program on CD)

Richard Nelson, The Island Within, "Prologue," "A Face in the Raindrop" (Xerox)

 

Thurs., Nov. 11:   Responses To Crisis:  Ecofeminism and Deep Ecology

Selections on deep ecology from Michael Zimmerman, ed., Environmental Philosophy (Xerox)

Terry Tempest Williams, An Unspoken Hunger, "Water Songs," "Undressing the Bear" (Xerox)

Judith Plant, "Searching for Common Ground: Ecofeminism and Bioregionalism"

 

Tues., Nov. 16:   Is the earth listening?  Life in a Post-modern Garden

John McPhee, The Control of Nature, "Los Angeles Against the Mountains," pp. 183-272

 

Thurs., Nov. 18:    Paradigm Shift:  The Scientist

Daniel Botkin, Discordant Harmonies: "A View from a Marsh," "Moose in the Wilderness," Ch. 1, 3, pp. 3-13; 27-49

Optional: "Why the Elephants Died," "In Mill Hollow," Ch. 2, 7, pp. 15-25; 101-113

 

[THANKSGIVING VACATION]

Tues., Nov. 30:    Paradigm Shift:  The Curmudgeon

Alston Chase, In A Dark Wood, Ch. 8-9; Ch. 18-19 (Xerox)

 

Thurs., Dec. 2:    Re-imagining Disorder:  Toward New Metaphors for Nature

Alston Chase, In A Dark Wood, Ch. 30 (Xerox)

Botkin, Discordant Harmonies, "The Forest in the Computer," "The Moon in the Nautilus Shell," Ch. 8, 12, pp. 113-131; 185-192

Donald Worster, "The Ecology of Order and Chaos" (Xerox)

SHORT PAPER (Visit Home)

 

Tues., Dec. 7:    Revisiting a Classic American Landscape  I

F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (begin)

 

Thurs., Dec. 9:    Revisiting a Classic American Landscape  II

F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (finish)

Mon., Dec. 13:

Film: From the Heart of the World: Elder Brother’s Warning (PBS Documentary, 1991, uncut version)

 

Tues., Dec. 14:    Reflections on Our Own Imaginings

William Cronon, "The Trouble with Wilderness" (Xerox)

 

FINAL (LONG) PAPER


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Last revision:  October 30, 2000