Description
Book SynopsisExplores the prominence of insects in the literal and symbolic economies of early modern England. Examines concepts cutting across species (insect and otherwise) and draws attention to the work of early modern natural historians.
Trade Review“Lesser Living Creatures of the Renaissance brings a welcome and timely focus on early modern understandings of insect life, ideas, and work that stood, as the authors convincingly argue, in the midst of the transformation of natural history ‘as literary authority’ to embodying the new scientific ideas and observational methods of the era. This two-volume work makes a significant scholarly contribution to literary studies and history by bringing insects and insect life into these conversations.”
—Martha Few,author of Baptism Through Incision: The Postmortem Cesarean Operation in the Spanish Empire
“There has not previously been such a wide-ranging collection as this. Lesser Living Creatures of the Renaissance is a vital new contribution to not only early modern studies, not only animal studies and ecocriticism, but also to the history of science, the history of medicine, and current debates about the environment.”
—Erica Fudge,author of Quick Cattle and Dying Wishes: People and their Animals in Early Modern England
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction Concepts
Joseph Campana
1.Sting Stinging like a Bee in Early Modern England
Julian Yates
2. Scale Lesser Living in the Renaissance
Joseph Campana
3. Pest Environmental Justice and the (Early Modern) Rhetoric of Pest Control
Jennifer Munroe and Rebecca Laroche
4. Infestation Out of Africa: Locust Infestation, Universal History, and the Early Modern Theological Imaginary
Lucinda Cole
5. Habitat and Politics “Regardles of his gouernaunce”: Exploring Human Sovereignty and Political Formation in Early Modern Insect Habitats
Andrew Fleck
6. Consume Consuming Insects
Amy L. Tigner
7. Decompose Worm Work
Frances E. Dolan
8. Locomotion Creeping and Crawling
Keith Botelho
9. Communication Tettix
Lowell Duckert
10. Swarm Song of the Swarm
Derek Woods
11. Illumination “Living Lamps”
Jessica Lynn Wolfe
Epilogue Concepts
Keith Botelho
List of Contributors
Index
