Description
Book SynopsisTracing the continuities and trends in the complex relationship between literature and science in the long nineteenth century, this companion provides scholars with a comprehensive, authoritative and up-to-date foundation for research in this field. In intellectual, material and social terms, the transformation undergone by Western culture over the period was unprecedented. Many of these changes were grounded in the growth of science. Yet science was not a cultural monolith then any more than it is now, and its development was shaped by competing world views. To cover the full range of literary engagements with science in the nineteenth century, this companion consists of twenty-seven chapters by experts in the field, which explore crucial social and intellectual contexts for the interactions between literature and science, how science affected different genres of writing, and the importance of individual scientific disciplines and concepts within literary culture. Each chapter
Table of Contents
Contents
Notes on contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction: literature and science in the nineteenth century
John Holmes and Sharon Ruston
I Contexts
1) Science, empire and globalization in the nineteenth century
Sadiah Qureshi
2) Scientific cultures and institutions
Martin Willis
3) Science and religion
Paul White
4) Women and science
Michelle Boswell
II Genres
5) The novel as observation and experiment
Charlotte Sleigh
6) From Gothic to science fiction
Adam Roberts
7) Poetry and science
Gregory Tate
8) Scientific literary criticism
Peter Garratt
9) Writing the scientist: biography and autobiography
David Amigoni
10) Writing science: scientific prose
Jonathan Smith
11) Science for the general reader
Ralph O’Connor
12) Science in the periodical press
Gowan Dawson
13) Science for children
Debbie Bark
14) Staging science
Iwan Morus
III Mathematical and physical sciences
15) Mathematics
Alice Jenkins
16) Astronomy
Pamela Gossin
17) Geology
Adelene Buckland
18) Chemistry
Sharon Ruston
19) Thermodynamics
Barri Gold
20) Electricity
Stella Pratt-Smith
21) Technology
Meegan Kennedy
IV Biological and human sciences
22) Natural history, evolution and ecology: the biological sciences
John Holmes
23) Archaeology and anthropology
Julia Reid
24) Medical research
Andrew Mangham
25) Sciences of the mind
Suzy Anger
26) Sexology
Anna Katharina Schaffner
27) Occult sciences
Christine Ferguson
Afterword
Bernard Lightman
Index
