Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and the Environment

The underlying intent of Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and the Environment (ISLE) is to gather as many perspectives on environmental thought and literature as possible. Its articles connect environmental discourses with a wide variety of disciplines, including animal studies, disability theory, postmodernism, and queer theory. As part of the wider Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment (ASLE), there is also a persistent emphasis the meeting of slow thinking (e.g., scholarly research) and swift action (e.g., activism), particularly how the former can inform and hep with the latter. The items published in ISLE fall into four categories: Scholarly Articles, Creative Nonfiction, Fiction, and Poetry. This range of styles further highlights ISLE’s desire to engage with multiple perspectives, which comes across most effectively in issues with a pervading theme (e.g., 2022 Vol. 29, Issue. 3 which has a cluster of articles on birds). Most of the scholarship included in ISLE relates to modern anglophone literature, although there are also discussions of earlier texts, including from Ancient Egypt and China. In the articles which engage with the Greek and Roman worlds (see examples below), there is a strong focus on how Ancient ideas can be used to help understand and approach modern environmental issues.

Quotation

‘ISLE invites scholarly articles and creative writing that interpret the environment in complex, imaginative, and generative ways. As the journal’s work takes place in the material context of intertwined ecological, economic, and social justice crises, ISLE adopts Elizabeth Ammon’s call to find the “brave new words” that will help us understand and engage this moment and imagine and work and move toward alternate futures.’

[About | ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment | Oxford Academic (oup.com) Accessed 09/05/2023 15:18]

Articles of Potential Interest

Mark J. Hanson (2020), ‘Denying the Wolf Within: A (Greek) Tragedy for Our Time’, ISLE 28, 347-358.

• A piece of creative nonfiction which considers modern conceptualisations ‘wilderness’ with particular reference to Euripides’ Bacchae. It provides an interesting example of how ancient texts can be used to shed light on modern issues.

Serenella Iovino (2017), ‘Mediterranean Ecocriticism’, ISLE 24, 325-340.

• Engages with ideas of the Mediterranean both as an ancient and modern space, with particular focus on its multiculturality and modern mass migration.

Madison P. Jones, IV (2016), ‘Plato’s Apocalyptic Rhetoric: Interpreting Bioregionalism in the Critias-Timaeus Dialogs’, ISLE 23, 548-563.

• Builds on ideas put forward in Melissa Lane’s Eco Republic and explores Plato’s criticisms of overconsumption and over-working natural resources, linking to contemporary issues of Capitalist overconsumption leading to damaging carbon emissions.

Jill Da Silva (2008), ‘Ecocriticism and Myth: the Case of Erisychthon, ISLE 15, 103-116.

• Reads the myth of Erisychthon, who cut down a tree in a sacred grove and was thus cursed with insatiable hunger, as an allegory for what happens when humans abuse the natural world. It includes both ancient (Callimachus, Ovid) and modern (Arthur Golding, Ted Hughes) versions of the myth.