The Natural History of Great Writers: From Goethe to Steinbeck

Catalog description

Many great and influential writers have also been natural historians. This course examines selections from the writing of such authors as the romantic and naturalist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the rationalist Benedict de Spinoza, the intuitive thermodynamicist William Blake, the naturalist novelist John Steinbeck, the lepidopterist novelist Vladimir Nabokov, the amateur paleontologist Arthur Conan Doyle, the proto-ecologist Henry David Thoreau, and the philosopher and sociologist Herbert Spencer. We will examine in a modern scientific context how facts and theories of natural history informed their writing and influenced their worldviews. Specific topics in this seminar will include: man’s place in nature and the importance of the discovery of this deep time perspective, Darwinian evolution and its impact on sociology, and the emerging science of ecology in 19th century American literature. Enrollment limited to 19 first year students.