British Labouring-Class Nature Poetry, 1730-1837

BRIDGET KEEGAN is Professor of English at Creighton University, USA. She is the editor of volume two of Eighteenth-Century Labouring-Class Poets and (with James C. McKusick) of Literature and Nature. With Simon White and John Goodridge, she co-edited Robert Bloomfield: Lyric, Class and the Romantic Canon. She is the author of numerous articles and chapters on labouring-class writers.

• Table of contents Acknowledgments List of abbreviations Introduction: 'A weed in nature's poesy': British Labouring-Class Nature Poetry, 1730-1837 'The Fields his Study': Robert Bloomfield's Poetics of Sustainability Return to the Garden: James Woodhouse and Polite Cultivations Heavenly Prospects: Views from Clifton and Cliffden Writing against the Current: Anne Wilson's Teisa and Labouring-Class River Poetry 'What terms of Art can Nature's pow'rs express?': William Falconer and Labouring-Class Poetry at Sea 'And all is nakedness and fen': John Clare's Wetlands Conclusion: The Politics and Poetics of Wood: Labouring-Class Poetry in the Victorian Era Notes Index

'Bridget Keegan's book is a work of meticulous scholarship and will be welcomed as a substantial contribution to the postmodern reassessment of the English literature canon that is going on in the academic world; but it also has things to reveal to the non-academic reader who holds that the realm of poetry is a classless republic.' - M.M. Mahood, John Clare Society Journal 'Her [Keegan] survey as a whole appears to be both well-informed and well-balanced. Students and lovers of English poetry will read it with profit and pleasure.' - Thomas Kullmann