3 books of note

by J J Cohen

'Tis the season when a flurry of publication activity inevitably unfolds. Here are three book projects with which I've been happily involved. I am recommending these volumes as being of wide interest to ITM readers. Plus, the editors will really appreciate your support.

Environmental Humanities: Voices from the Anthropocene
ed. Serpil Oppermann and Serenella Iovino
from the website:

This important volume brings together scientific, cultural, literary, historical, and philosophical perspectives to offer new understandings of the critical issues of our ecological present and new models for the creation of alternative ecological futures. At a time when the narrative and theoretical threads of the environmental humanities are more entwined than ever with the scientific, ethical, and political challenges of the global ecological crisis, this volume invites us to rethink the Anthropocene, the posthuman, and the environmental from various cross-disciplinary viewpoints. The book enriches the environmental debate with new conceptual tools and revitalizes thematic and methodological collaborations in the trajectory of ecocriticism and the environmental humanities. Alliances between the humanities and the social and natural sciences are vital in addressing and finding viable solutions to our planetary predicaments. Drawing on cutting-edge studies in all the major fields of the eco-cultural debate, the chapters in this book build a creative critical discourse that explores, challenges and enhances the field of environmental humanities.

My own contribution is about onomatopoeia and environmental impress (with special attention to Marie de France and Geoffrey Chaucer). Complete table of contents is HERE.

Ecocriticism, Ecology and the Cultures of Antiquity
ed. Christopher Schliephake
This book I blurbed. Here's what I wrote:

Too many writers assume that ecocriticism and environmental engagement began with the poems of Wordsworth or the writings of Thoreau. This collection of essays well demonstrates that for as long as humans have been creating texts they have been meditating critically upon their place within a natural world that far exceeds them in scale and duration. Of as much interest to those working in the environmental humanities as classists, Ecocriticism, Ecology, and the Cultures of Antiquity demonstrates that the Greek and Latin texts of antiquity have much of importance to say to a critical conversation today.

Fascinating and wide ranging volume that makes major inroads into bringing ecocritical concerns to Greek and Roman materials.

Monsters in the Classroom: Essays on Teaching What Scares Us
ed. Adam Golub and Heather Richardson Hayton

This one is coming soon (March 2017). It's a wonderful, extremely useful collection for which I composed an afterword contemplating the uses to which "Monster Theory" has been put in various classrooms.