Sylvia Bowerbank uncovers the historical roots of contemporary debates within ecofeminism as found in the works of such major literary figures as Mary Wroth, Margaret Cavendish, and Mary Wollstonecraft.
In early modern England, the entry of women into the politics of nature occurred during a volatile period when the cultural meaning of nature was being destabilized by scientific advances and religious controversies, thus opening up new rights, roles, and responsibilities for women. For the two centuries covered in this book, Bowerbank describes a range of choices made by literary women in negotiating their place within the broader discourse on nature and humanity's changing relationship to it