Fuel: An Ecocritical History

Description

Fuel: An Ecocritical History is the first book to chart our changing attitudes to fuel and energy through the literature and culture of the modern era, focusing on the 18th-century to the present. Reading a wide range of writers from Blake, Austen and Dickens to Upton Sinclair and Edward Abbey, Heidi Scott explores how our move from a pre-industrial reliance on biomass and elemental energy sources to our current dependence on the fossil fuels of coal, oil and natural gas have fundamentally shaped human identity and culture. The book’s Anthropocene perspective reshapes our view of energy history and climate change, and Fuel looks forward to ways in which we can reimagine our culture away from the fossil fuel paradigm towards a more sustainable energy future driven by renewable, elemental energy. Cover Half-title Title Copyright Contents List of Figures Acknowledgments 1. Introduction I. New York City to Albany II. Fuel history III. Defining Fuel IV. Energy ontology V. The arc of Fuel Part 1: Biomass 2. Grass: Muscle Power I. The country: The pastness of the pastoral II. The city: Crosstown traffic III. In depth: B lack Beauty IV. Borderline biomass: Peat and whale oil 3. Wood: Forests’ Fires I. Burning to survive II. The hospitable blaze III. In depth: Jane Austen 4. Charcoal: Firing Early Industry I. The collier II. Selling charcoal III. Blow it up: Gunpowder and fi reworks Part 2: Fossil Fuels 5. King Coal I. Workhouse workhorse II. The Big Smoke and Auld Reekie III. In depth: Wuthering Heights and H ow Green Was My Valley IV. Do the locomotion V. Horizon gone: Mountaintop removal mining 6. Black Gold I. Oil ontology II. Gusher gawkers III. Road trip! IV. Oil’s locales V. Pastoral oilfields: The suburbs VI. A note on natural gas 7. Interlude: Human Food Part 3: Primary Energy 8. Renewables: The Elements Move I. Breeze II. Flow III. Star IV. Atom 9. Conclusion Bibliography Index