Description

This workshop explores the various appearances and meanings of water in pre-modern literary cultures. What role did the geography of waterways play in the transregional movement of authors, texts, styles, and poetics? What commonalities and differences can we identify across pre-modern literary canons, including those in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and other vernaculars? How does water function as a literary motif and/or device in various traditions? Which (metaphorical) meanings are attached to it? And what light can our understanding of pre-modern human-nature relationships shine on modern-day ecological concerns? The aim of this workshop is to explore these questions through a variety of disciplinary, literary and linguistic contexts and approaches. In doing so, it seeks to build on a growing body of scholarship that turns the critical lens onto water.