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Cultural Nature in Andrew Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens

Received: 1 June 2018     Accepted: 10 August 2018     Published: 6 September 2018
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Abstract

There has always been a dichotomy between ‘nature’ and ‘culture’ in literary theory and criticism, the outcome of which is but preference of one over the other. In this study, a poem by Andrew Marvell is chosen which best exemplifies the play of these two terms which result in merging this binary opposition in a way that defining one concept is conceivable in terms of the other. In view of the fact that culture functions a basic and inevitable role in literature and considering Baroque reasoning of the seventeenth century in mind, impact of culture in Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens on the basis of Terry Eagleton’s definition of culture is noticeable. In this regard, analysis of the poem embraces consideration of the speaker’s tone and consciousness as well as the poet’s viewpoint toward historical and cultural indications of the time, exposing how nature and culture affect each other without being conflicting to each other. The present paper aims to prove impact of culture with ample extracts of natural descriptions of the poem and disclose that ‘nature’ and ‘culture’ are applied interchangeably. In this study, the dominant cultural, socio-political and religious ideas and their impact on Marvel’s poem are taken into account. Application of Eagleton’s definition becomes possible through differentiation between the poet’s and the speaker’s idea toward nature and existing dialogism between the artificial and the natural in the poem.

Published in English Language, Literature & Culture (Volume 3, Issue 2)
DOI 10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11
Page(s) 33-36
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2018. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Culture, Nature, Terry Eagleton, Baroque, Andrew Marvell, The Mower Against Gardens, Historical, Religious

References
[1] Ashoori, D. (1938). Definitions & concept of culture. Tehran: Agah.
[2] Bushnell, Rebecca. (1996). A culture of teaching: early modern humanism in theory & practice. Cornell University Press.
[3] Corns, T. N. ed. (1993). The Cambridge companion to English poetry: Donne to Marvell. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[4] Eagleton, Terry. (2007). How to read a poem. Oxford: Wiley- Blackwell.
[5] Eagleton, Terry. (2000). Idea of culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
[6] Eagleton, Terry. (1984) “Nature and violence”, Critical Quarterly, Vol 26, no 1-2.
[7] Gosse, Edmund. (1885). From Shakespeare to Pope. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
[8] Lessenich, P. (2016). “The metaphysicals: English Baroque literature in context”. University of Bonn.
[9] Ogden, H V S. (1955). English taste in landscape in the seventeenth century. University of Michigan Press.
[10] Ryan, Michael. (2010) Cultural studies: a practical introduction. UK: Willey-Blackwell,
[11] Summers, J. Claude, & Pebworth, Ted-Larry, eds. (2002). Fault lines and controversies in the study of 17th C. English literature. Missouri: University of Missouri Press.
[12] Taylor, W. Edward. (1964). Nature & art in Renaissance literature. New York: Colombia University Press.
[13] Wilcher, Robert. (1967). “Natural details in the poetry of Andrew Marvell”. M.A Thesis, University of Birmingham.
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    Jalal Farzaneh Dehkordi, Parisa Pooyandeh. (2018). Cultural Nature in Andrew Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens. English Language, Literature & Culture, 3(2), 33-36. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11

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    Jalal Farzaneh Dehkordi; Parisa Pooyandeh. Cultural Nature in Andrew Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens. Engl. Lang. Lit. Cult. 2018, 3(2), 33-36. doi: 10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11

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    AMA Style

    Jalal Farzaneh Dehkordi, Parisa Pooyandeh. Cultural Nature in Andrew Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens. Engl Lang Lit Cult. 2018;3(2):33-36. doi: 10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11,
      author = {Jalal Farzaneh Dehkordi and Parisa Pooyandeh},
      title = {Cultural Nature in Andrew Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens},
      journal = {English Language, Literature & Culture},
      volume = {3},
      number = {2},
      pages = {33-36},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ellc.20180302.11},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ellc.20180302.11},
      abstract = {There has always been a dichotomy between ‘nature’ and ‘culture’ in literary theory and criticism, the outcome of which is but preference of one over the other. In this study, a poem by Andrew Marvell is chosen which best exemplifies the play of these two terms which result in merging this binary opposition in a way that defining one concept is conceivable in terms of the other.  In view of the fact that culture functions a basic and inevitable role in literature and considering Baroque reasoning of the seventeenth century in mind, impact of culture in Marvell’s The Mower Against Gardens on the basis of Terry Eagleton’s definition of culture is noticeable. In this regard, analysis of the poem embraces consideration of the speaker’s tone and consciousness as well as the poet’s viewpoint toward historical and cultural indications of the time, exposing how nature and culture affect each other without being conflicting to each other. The present paper aims to prove impact of culture with ample extracts of natural descriptions of the poem and disclose that ‘nature’ and ‘culture’ are applied interchangeably. In this study, the dominant cultural, socio-political and religious ideas and their impact on Marvel’s poem are taken into account. Application of Eagleton’s definition becomes possible through differentiation between the poet’s and the speaker’s idea toward nature and existing dialogism between the artificial and the natural in the poem.},
     year = {2018}
    }
    

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Author Information
  • Department of English Language, Imam Sadiq University, Tehran, Iran

  • Department of English Language, Tehran University, Tehran, Iran

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