Air and atmosphere studies: Enlightenment, phenomenology and ecocriticism

Abstract

This essay examines the treatment of air and atmosphere in literary scholarship of the late 17th- to mid-19th-century periods, from the first, early Enlightenment discovery of the air's chemical structure and the coining of the word ‘atmosphere’, to the dawning of Victorian industrial pollution. As climate has become the predominant focus of environmental campaigning, and as air pollution and air infection have become near-universal concerns, the air itself has gained a corresponding increase in academic attention. Part I of my essay begins by sketching out the longer history of this interest, showing that air and atmosphere are complex words that have longstanding philosophical and literary histories alongside their everyday ‘real’ meanings. I explore the place of air studies in the History of Science, and look at how this discipline and English studies have enjoyed a close proximity with regards to the major chemical discoveries of the Enlightenment period. Part II defines the field of ‘atmosphere studies’ as it has emerged from 20th-century philosophy, and its importance to contemporary geography, anthropology and architecture. The complexity of the idea of ‘atmosphere’ is, however, rooted in early 19th-century aesthetics, and hence, I argue, literary scholarship of this period makes a crucial contribution to this broader atmospheric enquiry. Part III explores how literary critics and historians have begun to respond to contemporary discourse on air as primarily an issue of climate change and pollution, and suggests that there is a new eco-realism or literalness in discussion of atmosphere, borne out by increasing reflection on the carbon impact of academic work itself. I sketch out some suggestions for future research and emphasize again the importance of the 18th- and 19th-century legacies for understanding and even acting upon the contemporary air and climate crisis.