Agency From A Stone: Shelley’s Posthumanist Experiments In "Mont Blanc"

Authors

Betsy Bolton, Swarthmore CollegeFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2016

Published In

Word And Text

Abstract

This article reads Shelley’s ‘Mont Blanc’ as an extended exploration into possible modes of relationship linking the human mind to the material world. The modes of relationship considered by Shelley anticipate many of the structures and strategies developed by posthumanist theory, including structural coupling, strategic anthropomorphism, imagistic translation, and human-nonhuman assemblages. After summarizing Kantian and post-Kantian readings of ‘Mont Blanc,’ the essay works through an extended close reading of the poem to elucidate its proto-posthumanist elements.

Keywords

structural coupling, strategic anthropomorphism, translation, assemblage, agency

Comments

This work is freely available courtesy of Word and Text.

Recommended Citation

Betsy Bolton. (2016). "Agency From A Stone: Shelley’s Posthumanist Experiments In "Mont Blanc"". Word And Text. Volume 6, Issue 1. 28-47.
https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-english-lit/318