This presentation allows glimpses of my first presented research paper. My research paper is on Envirocentric Literature and the title of my paper is Envirocentric Approach to Hard Times by Charles Dickens and William Wordsworth’s selected Poems .

1. Envirocentric Approach to Hard Times by
Charles Dickens and William Wordsworth’s
selected Poems
Prepared By: Barad Jheel
M.A. Semester 2
jheelbarad@gmail.com
Submitted to- Research Facilitation centre, MKBU
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH,
M.K. BHAVNAGAR UNIVERSITY

2. ABSTRACT
This paper attempts to view the Environment in selected
literary text. In recent years the human and environment
connection has provided a vast area for research.
Environment is an inseparable part of human’s world but
personal greed has increased the depletion of nature.
Dickens in Hard Times have done great service unknowingly
by projecting imagery of industrial town and imparted
serious teaching of Environment. William Wordsworth is
nature poet and so this paper also makes efforts to read his
poems as envirocentric literature. Every literary work
constitutes an environment in the background, reading it
allows us to understand its problem in contemporary time.
This paper attempts to read the environment in selected
literary works.

3. OBJECTIVES
● Envirocentric Literature was coined in 1978, Can we
find Envirocentricism in Literature published before
it?
● Do ‘Hard Times’, ‘The World is Too Much With Us’ and
‘The Tables Turned’ show the relation between
literature and Physical Environment?
● Envirocentric Literature provides deeper insight in
the mannerism of society in treatment of nature.

4. INTRODUCTION
‘Ecocriticism’ was coined by William Rueckert in his essay
‘Literature and Ecology: An Experiment in Ecocriticism’ in 1978.
Later in the 1980s, collective work began under this genre by the
efforts of Western Literature Association. It set up ASLE
(Association for the study of Literature and Environment’) at a
Conference in Reno with a motive of "sharing of facts, ideas, and
texts concerning the study of literature and the environment,"
in 1992 .
Cheryll Glotfelty defined Envirocentricism/ ecocriticism in ‘The
Ecocriticism Reader’ (1996) "ecocriticism is the study of the
relationship between literature and the physical environment".

5. HARD TIMES AS ENVIROCENTRIC
LITERATURE
Published: 1854
agricultural titles “ Sowing,” “Reaping,” and
“Garnering”-ironic
“It was a town of red brick, or of brick that would have been red if the
smoke and ashes had allowed it…
“ interminable serpents of smoke trailed
“black canal in it, and a river that ran purple
with ill-smelling dye....”

6. WORDSWORTH'S
POEMS
The world is too much with us; late
and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste
our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a
sordid boon!
Up! up! my friend, and quit your books;
Or surely you’ll grow double:...
Books! ’tis a dull an endless strife:
Come, and hear the woodland linnet,
How sweet his music! on my life,
There’s more of wisdom in it
One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the sages can.
“The World is Too Much
With Us” (1807)
“The Tables Turned”
(1798)

7. WORK CITED-
Ago, Miupiuin #poetry • 4 Years. “The World Is Too Much With Us.” Steemit, December 2, 2017.
https://steemit.com/poetry/@miupiu/the-world-is-too-much-with-us.
Barzinji, Mariwan. “Nature and Environment in William Wordsworth's Selected Poems: An Eco-
Critical Approach.” International Journal of Social and Educational Innovation (IJSEIro), January 1,
2020. https://www.academia.edu/44009821/Nature_and_Environment_in_William_Wo
rdsworths_Selected_Poems_An_Eco_critical_Approach.
Bate, Jonathan. “Romantic Ecology (Routledge Revivals): Wordsworth and the Environmental
Tradition.” Routledge & CRC Press. Accessed February 21, 2022.
https://www.routledge.com/Romantic-Ecology-Routledge-Revivals-Wordsworthand-the-
Environmental/Bate/p/book/9780415856652.
Batra, Jagdish. “Ecological Consciousness in Recent Indian English Fiction,” May 11, 2020.
“Coketown — Kodarik.” Accessed March 11, 2022. https://kodarik.com/Coketown.
Crosswalk.com. “What Does ‘Reap What You Sow’ Mean?” Accessed March 11, 2022.
https://www.crosswalk.com/faith/spiritual-life/what-does-reap-what-you-sow-mean.html.

8. Debrabant, Mary. “Smoke or No Smoke? Questions of Perspective in North and South.”
Cahiers Victoriens et Édouardiens, no. 71 Printemps (June 18, 2010): 75–88.
https://doi.org/10.4000/cve.2828. 8
Dickens, Charles. Hard Times. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2017.
Estok, Simon. “Ecocriticism in an Age of Terror.” CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and
Culture 15, no. 1 (March 1, 2013). https://doi.org/10.7771/1481-4374.2182.
Faraday, Michael. “The Great Stink.” Accessed February 21, 2022.
http://www.choleraandthethames.co.uk/cholera-in-london/the-great-stink/.
Gladwin, Derek. “Ecocriticism.” obo. Accessed February 21, 2022.
https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-
9780190221911/obo9780190221911-0014.xml.
Glotfelty, Cheryll. “The Ecocriticism Reader.” Georgia Press (blog). Accessed February 21,
2022. https://ugapress.org/book/9780820317816/the-ecocriticism-reader.
Hall, Clark. “The Development of Leisure in Britain, 1700-1850.” Accessed February 21, 2022.
https://victorianweb.org/history/leisure1.html.

9. meeker, Joseph. “Amazon.Com: The Comedy of Survival: Literary Ecology and a Play Ethic:
9780816516865: Meeker, Joseph W.: Books.” Accessed February 21, 2022.
https://www.amazon.com/Comedy-Survival-Literary-Ecology-Ethic/dp/08165168 63.
Ramazani, Abolfazl, and Elmira Bazregarzadeh. “An Ecocritical Reading of William
Wordsworth’s Selected Poems.” English Language and Literature Studies 4, no. 1 (February 20,
2014): p1. https://doi.org/10.5539/ells.v4n1p1.
Swami, Raj Kumar. “Ecological Harmony in William Wordsworth’s Selected Poems,” n.d., 5. 9
Taylor, Jesse Oak, Isobel Armstrong, Jonathan Bate, Tobias Boes, Kate Marshall, Dan Brayton,
Lynne Bruckner, et al., eds. “WHERE IS VICTORIAN ECOCRITICISM?” Victorian Literature and
Culture 43, no. 4 (2015): 877–94.
Vikash.S. “Hard Times as a Reflection of Victorian Society.” SMART MOVES JOURNAL IJELLH 9, no.
5 (May 31, 2021): 1–12. https://doi.org/10.24113/ijellh.v9i5.11024.
Wordsworth, William. “The Tables Turned by William Wordsworth.” Text/html. Poetry
Foundation. Poetry Foundation, February 20, 2022. Https://www.poetryfoundation.org/.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45557/the-tables-turned.
———. “The World Is Too Much With Us by William Wordsworth.” Text/html. Poetry Foundation.
Poetry Foundation, February 19, 2022. Https://www.poetryfoundation.org/.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45564/the-world-is-too-much-with-us.

10. jheelbarad@gmail.com
THANK YOU