A History of Gardens & Garden Literature from the Seventeenth to the Nineteenth Century

During the next five weeks, we are going to explore the exchange between garden design and its iconography, and the evolving relationship which it enjoys with the literature of the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in Britain.

The first two weeks will concentrate on seventeenth century garden design and thought and the manner in which politics became through the work of Marvell and Milton embroiled in the Garden. The garden during this period was politically involved with religious thought and ideas of the contemplative life, at odds with a period which sees the English Civil Wars.

Week 3 and 4 will explore the changing designs of gardens in the eighteenth century and will discuss the Picturesque and early Romantic literature.

Weeks 5 and 6 will focus on the garden's continued development into the nineteenth century and we will explore the upsurge in the pleasure garden and the literature associated with it. We will discuss Vauxhall in London particularly.

Throughout each element of the course we will encounter broad themes such as the better place/the Golden Age/, nostalgia, myth, identity and class. These subjects will prompt lively and engaged discussion.