Hinchman, Lewis P., and Sandra K. Hinchman. “What We Owe the Romantics.” Environmental Values 16, no. 3 (2007): 333–54. doi:10.3197/096327107X228382.
Romanticism is recognized as a wellspring of modern-day environmental thought and enthusiasm for nature-preservation, but the character of the affinities between the two is less well understood. Essentially, the Romantics realised that nature only becomes a matter for ethical concern, inspiration and love when the mind and sensibility of the human observer/agent are properly attuned and receptive to its meaning. That attunement involves several factors: a more appropriate scientific paradigm, a subtler appreciation of the impact that the setting of human dwelling, especially landscape, may have on character; the discovery of “life” and spontaneity as a motif in science and art; a deeper and more complex sense of time; and a feel for place drawn from the life-world rather than physics or economics. Romanticism invented a new language and set of descriptions to illuminate all of these things, one we neglect or forget at our peril.
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