The Nature of the Page; or Seeing and Reading the Social Ecology of Texts

In this talk, Joshua Calhoun discussed his recent book The Nature of the Page: Poetry, Papermaking, and the Ecology of Texts in Renaissance England. Exploring the ecopoetic interplay between human ideas and the plant, animal, and mineral forms through which they are mediated, Calhoun’s work prompts us to see and even read the finite natural resources in everything from the old books we research to the new smartphones we use to take pictures of those books. Calhoun’s talk focused especially on the role of gelatin sizing in early handmade printing paper and on the environmental ethics of book preservation in fossil-fueled “ideal” climates. A robust discussion followed the talk during which attendees are welcome to ask questions as well as to share their own related insights or discoveries.

Joshua Calhoun, Associate Professor of English and Faculty Affiliate with the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, specializes in Shakespeare, 16th- & 17th-century poetry, the history of media, and the environmental humanities. His work has been published in PMLA, Shakespeare Studies, and Environmental Philosophy. His first book, The Nature of the Page: Poetry, Papermaking, and the Ecology of Texts in Renaissance England (UPenn Press, 2020), explores the ecopoetic interplay between literary ideas and the physical forms they are made to take as paper texts. Calhoun is also the co-founder of Holding History, a mentorship-driven public engagement project that involves hands-on training in book making and archival research.