The Green Depression: American Eco-Literature of the 1930s and 40s

Project Overview:

While literary critics associate authors of the 1930s and 40s with leftist political and economic thought, they often ignore concern in the period’s literary texts with major environmental crises—including drought, dust storms, flooding, urban pollution, and the use of the atom bomb.  To fill this gap, The Green Depression: American Eco-Literature of the 1930s and 40sargues that depression-era authors contributed to the development of modern environmental thought in three distinct ways.  First, they began recognizing the apocalyptic effect that humans could have on the environment, particularly in response to the period’s many human-made environmental disasters.  Second, they supported the inherent value of nonhuman nature, including animal “predators” and “pests,” as conservationists like Aldo Leopold and Rosalie Edge were doing during the period.  And third, they anticipated what we now refer to as “environmental justice” by directly connecting environmental exploitation with racial, economic, and gender inequality.