Acknowledgements xvii
Preface:Communities,collaborations and chaos xix
The process of the book xxi
Introduction:Ecofeminism and the seeds of time 1
Ecofeminism past and present 2
Ecofeminism in/and early modern studies 11
1 Ecofeminism matters 17
Domesticated beings 18
Knowing things 22
A substance of subject-objects 26
Historical practice and present crisis 32
2 Of mouseholes and housefires:Transcorporeal domesticity 39
‘Noysome and pestilent things’ 42
Pest control:The scratching cat and ‘the smallest monstrous mouse’ 51
(Beyond) pest control:Fleas,flies and other creeping creatures 58
Between small and great,soft and fierce:The hearth 63
After the fire 73
3 How we know any thing 77
Nothing is everything 78
Unknowability 89
‘Howe'er you come to know it’ 98
The power of and in uncertainty 103
4 The dynamic object 105
The indifference of stone 105
Dynamism in the garden 109
(Boys as) women as plants 117
Petrarch in the produce aisle 128
Conclusion:Nature,stir:Ecofeminists in the archive 131
Healing nature 131
Living nature 140
Appendix:Excavating nature 143
Notes 147
Bibliography 171
Index 185
