ABSTRACT
While the previous two chapters explore colonial landscapes, this chapter explores the use of natural landscapes to respond to evolving ideas about the self, religion, and belief. Tracing the range of landscapes—barren, populated, urban, rural, broken, or inaccessible—Thomas Hardy and T. S. Eliot depict in their poetry, the chapter argues that both poets share similar approaches to depictions of human experience, broken communication, and religious doubt. These concerns were not unique to the “moderns” but preoccupied writers from the nineteenth century, especially as the advent of ecology brought with it new ways for humans to consider and theorize their relationships with the changing landscapes surrounding them. The chapter exposes Hardy’s and Eliot’s complex negotiations with concerns about human relations, communication, and the rapid gentrification which saw cities evolve into sprawling suburbs in which people were paradoxically closer and yet more alienated from one another.
