A review of
Colonizing Nature: The Tropics in British Arts and Letters, 1760-1820
appears in CLIO, a Journal of Literature, History, and the Philosophy of History, Volume 35:3. Reviewer Janet Sorensen writes:
Moving gracefully between a variety of written and visual genres, from georgic poetry and travel narratives to paintings and illustrated botanical books, Fowkes Tobin investigates "discursive processess…to reconstruct the conditions under which tropical plants, flowers, and fruit as well as landscapes were produced and consumed."
Colonizing Nature speaks to scholars of all levels, says Sorensen:
While the seasoned postcolonial scholar will find new and original arguments here, the student new to colonial discourse will find an especially helpful review of some of the major discussions of British colonial practices and debates in the eighteenth centure, from the economic relations between the West Indies and New England to Edmund Burke’s rhetoric in the trial of Hastings.
