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Critical Insights: Going Into the Woods
Woods and forests in literature have long been seen as places of both beauty and danger, of both charm and threat. Dark woods, in particular, have often been treated as symbols of vulnerability, especially when they are imagined as inhabited by wild animals so that they become literal wildernesses—wild places—in which people can easily lose their way and face general insecurity and specific forms of menace.
The woods have traditionally symbolized mystery, the unknown, and even danger as countless brave characters have ventured into the forest. In contrast, forests have also symbolized a place where literary figures have sought refuge, sanctuary, freedom, and escape.
Sometimes, as in Shakespeare’s As You Like It or A Midsummer Night’s Dream, entry into a forest can result in positive, even magical, outcomes. But other times, as in Jack London’s short story, "In a Far Country", entering a forest can suggest hardship, survival, and potential madness. This volume explores the theme of journeying into the woods by interpreting the topic broadly and sometimes metaphorically.
This new addition to the Critical Insights series guides readers through the historical, philosophical, and sociological perspectives of the forest as a setting in literature, examining the topic broadly and metaphorically. The ways in which literary depictions wilderness journeys have been translated into various forms of media including film and art are also explored.
Relevant works include C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Flannery O’ Connor’s "A View of the Woods", Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s play Into the Woods, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, as well as Jon Krakauer’s noted work of nonfiction, Into the Wild.
This volume guides readers in exploring the different ways in which forests appear in literature, taking into account historical context and viewing the work through a critical lens. Relivant works are examined in terms of their critical reception and in comparison to other important works within this theme.
Four Critical Context essays explore the theme of the woods within literature. These Essays include:
- The Once and Future Wizard: Arthurian (and Anti-Arthurian) Themes in the Harry Potter Series, Danny Adams.
- Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods on Broadway and TV: A Survey of Early Reviews, Robert C. Evans
- Mystery and Sacrament in Flannery O’Connor’s “A View of the Woods,” Brandon Schneeberger
- “Out of this wood do not desire to go”: The Woods in Six Productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Christopher Baker
The Critical Context essays are followed by nine Critical Readings essays which include:
- The Matter of the Greenwood and Otto Bathurst’s Robin Hood (2018), Alexander L. Kaufman
- The Forest Scenes in the 1981 BBC Production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Robert C. Evans
- Forest Imagery in Four Illustrations of Shakespeare’s As You Like It, Jordan Bailey
- Finding a Voice in the American Woods: Henry David Thoreau, Jericho Williams
- Mark Twain in the Woods, Jeffrey Melton
- Wilderness, Forest, and Jungle: The Woods and the Rhetoric of Colonialism in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Matthew M. Thiele
- Wilderness Survival in Jack London’s “In a Far Country,” Kelley Jeans
- “How do we know?”: Mystery and Ambiguity in the Narnian Forest in C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Robert C. Evans
- Responses to Christopher McCandless in Sean Penn’s Film Into the Wild, Bryan Warren
Each essay in Critical Insights: Going Into the Woods includes a list of Works Cited and detailed endnotes. In the final section, Resources, provides a list of Additional Works on The Supernatural for those who wish to further explore this theme followed by a Bibliography. Finally, this section closes with an About the Editor section, Contributors, and a detailed Index.
The Critical Insights Series distills the best of both classic and current literary criticism of the world’s most studied literature. Edited and written by some of academia’s most distinguished literary scholars, Critical Insights: Going Into the Woods provides authoritative, in-depth scholarship that students and researchers will rely on for years. This volume is destined to become a valuable purchase for all.
