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Hybrid Philosophers: Cavendish’s Reading of Hooke’s Micrographia

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The Palgrave Handbook of Early Modern Literature and Science

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Abstract

The animals which appear in Robert Hooke’s Micrographia (1665) and Margaret Cavendish’s The Blazing World (1666)1 illustrate the two authors’ very different ideas about the relationship humans have with nature. In this paper I will argue that the human-animal hybrid characters who are a memorable part of Cavendish’s story were in fact a response to and parody of Hooke’s drawings and descriptions of insects enlarged with a microscope. The two lots of creatures can be seen as emblems of conflicting ideas about the correct methodology for natural philosophy.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Unit for History and Philosophy of Science, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    Ian Lawson

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  1. Ian Lawson
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of English, Rutgers University–Camden, Camden, NJ, USA

    Howard Marchitello

  2. Department of English, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand

    Evelyn Tribble

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Lawson, I. (2017). Hybrid Philosophers: Cavendish’s Reading of Hooke’s Micrographia . In: Marchitello, H., Tribble, E. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Early Modern Literature and Science . Palgrave Handbooks of Literature and Science. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-46361-6_22

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