This lecture by Romanticism researcher Frederike Middelhoff uses selected examples to illuminate how Romantic literature and visual art from the German-speaking world staged ecological ideas before ecology was even spoken of as a science in the second half of the 19th century. At - or more precisely: before - the starting point of the history of ecology, a plurality of ecological thought is revealed that corresponds to a plurality of romantic forms of representation.

About the lecture series Cultural Plant Studies

The scientific study of plants has long since ceased to be the sole subject of botany. Literary and cultural studies now also utilise new botanical and philosophical findings to question established views of plants and, on this basis, to examine the role of plants in literary texts and other cultural media. In this way, the humanities are making a significant contribution to redescribing the relationship between humans and other living beings and showing, by way of example, how artistic forms of expression can help us to think differently about the future in times of global climate change and the destruction of biodiversity.

The interdisciplinary German-language event series Critical Plant Studies has been taking place since the summer semester 2023 as a cooperation between the Verein der Freunde und Förderer des Botanischen Gartens Wuppertal e.V. and the University of Wuppertal.

Date and time: 6 November 2025, 6 pm, location: Orangery, Elisenhöhe 1, 42107 Wuppertal