Abstract

This paper sets out to study the concept of ‘dynamic organicism’ in Percy Bysshe Shelley’s romantic vision of Vegetarianism. Dynamic organicism refers to an energetic and driving force instrumental in growth or change. It is a universal literary concept whereby the writer transcends the ordinary view of things, sees reality beyond the corporal frame of existence and through the imagination seeks an ideal and works towards changing the corrupt order of the universe by reinstating order and moving it backwards to its natural state of felicity. According to Barzun (1943: 2 to 3), it is “a kind of revolt, a vindication of the individual, a liberation of the unconscious, a reaction against scientific methods...a revival of Catholicism...a return to nature”. Abrams (1973) considers dynamic organicism as a return to man’s original state of felicity as inGenesis before the original sin of Adam and Eve. For him, therefore, it is a kind of progression that looks like a regression. This study posits that Shelley’s vegetarianism is not only a health prescription, it is also a return to the nonviolent nature of man as in the Garden of Eden before Adam and Eve distorted and corrupted the natural order of being. It is, therefore, Shelley’s goal to seek a return to vegetarianism as a meal prescription in the Bible both for health reasons and as a nonviolent necessity in the universe. The quickening point here is that those who feed on vegetables are less prone to violence than those who slaughter for food. The violence on animals is a microcosm of man’s macroscopic violence on man, thus the result of all societal violence, conflicts and ills. The paper uses both the romantic theories of Morse Peckham and the Ecocriticism of Glotfelty in the interpretation of Shelley’s vegetarianism.

Key words: Vegetarianism, dynamic organicism, romanticism, imagination, nonviolence, ecocriticism.