Description:

Arctic ice was both an obstacle and an object of desire in England's attempts during the sixteenth century at building an empire overseas, and, as the Little Ice Age set in in Europe, increasingly a regular feature of the English climate at the end of the 16th century.  A series of English expeditions to discover northerly trade routes to both East and West Indies promised riches but ended in disaster, while winter fairs on the frozen Thames celebrated the strange new cold that reached England itself.  The article took shape in the early modern imagination between monstrous ice and a wonderful land of snow.

Sophie Lemercier-Goddard is maîtresse de conférences (associate professor) at the École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, specializing in early modern European literature and the literatures of Britain.

Lemercier-Goddard's visit is organized by William West (Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literary Studies), and is supported by Northwestern Buffett and the Office of the Vice President for International Relations through a Virtual International Visitors Grant.