Easter Term 2016 - Frogs

   
The Science and Literature Reading Group returns for Easter Term 2016 with a series of meetings themed around frogs. The four sessions will explore various literary manifestations of frogs from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries, and from pond-dwelling tadpole to taxidermied specimen.

Fortnightly meetings will take place in the Newnham Grange Seminar Room at Darwin College, on Monday evenings from 7.30-9pm. All are welcome! Organised by Melanie Keene (Homerton) and Charissa Varma (Darwin).
 

2nd May – Natural historical frogs

•  Edward Topsell, ‘of FROGS’, in The History of Four-Footed Beasts and Serpents (1658), pp. 718-726.

16th May – Experimental frogs

• W.T. Sedgwick, ‘On Variations of Reflex-Excitability in the Frog, Induced by Changes of Temperature’, in Studies from the Biological Laboratory (1883), pp. 385-410.

30th May – Anthropomorphic frogs

• Hermann Ploucquet, The Frogs who would a-woo-ing go’, in The Comical Creatures from Wurtemburg (1851), pp. 58-60.

• Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Jeremy Fisher (1906).

 13th June – Poetic frogs

• Christina Rossetti, ‘A Frog’s Fate’ (1885).
• Robert Graves, ‘The Frog and the Golden Ball’ (1965).
• Seamus Heaney, ‘Death of a Naturalist’ (1966).

Optional additional reading

• Charlotte Sleigh, Frog (2012).