Fact and Fiction explores the intersection between literature and the sciences, focusing on German and British culture between the eighteenth century and today. Observing that it was in the eighteenth century that the divide between science and literature as disciplines first began to be defined, the contributors to this collection probe how authors from that time onwards have assessed and affected the relationship between literary and scientific cultures.

Fact and Fiction’s twelve essays cover a wide range of scientific disciplines, from physics and chemistry to medicine and anthropology, and a variety of literary texts, such as Erasmus Darwin’s poem The Botanic Garden, George Eliot’s Daniel Deronda, and Goethe’s Elective Affinities. The collection will appeal to scholars of literature and of the history of science, and to those interested in the connections between the two.

Christine Lehleiter is an associate professor in the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures at the University of Toronto.

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‘The contributions succeed in both advancing understandings of historical processes of disciplinary differentiation and integration from the eighteenth century onwards and in introducing new perspectives on perennial debates concerning the potential value of literary cultures to the production of scientific knowledge. For this, perhaps above all else, the volume deserves a wide readership.’

European Romantic Review vol 28:04:2017

‘This collected volume presents a timely intervention into current disciplinary debates about the humanities and sciences…Fact and Fiction is an excellent example of interdisciplinary work in humanities.’

Monatshefte vol 110:01:2018

"This volume should be welcomed as an essential contribution to inter-disciplinary eighteenth- and nineteenth-century studies… It is an exemplary instance of the translation of a symposium into a published work and will be appreciated by researchers and advanced students of historical cultural studies in Europe as well as specialists in the question of literature and science."

University of Toronto Quarterly, vol 87 3, Summer 2018