The Romantic Turn of Industrial Rationality：A Case Study of Landscape Changes on Dartmoor in Southwestern England in the 19th Century

Abstract

Dartmoor in Devon, southwest England, is an ecological habitat with Blanket Bog as the predominant soil type. After the 1760s, industrial activities considerably changed Dartmoor's surface and subsurface landscapes. Against the background of the industrial landscape eroding the natural landscape, the romantic trend of thought colored the pale landscape narrative in the past, transforming the British people's sympathy for the environment into empathy for the environment in the 19th century. The academic tradition believed that romanticism was a treason to enlightenment rationality. However, romanticism was the development of enlightened rationality based on inheriting rational thinking tools to seek the way of harmonious coexistence between humans and nature.