All Is Deep: All Is Shallow—Literary Springs, Wells and Depths, from Shakespeare to Ecocriticism

Kerridge starts his Coda with the tropes associated traditionally with the idea that water rising from deep underground in springs has healing and rejuvenating properties. His special concern, in this Coda, is with the tradition that deep springs represent a return to personal and cultural origin, and therefore have the capacity to restore the youth and vigour associated with origin. Kerridge then bridges the gap between past and present approaches to spa waters. He also turns to ecocriticism, and asks what inflection an environmental concern with ecological processes has given to the tropes explored in Chiari and Cuisinier-Delorme’s volume. The need for ecological familiarity with depth and origin stands in difficult but energetic dialectical relation to the traditional need for mystery, Kerridge concludes.