Monica Gagliano & John Charles Ryan 
Green Thread 
Dialogues with the Vegetal World

The Green Thread: Dialogues with the Vegetal World is an interdisciplinary collection of essays in the emerging field of Plant Studies. The volume is the first of its kind to bring together a dynamic body of scholarship that shares a critique of long-standing human perceptions of plants as lacking autonomy, agency, consciousness, and, intelligence.The leading metaphor of the book’;the green thread’, echoing poet Dylan Thomas’ phrase ’;the green fuse’carries multiple meanings. On a more apparent level, ’;the green thread’ is what weaves together the diverse approaches of this collection: an interest in the vegetal that goes beyond single disciplines and specialist discourses, and one that not only encourages but necessitates interdisciplinary and even interspecies dialogue. On another level, ’;the green thread’ links creative and historical productions to the materiality of the vegetala reality reflecting our symbiosis with oxygen-producing beings. In short, The Green Thread refers to the conversations about plants that transcend strict disciplinary boundaries as well as to the possibility of dialogue with plants.