Cover -- Half-title -- Title -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Figures -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: making early modern science and literature -- 1 Model worlds: Philip Sidney, William Gilbert, and the experiment of worldmaking -- 2 From embryology to parthenogenesis: the birth of the writer in Edmund Spenser and William Harvey -- 3 Reading through Galileo's telescope: Johannes Kepler's dream for reading knowledge -- 4 Books written of the wonders of these glasses: Thomas Hobbes, Robert Hooke, and Margaret Cavendish's theory of reading -- Afterward: fiction and the Sokal hoax -- Notes -- introduction: making early modern science and literature -- 1: model worlds: philip sidney, william gilbert, and the experiment of worldmaking -- 2 from embryology to parthenogenesis: the birth of the writer in edmund spenser and william harvey -- 3 reading through galileo's telescope: johannes kepler's dream for reading knowledge -- 4 books written of the wonders of these glasses: thomas hobbes, robert hooke, and margaret cavendish's theory of reading -- afterword: fiction and the sokal hoax -- Index.