Nature Literature discussion
News
>
Survey on the Influence of Environmental Fiction
date
newest »
newest »
Hi!This looks interesting and has set me off on a mission to explore some of your titles - I tend to read reflective nature writing rather than the fiction you are looking for.
I suppose part of the question here might be what difference the fiction a person reads might make to outlook and behaviour. As such, i suspect that the fiction that changes us might be harder to pin down. As an environmental artists and storyteller, I am still moved and inspired by some science fiction, and other work by people like Charles de Lint, Ursula Le Guin, Alan Garner, Keri Hulme, Paula Naban (not fiction but very inspiring - right name? The Desert Smells Like Rain). Even some crime fiction takes me deeply into a sense of place and a sens eof social and landscape change - Tony Hillerman for Navaho land, some of the Scandinavian writers for those landscapes....Good luck with your survey. I hope you get more responses than this unhelpful one and I shall look forward to reading them.
Hi, Gordon! Have you checked out Eco-Fiction.com and Ecology in Literature and the Arts- both great sites. Www.annispratt.com
I don't read a lot of fiction, but it makes sense that climate fiction would have a strong influence. The fiction works of Edward Abbey, particularly The Monkey Wrench Gang, but also Hayduke Lives and Black Sun, were tremendously influential in creating a unique brand of activism in recent history. Perhaps there is a similar work in the climate fiction sub genre.
It seems as if non-fiction dealing with facts should have greater influence that fictional accounts of the same phenomenon. Besides the actual facts of climate change seem much more powerful (in my eyes). Perhaps the initial question (goal) is geared towards reaching awareness in groups that generally do not concern themselves with the factual realm of nature?Why should fiction focusing on environmental impact/futures carry more influence more than worlds created by science fiction or fantasy novels? I guess this new fictional climate genre is a niche within science fiction (although getting far too close to where reality is heading for my taste).
Ray wrote: "I don't read a lot of fiction, but it makes sense that climate fiction would have a strong influence. The fiction works of Edward Abbey, particularly The Monkey Wrench Gang, but also Hayduke Lives ..."I view Abbey's Desert Solitaire (being in the realm of an environmental "biography") as much more powerful than his fictional works.
There is an article on this topic in the current issue of American Scholar:https://theamericanscholar.org/writin...
I would imagine that film would have more direct impact on popular culture than books. Waterworld is an example of climate fiction in film. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114898/
The list of books is: "Flight Behavior" by Barbara Kingsolver; "Forty Days of Rain" by Kim Stanley Robinson; "The Windup Girl" by Paolo Bacigalupi; "Odds Against Tomorrow" by Nathaniel Rich; "Solar" by Ian McKewan; "A Friend of the Earth" by T.C. Boyle; "The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View From the Future" by Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway; "Back to the Garden" by Clara Hume; "The Healer" by Antti Tuomainen; "Far North" by Marcel Theroux; "The Ice People" by Maggie Gee; "The Rapture" by Liz Jensen; "The Water Knife" by Paolo Bacigalupi; "From Here" by Daniel Kramb; "Heavy Weather" by Bruce Sterling; "Julian Comstock" by Robert Charles Wilson; "Not Dark Yet" by Berit Ellingsen; "Ultimatum" by Matthew Glass; and "The Carbon Diaries" by Saci Lloyd.