How the world changes dystopias :|an ecocritical study of evolving climate fiction novels

Abstract

There is a deep lack of attention to the discussions of climate change, both in general and in literature. The scientific data suggests that we are at a point of no return when with global warming and we will face great climate disasters in the near future. The Drowned World(1962) written by J. G. Ballard and New York 2140 (2017) written by Kim Stanley Robinson, as novels depicting similar drowned futures, use future narratives to criticize current Anthropocentric stances on climate change, and portray dystopic futures as warnings for the present reader. Reading the novels’ fluid connection to time and place through the lens of science fiction as a genre that blurs the boundaries between reality and fiction, this work seeks to trace the entanglements future climate narratives offer as alternatives to current dynamics of capitalism and ecological disaster. Both novels use the motif of the water as an actor that freely flows between boundaries and the different scales of time and disaster depictions show the ineffectiveness of Cartesian binaries against a fast changing climate. Science fiction elements blur the well-established time and space constraints of the Western narrative while questioning the human time and place on Earth. The use of posthuman ecocritical theories offer an alternative to present dichotomies between nature and culture. Science fiction works help to shape different ideologies that do not alienate the human from the the nature, which in turn may help the longevity and quality of human life on the planet.