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'How do we best define a climate change novel? Given the complexities of climate change, as a real, scientific and cultural phenomenon, global warming demands a corresponding degree of complexity in fictional representation. Recent popular debates here and overseas raise further questions about what exactly constitutes a climate change novel. Does a climate change novel need to be set in the present? Or set in the future? Set during the time of climate change and extreme weather events, and the associated food scarcity and water wars, or can it be well after that —such as George Turner’s iconic The Sea and Summer? Are these novels best framed in context of utopian studies and science fiction studies? Andrew Milner has contextualised The Sea and Summer in terms of understanding the history of Australian science-fictional dystopias. For him, science fiction, whether utopian or dystopian , is ‘as good a place as any’ for ‘thought experiments about the politics of climate change’. He rejects the widespread ‘academic prejudice in literary studies against science fiction dystopias’ arguing that science fiction cannot readily be assimilated into either high literature or popular fiction (as genre). ' (33)
Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of
Last amended 5 Jun 2019 16:03:47
33-40
How Do We Define the Climate Change Novel?
Subjects:
- The Sea and Summer 1987 single work novel
- Days Like This 2010 single work novel
- D'harawal Seasons and Climatic Cycles 2008 single work prose
- Dance of the Freaky Green Gold 2008 single work novel
- Red Heart 2001 single work novel
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