Abstract:
Environmental Chronotopes, Climate Change, and High North Counter-Narratives in Contemporary Fiction
This project has two main objectives. The first objective entails examining the roles of Nature and climate change in contemporary Nordic and Anglophone novels set in the High North. I will contrast the ways in which novels like Ann-Helén Læstadius’ Stöld (Stolen), and Alice Henderson’s A Blizzard of Polar Bears create literary spacetimes (or “chronotopes”) that play into Arctic master- or counter-narratives of High North Environments, and compare the way in which these authors envision characters reactions to their environment changing.
For the second half of my project, I will apply the Climate Reality Check to just over thirty novels that won the Critic’s, Pulitzer, and Booker Prizes from 2014 to 2024. The Climate Reality Check is a Bechdel-Wallace-inspired test for climate change representation in on- and off-screen narratives. It was designed in 2024 by Professor Matthew Schneider-Mayerson, members of Buck Lab for Climate & Environment, and the non-profit Good Energy, and asks two questions:
1. Does climate change exist in the story’s world?
2. Do characters know about it?
For this project, I will ask one additional question when examining the novels:
3. If it exists in the story world and characters know about it, do the characters talk about or act against climate change?