Marek Oziewicz, Brian Attebery, and Tereza Dĕdinovă (eds.), Fantasy and Myth in the Anthropocene

Marek Oziewicz, Brian Attebery, and Tereza Dĕdinovă (eds.). Fantasy and Myth in the Anthropocene. Imagining Futures and Dreaming Hope in Literature and Media. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2022 ISBN: 978-1-350-20416-4. UK: £24.99

Fantasy and myth are two of the best ways of dealing with the doom and gloom of climate change according to the contributors to Fantasy and Myth in the Anthropocene because imagination helps us to resist despair and see possibilities. How can we transition to an ecological civilisation? This is the primary question raised in the texts, stories and images that fill the pages of Fantasy and Myth in the Anthropocene.

The consequences of the pollution, global warming, loss of biodiversity and climate change that characterise the Anthropocene pose enormous challenges to the survival of the human race – but not to the Earth. Our planet will survive with or without us. Human exploitation of the Earth and the inevitable extinction of mankind due to over-exploitation of resources and a belief in our inalienable right to be masters of the planet have provoked a variety of reactions, including anger, triumph, denial and resignation.

It is necessary to create a different story, argue the contributors. A story based on a deep understanding of the special qualities of the Earth, a recognition that it is not a resource without limitations, and that what we do today will decide what tomorrow will look like.

Fantasy and myth are important components of the different story we need to write because they enable us, through imagination, to engage with what the editors call ‘the questions of the Anthropocene.’ This imagination enables us to visualise sustainable futures. As Marek Oziewicz writes in the introduction, ‘we need to jump-start our imaginations to envision an ecological civilization’ (5). Our imagination must create the stories we need.

Fantasy and Myth in the Anthropocene. Imagining Futures and Dreaming Hope in Literature and Media focuses on younger readers because they have most at stake. The stories we tell about the Anthropocene must show that visions can become realities, and that resistance is not only possible, it is necessary. It is not dystopian literature that we need but fantastic stories that will change our vision, stimulate our imagination, and encourage action.

The contributors discuss a wide range of well-known works by such authors as J.R.R. Tolkien, Terry Pratchett, Jeanette Winterson, Kim Stanley Robinson and many others. As Brian Attebery puts it, fantasy enables us to see the Anthropocene as shifting and elusive. We must move with it, in our stories as well as in our thoughts, if we are to understand it and save the Earth. Fantasy helps us to understand the nature of the universe by asking questions – questions that we tend not to ask in any other kind of text.