Writing the world’s end: new stories about climate change and the end of humanity. From the interview:

YaleNews asked [James] Berger about apocalyptic media, the “existential threat” of climate change, and what hope — if any — fiction can offer in the face of real-life catastrophe.

Apocalyptic stories date back at least to ancient flood myths, and have existed and evolved up to the recent boom in “zombie apocalypse” media. What is it about the end of the world that is so timelessly appealing?

In traditional apocalyptic thought, there’s a sense of some fundamental moral problem with the world, a problem or set of problems that cannot be fixed by human means. The world must be utterly transformed, brought to an end and begun again — which requires divine intervention. Apocalyptic thinking is different from prophecy. The prophet tells people to change their behaviors and warns of terrible consequences if they do not: If the people do repent and change, the disaster will be averted. But the apocalyptic messenger tells what will happen no matter what people do. The coming catastrophic punishment has been determined and will come no matter what. Human agency has been vacated.

The catastrophe itself is a revelation of a deep truth about the world that had been hidden and is now exposed. The apocalypse is a revelatory catastrophe — and apocalypse means revelation, a making apparent of what had been concealed — and that is why religious apocalypses are always preceded and accompanied by symbols and portents that must be interpreted even as they are occurring.

So, the appeal is that the world of sin, oppression, and injustice finally gets what it so richly deserves: absolute obliteration (except for the few, virtuous chosen people who are to survive and enter the new world)….

With scientists and politicians increasingly referring to climate change as an “existential threat” to society, there’s a growing phenomenon of so-called “climate anxiety” — a looming dread about the effects of global warming. How has this anxiety worked its way into popular culture and literature?

There’s an increasing number of science fiction novels that deal with climate disaster. Paolo Bacigalupi’s work is notable. And climate is one important element among others in Margaret Atwood’s “Maddaddam” trilogy. A bit earlier, there was T.C. Boyle’s “A Friend of the Earth.” And there have been a few films: “The Day After Tomorrow,” “Snowpiercer.” Generally, the topic has proved difficult for genre fiction to figure out. It happens too slowly; it lacks characters. The politics are too complicated. And, I suppose, it’s really too depressing. It’s a fight that’s being lost. The best work of fiction, to my mind, is Richard Powers’ “The Overstory.” It’s scientifically on point. It’s about forests. And it really is about forests. There are interesting human characters too. But in a sense, it’s actually not about us….

The term “extinction” has superseded the term “apocalypse.” That seems to be what we’re looking at. If there’s any “revelation” involved in the process, that appears to be it.

Our thinking and action now must be resolutely anti-apocalyptic.