Climate fiction : changement climatique et littérature

Last updated on 17 septembre 2019

Un nouveau genre littéraire

En science-fiction et dans les romans en général, un nouveau genre commence à se faire connaitre : la climate (change) fiction, ou cli-fi pour les intimes.

Il s’agit de traiter des différents scénarios du changement climatique dans des fictions, anticipation, mondes post-apocalyptiques, dystopies, ou autres récits de survivants.

Imaginer le monde qui change avec le climat

Montée du niveau des eaux, sécheresses extrêmes, repli derrière des murs, tous les aspects des différents scénarios du GIEC sont exploités, ainsi que certains des éléments les plus préoccupants des avancées scientifiques : mutations génétiques, géo-ingénierie, et autres crises sanitaires.

Découvrir cet univers

Cet article recense ci-dessous quelques références pour aborder le thème : publications dans la presse et romans. Pour ces derniers, cliquer sur le titre vous enverra vers le site marchand d’amazon (liens affilés). De nombreux textes ne sont encore disponibles qu’en anglais, n’ayant pas encore fait l’objet de traductions.

Éléments de revue de presse sur le sujet :

• en français

  • La climate fiction va réchauffer la littérature Le Soir 04/04/2019
  • La « cli-fi », quand la science-fiction rencontre l’écologie Slate.fr 27/12/2018

• en anglais

  • Climate Fiction Guernica
  • Can the novel handle a subject as cataclysmic as climate change?The Economist 04/04/2019

À la radio, en réécoute :

• Les fictions climatiques vont-elles sauver la planète ? sur France Culture 

Quelques livres entrant dans cette catégorie :

En français :

• La Fille automate de Paolo Bacigalupi
  • Un monde frappé par une pénurie des ressources pétrolières et une montée des niveaux des océans due au réchauffement climatique.
• The Water knife de Paolo Bacigalupi

  • Dans un contexte de sécheresse apocalyptique liée aux activités humaines, la lutte qui oppose les États du Sud-Ouest américain pour l’accès à l’eau de la rivière Colorado. Sous le soleil écrasant du désert de l’Arizona, la population de Phoenix en est réduite à boire de son urine recyclée. Les personnes les plus fortunées survivent quant à elles confortablement sous des dômes recréant artificiellement des écosystèmes paradisiaques.

• Les Sables de l’Amargosa, de Claire Vaye Watkins
  • Un couple californien tente de survivre à la sécheresse en se ralliant aux adeptes d’un gourou sourcier et manipulateur.
• Terre Lointaine de Pierre-Yves Touzot
  • Débute sur l’éveil d’un personnage ne connaissant ni son identité, ni son passé, dans un environnement peuplé de créatures étranges et familières à la fois, dans lequel il tentera de survivre et de comprendre ce qui s’est passé durant son sommeil.

En anglais

• New York 2140 by Kim Stanley Robinson
  • A rise in sea levels has left Manhattan underwater, transformed into an archipelago of skyscrapers connected by waterways and bridges. Much of lower Manhattan is uninhabitable, with ever taller buildings being constructed where elevation is higher. A market trader finds new way to deal; a detective is never out of work; an internet star keeps entertaining fans; and a group of coders on the roof disappear, triggering a series of events that will shake the city to its core.
• Gold Fame Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins
  • Named after three major factors that have compelled hordes of people to move to California. Decades of unrelenting drought have left California bone dry. With no vegetation to hold it in place, dirt is swept into the wind, forming a massive sand dune that takes over the Mojave Desert. Most « Mojavs » have been evacuated to to internment camps — but not Luz and Ray. Tucked away in Los Angeles’ Laurel Canyon, the couple hide out in an abandoned mansion and bide their time drinking rationed cola and scavenging what little they can find nearby. But when a chance encounter with a child makes them yearn for something more, Luz and Ray embark on a dangerous journey east in hope of discovering a better life
• Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
  • Snowman might be the last human being alive. Struggling to survive in the aftermath of a worldwide plague, he begins a journey through the wilderness that was once a city, mourning the loss of his best friend, and surrounded by a new breed of humans — the remnants of corporate-run genetic engineering gone awry.
• Tentacle by Rita Indiana
  • In a post-apocalyptic Santo Domingo, a young humble maid named Acilde Figueroa discovers she’s able to travel back in time — and that a prophecy calls for her to do so and save the world by saving the ocean. With the help of a sacred anemone, she sets off on a mission that tackles issues of climate change, technology, queerness, colonialism, and Acilde’s own gender identity.
• The Overstory by Richard Powers (prix Pulitzer 2019)
  • A group of seeming strangers who’ve each been deeply affected by a tree at some point in their life, and who are drawn eventually to the same place, a final stand for the last acres of virgin forest in the world.
• The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi
  • A drought-stricken dystopia in the American West : The Colorado River is dwindling and the people of the American Southwest are in constant fight over water shares. Angel Velasquez is known as a « water knife » — a for-hire hitman who cuts off the water supply to impoverished communities and directs it instead to wealthy clients trying to maintain their luxurious lifestyles.
• The Completionist by Siobhan Adcock
  • All across America, people struggle with infertility issues. That is why a miraculously pregnant Fredricka has asked her brother Carter to look for their missing sister, Gardner. His search leads him to dangerous underground world he never really understood, and deep into their family’s past where he uncovers a painful truth he’s never been able to face.
• The Floating World by  C. Morgan Babst
  • As the storm is fast approaching the Louisiana coast, Cora refuses to leave the city. Her parents, Joe, an artist descended from freed slaves who became the city’s preeminent furniture makers, and his white “Uptown” wife, are forced to evacuate without her, setting off a chain of events that leaves their marriage in shambles and Cora catatonic.
• The Wall by John Lanchester
  • An island nation has built a gigantic concrete wall around its entire coastline in an effort to keep the Others out. Joseph, a new Defender, is tasked with protecting his section of the Wall from those trapped on the other side, where seas are rising and resources are dwindling. Failure means becoming an Other himself, but a part of Joseph can’t help but wonder: What would he do if he really did have to fight for his life?
• American War by Omar El Akkad
  • In this compelling dystopian, the second American Civil War has broken out over the use of fossil fuels and the increasingly deadly effects of climate change. The book’s protagonist Sarat was only six when the war started, and her entire life — including her father’s death and her family’s displacement — has been shaped by the never-ending conflict. It isn’t until she is befriended by a mysterious functionary and becomes an instrument of war herself that Sarat realizes her actions, and her choices, can shape the conflict.
• Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler
  • Global climate change and economic crises have created chaos across the nation. Outside, people will do anything it takes for a sip of water or a bit of shelter, but inside her gated community, 15-year-old Lauren Olamina is safe from the violence and her own debilitating hyperempathy. That is, until she decides to speak out and fight back against the disaster she knows is creeping right outside her door.
• Dry by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman
  • In this survival story, California’s deadly drought forces one young teen to make life or death decisions in order to stay alive. When the tap runs dry and her neighborhood becomes a warzone for water, Alyssa realizes she will do anything to keep her family safe.
• Age of Blight by Kristine Ong Muslim, illustrated by Alessandra Hogan
  • A haunting future world ravaged by humanity’s mistakes and missteps.
• Clade by James Bradley
  • In an apocalyptic future, the destruction of the planet seen through the eyes of one family over the course of three generations — beginning with one couple, and a scientist overwhelmed by his frustration over the fact that no one seems to understand the changing climate as the threat that it is.
• Memory of water by Emmi Itäranta
  • Earth’s landscape — geographic and political — has shifted irrevocably because of climate change, and much of the world is in the midst of water wars. Scandinavia is occupied by a state called New Qian; here, 17-year-old Noria Kaitio is following in the footsteps of her greatly respected father and training to be a tea master. The role comes with much responsibility, including knowledge of the locations of secret water sources — knowledge that quickly puts Noria’s life at risk.

© Gwen Caillet 2019 – Tous droits réservés.