Speaking Climate Truths to Power and Spotlighting Five Climate Flash Fiction Pieces I Read on World Environment Day 2024

by Mandira Pattnaik

USGS

Saudi Arabia hosted the 2024 World Environment Day global celebrations last week. This year’s campaign focused on land restoration, desertification and drought resilience under the slogan “Our land. Our future. We are #GenerationRestoration”, which was great because land is the only thing we have. We can’t live on water, or under the surface, or up in the air.

It is particularly vital for a country like India where a new analysis showed that the built-up area has steadily increased over the past 17 years from 2005–06 to 2022–23, expanding by almost 2.5 million hectares. The trend underscored the rapid pace of urbanization and infrastructure development across the country during this period.

I kept track of the developments at the summit while nearer home, we registered unprecedented heatwaves. Large parts faced severe water crisis. Climate crisis truly knocking at our doors. In the midst of all this, it was heartening to note that there had been considerable success raising awareness among the people most critically affected by climate change. At least some of the heightened awareness of the challenges of environment, its conservation and regeneration in the last decade can be attributed to climate fiction. Several award-winning novels have brought the criticality into sharp focus. Every year, I make it a point to mark World Environment Day (and the week around it) through the reading of climate fiction. This year, instead of a novel, I decided to turn to flash fiction about endangered nature and climate crisis. Although not very common, writers are looking at climate through a new lens, and recording their findings in tiny narratives. I know it is a difficult proposition to condense an issue of this magnitude and this seriousness into something so concise as a flash-length work. Yet, I found the following five works of exceptional (flash-length) climate fiction:

“The Flood” (by Neuki Nuertey; Flash Fiction Ghana; 2014), particularly for this line: “If these trees hadn’t been cut, people would not have built their houses in the water’s way”, and the final sorry image of a dead husband presumably drowned trying to save their baby.

“What to do When a Wildfire Threatens Your Home” (by Tom Walsh; JMWW, 2021). A list story. And this point, so poignant: “No, we cannot take the bikes, the Xbox, the crates of Star Wars crap, the Legos, the rocking chair that mom used while nursing each of you, the paintings from that little place in Greece, the 36 photo albums from before digital cameras, the carving of Lono from Hawaii, the trophies from the Little League World Series — none of it.”

When Candace Nadon’s narrator says: “I look up at the mountains behind our home. All it would take is one lightning strike, and boom.”, about a devastating drought in “Exceptional Drought” (New Flash Fiction Review; Issue #15), readers can experience first hand the helplessness and urgency that the family faces.

In a strange limbo between hope and dystopia is “Wild Joshua Trees” (by John Brantingham; TSS; 2020). Though not strictly climate fiction, it establishes a connect and resonance with the reader through the story woven between a boy and the Californian desert of Mojave.

“The Beginning” is flash fiction about rising tides set in Lagos, Nigeria. Written by a teenager (Radha Zutshi Opubor; Omenana Magazine; 2020), it tells the story of a girl who only has memories about what her life used to be. It describes a future Lagos that could come true unless… The narrative deeply affects the reader because they can sense it is a situation where where all is not yet lost, but where choices today can avert much of the impending disaster.

I also returned to my January 2023 column that talked of climate disaster, particularly the case of the Joshimath land subsidence. I was curious about the current situation in Joshimath, Uttarakhand. I did some digging, and in the end, was distraught to learn that the plight of the people there more or less remains unchanged. The USDMA (local disaster authority) has still not relocated a single family.

Why climate fiction one may ask? For one, it is effective. I see hope. Even though, I know that hopeful positive endings in climate stories are definitely rare. Matthew Schneider-Mayerson seems to agree. The article “The Influence of Climate Fiction: An Empirical Survey of Readers” says: “…cli-fi reminds concerned readers of the severity of climate change while impelling them to imagine environmental futures and consider the impact of climate change on human and nonhuman life. However, the actions that resulted from readers’ heightened consciousness reveal that awareness is only as valuable as the cultural messages about efficacious action that are in circulation. Moreover, the affective responses of many readers suggest that most works of climate fiction are leading readers to associate climate change with intensely negative emotions, which could prove counterproductive to efforts at environmental engagement or persuasion.”

I still find climate-fiction “necessary”. For secondary reasons, one must look at the myriad possibilities of the genre — there is reflection and reimagination involved, and sooner or later, we, as a race, must get to solutions.

This is what I love about climate fiction. Although much of it may seem dystopian or improbable imagination, in the end, we are somewhat comfortable in the recognition that all is not lost yet, and that there is still hope. It might seem too far-fetched at first, but eventually our race’s future restorative actions for saving the planet might be based on these imaginative calls of utmost urgency woven around fictional premises. I certainly appreciate the attempts being made, across novels, short-stories and flash fiction (as most of us do, except those who say ‘Climate fiction won’t save us’ or that ‘Concerns for the climate are fictitious’). Across the world, concerned citizens are ready to wade deeper into the darkness, and yes, they are not choosing climate fiction for escapist purposes, but for being forewarned about the end of life as we know it, and for reimagining actionable solutions. Ultimately, in my hope that writers produce more climate-themed work (even if within the tiny scope of just under a thousand words), I see this genre’s limitless ability to hold a mirror to our collective fears and triumphs, and be impactful in decisive action for the planet’s good.

Meanwhile, concerns of my last column written around the Indian general elections, remain, even though this past week, the results have been declared. And, it has to do, in part, with climate. The winning alliance of right-wing, pro-capitalist parties, led by the BJP, has scored victories in the both the mineral-rich states of Odisha and Chattisgarh. That coal-mining will reach record levels, is a given. That the bowels of the earth will be scraped clean for bauxite and iron, is not up for debate. That concerned locals, activists, and writers, will resist it, like they have before, is not in doubt.

I have hope!