#31 Can climate books save the planet?

On COP26, the climate crisis, and what we need to change the world.

Nov 05, 2021

“We humans, alone on Earth, are powerful enough to create worlds, and then destroy them.” – David Attenborough, A Life on Our Planet: My Witness Statement and a Vision for the Future

With COP26 in full swing, the entire world is waiting for a change. A change that was necessary for so long, yet one that kept being brushed under the carpet until it became too big of an issue to hide. Then the angry, apocalyptic commentary replaced the silence. “A code red for humanity” announced the latest report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Unless we limit global heating to 1.5 degrees Celsius, compared to pre-industrial levels, as the key target of the 2015 Paris Agreement states, we are doomed. After all, biodiversity is in free fall, whilst deforestation is on the rise; coral reefs are dying, and the Arctic sea has reached one of the lowest levels in the ice age record. But we know all that.

“Because, underneath all of this is the real truth we have been avoiding: climate change isn’t an “issue” to add to the list of things to worry about, next to health care and taxes. It is a civilizational wake-up call. A powerful message – spoken in the language of fires, floods, droughts, and extinctions – telling us that we need an entirely new economic model and a new way of sharing this planet. Telling us that we need to evolve.” – Naomi Klein, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate

We don’t need more bad news.

We don’t need to be reminded every day that we’re in the face of an environmental disaster – even though we are.

We don’t need this “I-am-more-eco-conscious-than-you-because-I-am-drinking-oat-milk-and-all-my-rubbish-can-fit-in-one-jar” virtue signaling / BS type thing.

We don’t need to be shown world leaders coming to Glasgow in their private jets, falling asleep, and eating meat.

We don’t need buzz words. Ocean acidification, particulate matter, biofuels, greenhouse gases. Climate politics. Climate anxiety.

We don’t need the ‘blah blah blah’.

“The perpetual growth model is simply not built for an era of rapid planetary change. In a world where the richest 85 people in the world own as much wealth as the bottom 3.5 billion, and the wealthiest 10% produce 49% of all emissions, it’s not individual choices that are driving climate change. When we realize that rich people have stolen our planet’s habitability for themselves, we will demand revolutionary change.” – Eric Holthaus, The Future Earth: A Radical Vision for What's Possible in the Age of Warming

What we do need is a different narrative. A story.

Stories have the power to make people care. Stories can help us relate, but also navigate the reality of new worlds with all their complexities.

Through stories we get to reach more diverse, nuanced, and empathetic characters and somewhat inexplicably, we develop a connection with them. We want to pat them on the back when something unfair has happened to them; we get upset when they’re crossing the line and do something we didn’t expect them to do; we want to reach out to them and be their companions, siblings, parents, relatives. We develop an intimate connection that unearths a sense of understanding and belonging. We are touched in a way no scientific study or policy roadmap could ever do.

We care. And if we care, we act.

“The floods, the fires, the tornadoes, the hurricanes, the droughts, the water shortages, the earthquakes. [...] Why did I think it would nonetheless be business as usual? Because we’d been hearing these things for so long, I suppose. You don’t believe the sky is falling until a chunk of it falls on you.” – Margaret Atwood, The Testaments

Ultimately, what we need is hope.

As it stands now, we are all a bunch of pessimists trapped in a tunnel. But it takes an optimist to see that even in the darkest times, there is always a little light at the end of any tunnel.

In fighting climate change, we must lead with hope. It’s the only way.

What books do you recommend on climate change? (fiction/ nonfiction)

🥁 📚 The latest in the literary world

“Third time lucky” for the South African novelist Damon Galgut who is the 2021 Booker Prize winner! 🏆After being shortlisted in 2003 and 2010, Galgut has bagged the leading award for literary fiction written in English with his ninth novel, “The Promise.” 🎉 🥂The judges said the novel is “a strong, unambiguous commentary on the history of South Africa and of humanity itself that can be best summed up in the question ‘does true justice exist in the world?’”And when you think this book started one semi-drunken afternoon listening to funeral anecdotes…BONUS: Listen to this episode of “Monocle Meet the Writers” where Galgut discusses his childhood, winning the Booker, and why African writing needs to be taken more seriously.
The rival literary prize – France’s oldest and most prestigious – the Prix Goncourt was awarded this year to the Senegalese novelist Mohamed Mbougar Sarr! 👏 He is the youngest winner of the Goncourt since 1976, and the first sub-Saharan African writer to receive this distinction for his novel “La plus secrète mémoire des hommes” (The Most Secret Memory of Men). The judges have called it “a hymn to literature.” 😮 Fun fact: Compared to the Booker where the laureate is awarded £50,000, in France, the winner of the Prix Goncourt receives a symbolic cheque of €10. [Of course, a Goncourt book will sell on average more than 400,000 copies, but still, what’s going on, France?!]
If you thought €10 was ‘scandalous,’ the laureates of the Renaudot Prize don’t get any money at all! 🤯 Not that this year’s winner would need any. The Belgian novelist Amélie Nothomb was awarded “the second-best French literary prize” (that’s mean, Teodora!) for her fictional memoir “Premier sang” (First Blood). 🩸 A little bit of advice – that no one’s asked for – on how to handle a Nothomb book: This lady claims to write between three to four novels a year, but has a fixation and publishes only one each September when the schools open. “Premier sang” is her 32nd book and it is about the death of her father at the beginning of the pandemic. To me, this sounds like publishing her bereavement journal. Sweet, but unnecessary. 🙊 The real deal is “Stupeur et Tremblements” (Fear and Trembling) which actually won the French Academy’s Grand Prix in 1999 too. [You’re welcome.] ✔️
Let this week be just awards and glory and step away from the doom and gloom! Diana Souhami has won the 2021 Polari prize for LGBTQ+ books with “No Modernism Without Lesbians”! 🏳️‍🌈 I’ll add this to my TBR because it’s got such a great title. The green cover works too – my bank balance has seen better days! 😔
BONUS: A new trilogy of James Bond books has been announced, written for the first time by a female author. 😱 Kim Sherwood has signed a deal with HarperCollins to pen a “Double O” trilogy of novels that promises to “blow the world of Ian Fleming’s James Bond wide open.” We shall see this, indeed. 🕵️🍸

🎧 📰 👀 My media diet this week

Lady Gaga in the December issue of British Vogue is simply stunning. 😍 In fairness, I don’t understand why she’s covered in *???* (I don’t really know what she’s covered in), but it’s not for me to decide what’s fashionable or appropriate for the pop singer. “Whatever I wear, I will be serving painful Italian glamour from within,” Gaga says in the interview. Glad we clarified that. Why read this? Learn more about “House of Gucci”, the film about the retelling of one of the late 20th century’s most notorious crime cases, and Gaga on set as Lady Gucci. Plus bits on happiness, and her journey as an artist.
How much do you know about Wikipedia? In particular, the thousands of people who spend their time writing, updating and correcting the posts that you read for free. Probably not much. In this new series by Crowd Network, host Katie Puckrik meets some of these people. Why listen to this? A bit of a spoiler alert: The first episode is a conversation with a Wikipedia editor who has written more than 35,000 articles and has made more than four million edits on the site! I mean, wow. 🤯 Note to academics who say Wikipedia ain’t a good source to reference in your papers: 🙄!
BONUS: I made a curation of ten excellent climate stories 💚 that underline how extreme weather events are driving humanitarian crises. 👀 Why read this? It’s not cheery content, I’ll admit that, but the level of reporting The New Humanitarian does is outstanding. Also, 👏the climate crisis is a humanitarian crisis👏, too. You’ll learn about the adaptation efforts in Mozambique, how women in Fiji are leading disaster response, the known unknowns when it comes to the aid sector’s greening efforts, and more. 🌍

📌 Random news in brief

That’s it. It is officially acceptable to start listening to Mariah Carey and Michael Bublé on the radio! 🎄🎅 🎁 The Christmas season has begun because the John Lewis advert is here. 🙌 This year, though, it was branded “too woke,” with too much of a “message” instead of a traditional festive theme. 🙄
A Malaysian gynaecologist created the “world’s first unisex condom.”👨‍⚕️ We needed equality on this front, that’s true, but that’s not how I imagined the problem to be solved. Birth control methods for men are limited to condoms, withdrawal, or vasectomy, whilst women have taken – by and large – on the burden of contraception. Anyway, innovation is innovation, I suppose. 🤷‍♀️
Research shows that pollution is causing penises to shrink. 🍆 Watch out, men will suddenly start to care more about the state of our planet. #HowToMotivateMen 🤭
Dogs will get their own TV channel to help them feel more stimulated or relaxed when needed. 🥺 I’m cool with that. Our four-legged friends deserve everything, and more! 🐶 🐾

Before we say goodbye… 🥺

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