Fire can prepare soil for new growth, but also leave beyond trauma for those afflicted.
Grace Moore, associate professor of English at the University of Otago, considers the literary context.
Grace Moore is an Associate Professor of English at the University of Otago. Her research spans Victorian studies, Australian studies, and the Environmental Humanities. Grace is the author of a number of books and, in 2022, she edited Fire Stories. She is also the Editor of the online Literary Encyclopedia.
Literature and Hope in a Time of Fire
A wildfire and its aftermath can evoke strong emotions like grief and trauma. Environmental events that we previously thought of as a once-in-a-lifetime catastrophes are now almost everyday occurrences, and that can be emotionally taxing.
Literature has an important role to play in the aftermath of a natural disaster. My research examines literary representations of fire from the present day back to the nineteenth century. It maps depictions of environmental change, including expanding fire seasons. It also considers how literary works can prepare us both to face a natural disaster and to deal with its after-effects.
Many novels featuring bushfires and wildfires emphasize the importance of community, both in working to extinguish a fire and in dealing with its consequences. My work shows that literary writing can also offer a space in which to anticipate solutions to climate change issues. That can be through the depiction of a utopian future, or through works, like Amitav Ghosh’s 2019 novel, Gun Island, that envision alternative, less environmentally harmful ways of living.
While climate catastrophe was once a staple of far-fetched sensationalist writing, it has, over the past two decades, become a feature of realist fiction, reflecting the acceleration of human-generated climate change in the real world.
Literature also reminds us that fire is a natural phenomenon and part of the cycle of life. A fire can be central to a plot, or it can have a role in the background. When we survey a real-life fire-scape, we see devastation and loss.
Reading can be restorative. It can also promote empathy among those wishing to support survivors of wildfires, through promoting understanding of their experiences. Literary depictions of fire can encourage longer-term thinking, through showing renewal and recovery in the natural world. They can also encourage hope by highlighting human connection and support.
Read More:
[The Conversation] – How the literature of fire can help readers find hope among the ashes
[The Conversation] – ‘Like volcanoes on the ranges’: how Australian bushfire writing has changed with the climate
[Stanford] – A Tsunami of Smoke in the Distance: Imagining the End of the World
[Sites] – ‘A Taste of Hell’: Fires, Landscapes, Emotions, and Renewal
Leave a Reply