Today, weather extremes brought about by anthropogenic climate change
pose relentless cognitive and imaginative challenges. Beyond news media,
what are the cultural registers of this phenomenon? How can artistic and
literary engagements with destabilizing natural patterns summon new
planetary imaginaries--reorienting perspectives on humanity's position
within the environment?
A Year Without a Winter brings together science fiction, history,
visual art, and exploration. Inspired by the literary 'dare' that would
give birth to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein amidst the aftermath of a
massive volcanic eruption, and today, by the utopian architecture of
Paolo Soleri and the Arizona desert, expeditions to Antarctica and
Indonesia, this collection reframes the relationship among climate,
crisis, and creation. The 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora, on the
Indonesian island of Sumbawa, enveloped the globe in a cloud of ash,
causing a climate crisis. By 1816, remembered as the 'year without a
summer, ' the northern hemisphere was plunged into cold and darkness.
Amidst unseasonal frosts, violent thunderstorms, and a general
atmosphere of horror, Shelley began a work of science fiction that
continues to shape attitudes to emerging science, technology, and
environmental futures. Two hundred years later, in 2016, the hottest
year on historical record, four renowned science fiction authors were
invited to the experimental town of Arcosanti, Paolo Soleri's prototype
for arcology, to respond to our present crisis. A Year Without a
Winter presents their stories alongside critical essays, extracts from
Shelley's masterpiece, and dispatches from expeditions to extreme
geographies. Broad and ambitious in scope, this book is a collective
thought experiment retracing an inverted path through narrative
extremes.
A Year Without a Winter is edited by Dehlia Hannah in collaboration
with science fiction editors Brenda Cooper, Joey Eschrich, and Cynthia
Selin. The book includes a suite of commissioned stories by Tobias
Buckell, Nancy Kress, Nnedi Okorafor, and Vandana Singh; essays by
Dehlia Hannah, Gillen D'Arcy Wood, James Graham, Hilairy Hartnett, David
Higgins, Nadim Samman, and Pablo Suarez; artwork by Julian Charrière and
Karolina Sobecka; and literary excerpts by Mary Shelley and Lord Byron.
