“She could go further, and record the ways and sayings of the now-vanished God’s Gardeners for the future; for generations yet unborn, as politicians used to say when they were fishing for extra votes. If there is anyone in the future, that is; and if they’ll be able to read; which come to think of it, are two big ifs. And even if reading persists, will anyone in the future be interested . . . . Maybe acting as if she believes in such a future will help to create it, which is the kind of thing the Gardeners used to say.”
– Margaret Atwood, The Year of the Flood “Living in survival mode creates a sense of fatalism in which tomorrow has to look after itself.” – Antonio Matimbe, communications manager for World Vision Mozambique) If the “doomers” are right, and human extinction will happen w/in a generation or two (or a year or two, for the Guy McPhersons), then can one think of readers in a future? Or even a past? Because, as Déborah Danowski and Eduardo Vivieros de Castro put it, “it is history itself that will soon ‘be history.’” If a species falls in the forest . . . I’m very interested in history – and in preservation and archiving. This comes from having done archival research – and craving documents that didn’t survive, are lost, or never existed. So naturally I want everyone to record everything and keep it all. The problem is that, in the meantime, we are living. And it is often difficult to live one's life and write about it, too. On top of that, living is getting faster, communications more ephemeral (think texting), and – and, well who wants to think about the future, nowadays? But writing is largely about imagining a future, insofar as it postulates a reader (or recipient). And the point in writing history, it would seem, would be for the future to be cognizant of the past. So, unless maybe you’ve been charting the history of carbon-fueled industrialism or the natural history of extinction, facing our threatened and threatening future, it’s hard to feel like there’s much point in history, other than entertainment. The past is prologue . . . to what? We were missing the most important part of the story all along; it was odorless and colorless. And as for envisioning the future – well, as a premeditatio malorum, to prepare one’s mind for what’s ahead, it makes sense. But if you're using history to learn lessons for the future - well, making plans depends upon the future’s being largely the same as the past; the more circumstances change, the less chance your plans have of coming to fruition (at least by the method you planned). And the only things we know for sure about climate change – and about how humans react to it – is that (a.) it can’t be predicted with any confidence, and (b.) whatever the predictions are, it always seems to turn out to be worse. So I guess that leaves us with the present, which is all we ever had or have anyway. If you're focused on finding water, literature will seem like a pretty distant concern. Can poetry help one appreciate the moment, live more fully in the present? Many a one has made that claim. I think it’s true, to some extent, provided one's immediate needs are met. But wouldn't living fully in the moment be an argument for abandoning writing altogether? Writing is recording, not being. (Wordsworth: “Aw, man – you shoulda been there!”) Or: maybe the only authentic (or valuable) writing is that which enters your mind and will not leave, but demands to be written down; or the phrase (or style) that you remember when you encounter an experience similar to the one in which it first occurred to you. Life as allusion. Lots of people have written things down without knowing whether or not anyone would read them again – but there was always the wan hope that somebody would. Perhaps the literature of the Anthropocene will focus more narrowly and consistently on the present moment – or the idea of the present moment. “Documentary poetry” will document life as it happens, not to inform but simply to honor its happening. Perhaps we’ll write and read just to stay sane. And that’s a plenty good reason, as far as I’m concerned.
2 Comments
Terry
10/24/2019 10:18:36 pm
Just want you to know someone is appreciating your blog, write more!
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Joe
10/25/2019 07:43:06 am
Thank you so much, Terry! It's nice to get encouragement as one broadcasts into the ether.
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June 2021
Kristin Prevallet Author/Editor
I'm a writer & teacher in Lawrence, Kansas who actually believes the scientists. I wrote a book of poems called Of Some Sky that seems to have something to do with all this. |