Amazing to read articles from the 80s/90s/00s and realize how little has changed in terms of our fossil fuel consumption and humanity’s general outlook on climate. Hard to be hopeful about this planet’s future. 

 The New Yorker publishes some of the best journalists writing today, and those featured in this anthology are no exception. Spanning from Bill McKibben's The End of Nature, first published in 1989, to essays published in late 2019, this anthology of collected works previously published in the magazine are thought-provoking, well researched, and observant (all traits I've come to expect from The New Yorker). My favorites of the collection include Kathryn Schulz's "Writers in the Storm," Tom Kizzia's "The New Harpoon," "The Emergency" by Ben Taub (probably the most thought-provoking for me), David Owen's "Green Manhattan" (I've read Owen's work before and really enjoyed it and while what he had to say about this topic was most directly tied with my interests, it also felt the most dated of any of the essays--rip Blockbuster), "Adaptation" by Eric Klinenberg (again, I've read his work before, and would say if this essay interests you, you should definitely read the expanded work Palaces for the People: How Social Infrastructure Can Help Fight Inequality, Polarization, and the Decline of Civic Life), and Bill McKibben's "Power Brokers."

I will point out, however, that I am not quite sure this is worth actually spending money on (definitely worth reading!), especially because all of these articles (and more on the subject) are available to you through a subscription to The New Yorker. I do think this could have been made more special had the preface by David Remnick and the afterword by Elizabeth Kolbert been more critical or thought-provoking, but in all honestly, they were not really. The afterword, in particular, I was not impressed by as I feel, given the purpose of the final section of this collection in exploring climate change adaptation and mitigation, Kolbert's final remarks would have been better served to highlight some of the work being done by young activists and policymakers, as opposed to basically saying "we're f*cked."

Finally, given that the vast majority of subjects covered here are ones I am already familiar with (and, since initially learning about these topics, I have taken classes complicating colonial/Western narratives of science), upon rereading about much of these issues I was particularly struck by the connections between colonialism, sustainable development, and climate change mitigation. In large part, I found many of the proposed "solutions" proposed in the final section to fall under the category of what Bill McKibben calls "carbon colonialism," which personally I did not love. More thoughts on that aspect to come though...

Thank you to Ecco (Harper Collins) for providing me with a free early e-copy of this work through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. The Fragile Earth: Writings from The New Yorker on Climate Change is out now.