Arctic Imagination: Jonathan Franzen (US)
Jonathan Franzen has been hailed for years as one of America's most prominent authors for years. He will visit The Black Diamond with his newest novel 'Crossroads'.
Jonathan Franzen visits International Authors' Stage with a focus on the impact of climate change on our existence based on the novel Crossroads and the essay What if we stopped pretending (2019).
An iteration of "the unspeakable"
Franzen has said that the themes of Crossroads are an iteration of "the unspeakable", which he believes is particularly salient in these times: "Rejection of facts, rejection of science, rejection of anything, whether it be state or scientific or intellectual authority. We are in super-religious times, a kind of endgame, and I can't help but relate to the kind of looming prospect that climate catastrophe is. Everyone is going crazy," he has said. Crossroads is a novel that digs deep into the psychology of its characters, depicting the United States from the time of the Vietnam War onwards. A nation he believes is in turmoil and in the midst of enormous change.
The inevitable climate apocalypse
In 2019, Jonathan Franzen published the groundbreaking essay What if we stopped pretending in The New Yorker. The essay sparked considerable debate, not least among climate activists from around the world. The subtitle of the essay may indicate why - it contains the text's inherent provocation: “The climate apocalypse is coming. To prepare for it, we need to admit that we can not prevent it. ”
Already the year before, Franzen had published an entire collection of essays, based on his love of nature, in particular of birds and endangered bird species, entitled The end of the end of the Earth .
On International Authors' Stage, the well-known American author will not only appear as an award-winning fiction writer, but also as a debating voice who can make half of Twitter see red.
Part of the Arctic Imagination
The event is part of the talk series Arctic Imagination, which has been created in collaboration between the Royal Danish Library and a number of cultural institutions in Canada: the Ideas of North Festival, the National Arts Centre and the Canadian Museum of Nature.
Arctic Imagination focuses on the disappearing ice in the Arctic and the accelerating climate change with a unified platform that combines experience and creativity. Here, the world's most urgent theme will be discussed in conversation formats between artists on the stages of the major cultural institutions in the countries concerned.
Jonathan Franzen
Jonathan Franzen (b. 1959) is an American author and essayist. He made his big breakthrough with the novel Corrections (2001), for which he received the National Book Award. The novel Purity (2015) consolidated Franzen's position as one of America's most important authors.
Arctic Imagination
Arctic Imagination is part of the trans-Nordic project Nordic Bridges, and sheds light on the transformation in the Arctic as a strong symbol, a mythological, inspiring landscape and a geopolitical factor.
Arctic Imagination follows up on the first edition of Arctic Imagination, which was a collaboration between a number of Nordic national libraries, the New York Public Library and the Danish Consulate in New York in 2017-2018.
