The Drowned World Essay

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At first glance it seems that from the title, The Drowned World, is just another attempt by JG Ballard to publish a book that uses scientific reasoning to validate the impending doom and failure of man-kind to deal with climatic change. The title also suggests that the world has already succumbed to the fate of a disaster and has been flooded. Moreover, there are many visual clues suggesting the author’s approach to climate change falls in the genre of cli-fi. For instance, one of the clues is the book’s outer cover. It is filled with luscious green fauna and larger than life iguanas, which suggests that the author has taken a more scientific, yet descriptive and narrative approach to describe the apocalypse and its post-apocalyptic era. Despite …show more content…

This hypothesis differs from the present day accepted cause of global warming because the novel was written during an earlier period of time when scientific concepts of global warming were not as established. Moreover, Ballard might have been influenced by scientific discovery of the Van Allen belts in 1958, the time during which he must have written the novel (1962). James Van Allen, a graduate of the University of Iowa, discovered the belt in early 1958. Ballard’s idea of enlargement of Van Allen belts was a possibility during 1958, as there were no discoveries of the outer, larger belt. A seemingly justified scientific statement made by Ballard might seem feasible to readers before the 1990’s, but advances in scientific research and technology proving the cause of global warming renders this statement fallacious. Moreover, the logic of “unstable Sun and expanding atmosphere” are very novel statements, yet bolster the writer’s bravado writing style. The use of descriptive words creates a theatre for the reader to visualize the “unstable Sun” and “expanding

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