The anthropocene in contemporary German ecothrillers

Gabriele Dürbeck

pp. 315-331

in: Caroline Schaumann (ed), German ecocriticism in the anthropocene, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2017

Abstract

Ecothrillers deal with the mostly invisible and intangible problems of climate change by searching for better ways of imagining its relations to nature and humanity. Ecothrillers present a global environmental crisis with variegated local effects that threaten all humankind but can still be prevented at the very last minute. The environmental crisis is mostly depicted as a result of anthropocentric dominion over nature, as a rationalistic ideology of progression and technological-economical exploitation of natural resources. The chapter (1) presents the impact of the Anthropocene for the humanities, (2) summarizes the characteristics of ecothrillers, and (3) analyzes prominent German-speaking examples by Frank Schätzing and Bernd C. Fleck while scrutinizing their different narrative patterns (precautionary, apocalyptic, dystopian, utopian) to contribute to a reflection on species agency.