Mayer, Sylvia. “Narratives of Resilience in Times of Climate Crisis: Angry Optimism and Utopian Minimalism in Kim Stanley Robinson’s New York 2140 and Jenny Offill’s Weather.” Journal of the Austrian Association for American Studies, vol. 6, no. 2, 2025, https://jaaas.eu/jaaas/article/view/227/237

• “Weather, in contrast, engages deeply with issues of climate-related cognitive dissonance, denial, and anxiety, which shape the narrator-protagonist’s responses throughout the narrative. At the same time, however, I argue that the novel also adopts a political stance of angry optimism and a sense of utopian minimalism, emphasizing the cultivation of personal resilience and, ultimately, suggesting a pathway toward broader social resilience” (13). Mayer talks about contemporary climate fiction novels exploring resilience as a way that people respond to crises. She uses two different works as an example, but she describes Offill’s Weather as “utopian minimalism.” She says that Offill captures “quiet optimism embedded in small acts of care and attention” (16). In this way, Mayer highlights that Offill uses everyday tasks as a way to cope with crisis, as it is something that is more manageable compared to dealing with the stress and anxiety that comes with being in a state of distress. 

Peinado-Abarrio, Rubén. “‘Fragmented and Bewildering:’ The New Risk Society in Jenny Offill’s Weather.” Revista De Estudios Norteamericanos, vol. 26, Dec. 2022, pp. 1–23, https://institucional.us.es/revistas/estudios/26/peinado-abarrio.pdf

• Peinado-Abarrio describes Offill’s Weather as an “anxious text,” to which her “fragmentary approach plays no small part in this” (8). He mentions that the fragments in which Offill writes, each one “invokes one type of anxiety or another, a sense of paratactical accumulation ensues, similar to how social media conveys information as a succession of posts” (5). All together, Peinado-Abarrio concludes that Offill’s choice of how she sets up her novel isn’t only stylistic but also political. It represents modern life while also encouraging awareness and highlighting how important it is to be connected to the things that are happening every day.

De Cristofaro, Diletta. “‘How Do You Sleep at Night Knowing All This?’: Climate Breakdown, Sleep, and Extractive Capitalism in Contemporary Literature and Culture.” Textual Practice, vol. 38, no. 10, 2024, pp. 1601–23, https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0950236X.2023.2265887#abstract

• In this article De Cristofaro uses contemporary literature and culture to connect the climate crisis with the sleep crisis. De Cristofaro explains how they are both connected to extractive capitalism that constantly demands more from both the Earth and the human body. “There are structural parallels, Dimaline’s series suggests, between the impossible demands of a 24/7 system on the planet and on our bodies and minds” (11). Offill’s fragmented anxiety based narrative is a live example of this. 

Garner, Dwight. “In Jenny Offill’s ‘Weather,’ Paranoia Is Delivered with Humor (Published 2020).” New York Times, 31 Jan. 2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/31/books/review-weather-jenny-offill.html

• This isn’t the best source, as it is not peer reviewed, and there is not much for me to pull and use in my essay. It is best that I find a different source as there isn’t much to work with in this one. 

Dean, Michelle. “A Fragmented Novel for the End of the World.” The New Republic, 2 Apr. 2020, https://newrepublic.com/article/156865/jenny-offill-novel-weather-book-review-end-world

• Dean makes some interesting points, such as modern consciousness being fractured and how he sees Weather as a “dispatch from this realm of consciousness.” However, it would be best if I found a different article that would be better to work with, as this one is not peer reviewed.

LeMenager, Stephanie. “Climate Change and the Struggle for Genre.” Anthropocene Reading, edited by Jesse Oak Taylor and Tobias Menely, vol. 1, Penn State University Press, 2021, pp. 220–38,

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780271080390-013.

• LeMenager argues how the Anthropocene is embedded within everyday life. She introduces Butler’s concept of the “everyday Anthropocene.” In the reading LeMenager explains how Butler uses the everyday Anthropocene in his novels as the “pox,” which is a “socioecological disease,” caused by “climatic, economic, and sociological crises”(223.) The “everyday Anthropocene” demonstrated through a socioecological disease is seen through Weather, as Lizzie balances her own existential dread, eco-anxiety, her job, and care for others ( Henry, Ben, Eli, Catherine, her mother.) LeMenager’s inclusion of Rob Nixon’s “slow violence” is also captured through the fragmented structure of the novel. In order to move forward, LeMenager explains how we must learn how to let go and learn how to die. I will use this idea to demonstrate how by the end of Weather, Lizzie has given up attempting to control her existential dread, and rather accepts it. LeMenager’s reinterpretation of love in the Anthropocene is also something I will use as Lizzie by the end of the novel, finds different ways to express love, for herself, for others, and her community.

Caracciolo, Marco. “Short Forms for Eco-Anxiety: Cognitive Realism in Climate Fiction.” Theory Now (Online), vol. 8, no. 2, 2025, pp. 10–29.

https://revistaseug.ugr.es/index.php/TNJ/article/view/30745/29756

• This piece discusses how eco-anxiety novels are able to evoke existential dread. Caracciolo also touches on “slow violence” and “ontological security”(13.) I would say that throughout the novel, Lizzie’s ontological security is threatened as she becomes hyper aware of the climate crisis that is affecting her emotional stability. Caracciolo argues that eco-anxiety is paralysing to a point where it is difficult to imagine a future. Furthermore, Caracciolo discusses how digital technologies further contribute to this eco-anxiety, more specifically, he uses the term “doomscrolling”(16.) Similar to how Lizzie doomscrolls through emails, podcasts, and televised news.

Mayer, Sylvia. “Narratives of Resilience in Times of Climate Crisis: Angry Optimism and Utopian Minimalism in Kim Stanley Robinson’s New York 2140 and Jenny Offill’s Weather.” Journal of the Austrian Association for American Studies, vol. 6, no. 2, 2025, https://doi.org/10.47060/jaaas.v6i2.227

• Mayer discusses how resilience is built through “angry optimism,” as well as “quiet optimism.” Mayer uses Sylvia as a perfect example of resilience as she is introduced into the novel as a woman with a podcast attempting to slow down climate change as well as her attempt to move towards a future where humans and animals are able to coexist. However, this attempt to change the morals of those around her leads her to exhaustion. Mayer explains how Sylvia’s retreat and reintroduction to the end of the novel where she is watering her plants, demonstrates how important solidarity is for self-preservation. Sylvia watering her garden also relates to growing something meaningful in order to maintain “quiet optimism” as Mayer describes.

Mahmoud, Jarrar. “The Peril of Climate Change in Jenny Offil’s Weather (2020).”

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/382936745_The_Peril_of_Climate_Change_in_Jenny_Offill’s_Weather_2020

• This article discusses the psychological and physical effects of eco-anxiety. As well as eco-paralysis, the inability to see a future resulting from eco-anxiety.

Dudley, Jack. “Beckett, Atwood, and Postapocalyptic Tragicomedy.” Novel : A Forum on Fiction, vol. 54, no. 1, 2021, pp. 104–19,

https://doi.org/10.1215/00295132-8868833.

• Dudley demonstrates how Atwood uses “survival laughter” in Beckett’s tragicomedy as a tool to move past a state of paralysis amidst an ecological catastrophe. As well as adaptation and mitigation strategies as resilience. In Weather, Lizzie uses these adaptation and mitigation strategies within fragments of the novel, such as through survival techniques, religious and spiritual reliefs.

We’ll be having conferences in pairs for the next-to-last and next-to-next-to-last (or “penultimate” and “antepenultimate” for you English majors out there) sessions on 12/8 and 12/11. Here’s the sign up: first come, first served, and it doesn’t matter who’s your partner:

Pairs Conferences Sign-up

More than a doc, Dropbox Paper is a flexible workspace that brings people and ideas together.

The relationship between Henry and Catherine reflects several relational phenomenons prevalent in the Anthropocene. In one aspect, the feedback loops in the Anthropocene. Henry’s emotional instability creates more stress on Catherine, as she takes on the role of caretaker. In turn, Catherine’s stress increases pressure on Henry to “get it together” because his functionality is a necessity to maintain their family structure. Increased pressure on Henry further pushes his instability, and the cycle repeats. This too manifests in climate change. For example, with higher temperatures brings more drought, which causes more wildfires. Without any trees to absorb carbon, it is released into the atmosphere, which causes more warming, and more drought. Like Henry and Catherines relationship, the cycle then perpetuates itself. Though I would emphasize the term “micro-Anthropocene,” in the sense that the feedback loop in Henry’s context that furthers his instability and, in turn, his marriage, is a single faceted circle. On the other hand, feedback loops in the Anthropocene can look like many, many things. It can be something like drought, a psychological echo chamber (climate change doomscrolling leading to researching even more info, then more anxiety, etc), or even overconsumption in preparation for the worlds end, (which then leads to more demand in production, resources, chemical release, extinction, etc). The range of the Anthropocene’s small deaths are almost incomprehensible, endless. No matter how much you try and think of all the ways we are effected, you can always find something else. The slow erosion of their relationship overtime reflects the slow destruction of our Earth. The “everyday” that some cli-fi writers attempt to portray as a way of truly mirroring the nature of climate change, (as opposed to something coming full force in a large catastrophized event), is something that Offill tackles perfectly. Their relationship imploded as a result a pre-existing pattern that slowly led to Henry’s relapse and infidelity. Similarly, climate catastrophe will be a result of slow increments of worsening climate conditions. As Lizzie passively comments on how “there are fewer and fewer birds these days,” Henry passively asks, “Do you ever think it’s weird that we even have families?” Both instances indicate smaller signifiers leading to grandiose consequences.

I believe that modernist styled writing is a great way to interact with the Anthropocene. With modernism arising out of an emerging psychosomatic response to WW1, and the term “shell shock” (now known as PTSD), I think it corresponds well with the contemporary trauma response in relation to looming climate disaster. Emerging writing styles respond to external reality, these fragmented flashes of life, stemming from modernism, relatively mimic flashback memories you often experience with PTSD. Offill uses fractured moments and conversations to encapsulate an almost incommunicable feeling of overwhelm, fear, and hopelessness in a way that mimics how we react to the realities that plague us today. An example of this appears in a stream of thoughts arising when Lizzie is listening to a podcast on the way home from work. “There  are  recognizable patterns of  ascent and  decline. But  our industrial civilization is so vast, it has such reach… I look out the window. Something in the distance, limping toward the trees,” I believe this kind of imagery better encapsulates this anticipatory fear of industrialization reaching past the point of ascent. Seeing something from a distance, coming towards you without any way to reach it.. Etc. This kind of poetic way of narration could also be more sustainable to readers. It seeks to invoke feelings in a relatable way that doesn’t entirely overwhelm the psyche, as it could if she were to narrate her entire anxiety spiral. In this way, you are able to sit with Lizzie and interact with eco-fears alongside her; especially considering that you are processing this at the pace of the everyday. More specifically, living alongside Lizzie’s everyday life as a reader.