Solarpunk is the Poetics of the Future
Franco Ricciardiello
ABSTRACT
Solarpunk is a new literary genre born as a spin-off of science fiction, in open opposition to the “dystopisation of the imaginary” which is functional to justify the theory of a lack of alternatives to capitalism.
The overflowing dystopian genre has engulfed science fiction: its reactionary imagery takes for granted the subjugation of the Natural to the Artificial, the degradation of the environment beyond the limit of no return. Dystopia has turned into a genre in its own right, with its own aesthetics and audience. As Osvaldo Soriano wrote: ‘The ruling classes hate dreams because they are incapable of generating a poetics of the future.’
Solarpunk does not preach an anachronistic ‘return to nature’, but pursues a conscious progress, in which science and technology, used in a transparent and democratic manner, allow us to finally achieve a balance with the planet and the life that inhabits it.
Solarpunk rebels against this pessimistic narrative; it imagines an anti-capitalist, ecologist, anti-racist, feminist, anti-patriarchal, antispecist and inclusive future, and acts to make it possible.
