Dall’utopia cozy alla distopia critica: poetiche solarpunk nell’opera di Becky Chambers, Andrew Dana Hudson e Cherie Dimaline

The term Solarpunk identifies a certain type of art, practices, communities and speculative narratives that imagine sustainable and radical futures, and is now rooted in the science-fictional imaginary. In this essay, I discuss three texts that constitute models for different solarpunk poetics: the novella A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Chambers, and the novels Our Shared Storm. A Novel of Five Climate Futures by Andrew Dana Hudson (2022) and The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline (2017). I start with some definitions of solarpunk to highlight the debates the term has generated; I then discuss the abuses of the solarpunk label, which it is important to come to terms with now that the term is gaining visibility. I then discuss how the three texts relate to these debates and then draw conclusions on how I visualise the continued relevance and generativity of solarpunk - developing a plurality of strategies, combining the registers of utopia and dystopia. I argue that solarpunk can come to represent a constellation of art forms and political reflections based on a mode of radical hope: a hope, in other words, that is an active instrument of struggle.