Zara Zerbe liest: Phytopia Plus

In the organizer's words:

Scorching heat, species extinction, periods of drought and empty supermarket shelves: things don't look too rosy for humanity in the 2040s. At least not for the poorer sections of the population. Those with money will live in comfortable, fenced-in settlements with their own organic supermarket and could survive the climate crisis by digitizing their consciousness and storing it on the DNA of a plant. Drosera AG, a biotech company based in Hamburg, is marketing such a process. The cost: 350,000 euros. Aylin is not one of those people who can afford such a thing. She works as a temporary gardener in Drosera AG's greenhouses and trades rare ornamental plants for fresh food with higher earners. She would love to have a storage space on a plant for her grandfather. When unusual variegations appear on the leaves of the storage plants, Aylin begins to profit from them on the black market in order to fulfill her wish.

"Phytopia Plus" is a socio-critical reflection on a not-too-distant future.

The reading will take place as part of the 3rd working meeting of the DFG-funded network "Energy and Literature" with a focus on environmental ethics and climate justice at FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg. The working meeting will focus on the discussion of the extent to which energy in its material and aesthetic dimensions is inextricably linked to ecological and political issues, in particular climate justice. These and other topics will be discussed using the novel Phytopia Plus and other literary works as examples: What role does literature play in the context of environmental ethics, climate and energy justice? How does literature depict the power structures and industrial-political entanglements that not only promote social inequality and environmental racism, but also systematically reinforce them?