Biography
Riley Erlandson (she/her) is a third-year M.Div. student at Yale Divinity School. She is interested in the entanglement of ecological crises, religion, and literature, and hopes to teach, write, and minister at this intersection. Originally from Minnesota, Riley loves reading by the lake and cooking for loved ones.
Paper Abstract
In a world in which individuals are increasingly well-informed about the reality and peril of climate change but lack the agency to combat it, what is the role of climate fiction? Is reading it just analog doomscrolling, or might it offer value in the midst of this terrifying and deeply entangled polycrisis? Lydia Millet writes profoundly at this intersection: her characters grapple with both ecological doom and the idea of God, experiencing often logically inexplicable obsession, grief, and anger toward environmental injustices. At the nexus of Christianity and environmental collapse, Millet’s plots emphasize the Christian part of apocalypse—unveiling, purpose, something made new—that might be able to spiritually transform and move readers. This paper explores a selection of Millet’s short fiction, examining how each text engages with God in the face of environmental collapse and how these engagements may inform readers’ experiences of faith and/or hope.