Oil and the Literary Imagination

Abstract

Postmodern ideology and globalization have encouraged a pervasive consumer culture which is more visible today than ever before As a part of this development contemporary petromania1 has pushed the planet into the era of global warming peakoil scenario2 and sociopolitical crisis3 of various kinds As argued by Wilson Szeman and Carlson 2017 oil has transformed our very belief systems where sociality is now viewed as ceaseless personal growth and incessant mobility even as a new energy source4 oil new ways of living oil driven urbanization and globalization accelerated by oil emerge as key drivers of this notion of sociality Though the concept of modernity cannot be diminished to the energy level in the context of consumerism infrastructural growth and the development of modern subjectivity Szeman and Boyer 2017 the significance of energy cannot be undermined While clifi narratives have started exploring planetary crises related to anthropocentric5 climate change the emerging domain of Energy Humanities6 in general and petrofiction7 in particular have analysed the ongoing global scenario concentrating on fossil fuel In alignment with the approaches developed by the PRG8 the present study proposes to investigate the overall complex hold that fossil fuel has on society today which is exhibited economically industrialized fossil fuel driven economy politically power network generated out of a nexus between capitalist governments and oil producers and culturally initiation of consumer culture The study further argues that owing to different historical political and geographical factors oil discourse does not enjoy a similar presence and visibility across all countries as evinced in the disparities in development and related resources between some developing and developed countries Against the abovementioned backdrop the present study would attempt to revisit and expand the domain of petrofiction with an aim to explore 1 how energy oil has become a social phenomenon and has initiated petroculture 2 how petrorich regions