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Beyond Ending

“Beyond Ending” is a 5,000-word essay on the idea of apocalypse in literary and scientific narratives. My essay traced the long history of changing apocalyptic fears, from plague, through the coming of the railways, to nuclear war and global warming. I analysed the role of apocalypse in my own novels, and reflected on the strategies I and other writers had used to deal with ethical issues that arise when confronting overwhelming communal fears. Research questions included: 1 How are artists to avoid becoming complicit with the sensory excitements of disaster – and should we? 2 How can we deal with young people when we give them potentially paralysing information? 3 What are the different roles taken by artists and scientists, and by their respective professional bodies, in relation to global warming, comparing in particular the Royal Society’s activities with the Royal Society of Literature’s passivity on the same subject? 4 Has irony resulted in a trahison des artistes, an unwillingness to speak out through fear of being thought boring? The essay was commissioned by the Royal Society for a volume of 20 essays by international scientists and artists to celebrate the Royal Society’s 350th anniversary. I was one of three novelists invited to contribute, the others being Margaret Atwood and Rebecca Goldstein: the scientists included Richard Dawkins and Martin Rees. Post-publication a filmed panel discussion event took place at the Royal Society with fellow contributors Richard Holmes, Bill Bryson, and Ian Stewart.