Climate Change and Fantasy: H.S. Norup and The Changeling Child

00:05 - Julia Golding (Host) Hello and welcome to Mythmakers. Mythmakers is the podcast for fantasy fans and fantasy creators brought to you by the Oxford Centre for Fantasy. My name is Julia Golding and today I'm delighted to welcome back HS Norup, also known as Helle, whose second book in a small series meant for children is about to come out, and her book is called the Changeling Child. And as Helle has returned to talk to us, I thought we would broaden out the discussion prompted by her book into a more general theme of looking at how fantasy and sci-fi deals with our pressing environmental issues. Anyway, welcome back. 00:52 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Hele, thank you so much for having me, Julia. 00:55 - Julia Golding (Host) So let's start with the Changeling Child, which I read and enjoyed greatly. It's, I think, the perfect book for a child of about 10, 11, 12, that kind of age, who are just beginning to sort of explore their own power in a way. Because one of the characters, saga, is a little campaigner in her own right, an eco-activist. I would call her, thank you, yes. An eco-activist. I would call her Thank you, yes. And her best friend, Alfred, is a child who has a foot in the fairy world, shall we say so? Would you like to sort of just give us a little glimpse of the plot line and also sketch out where it intersects with your concern for the environment? 01:44 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yes, so this is the second book in the series, and the first book, without being too much of a spoiler, ends kind of with a solution that involves Alfred and Saga finding this dripstone cavern, and they think they have found a complete solution to avoid having like a motorway tunnel through their local hill and forest and the place where the fairies live. 02:10 But, as it turns out in the beginning of this book, the mayor of this area, who is really one of the bad guys, announces that he wants, because of this strip stone cavern, he wants to turn the entire area into this gigantic tourist attraction. 02:27 Um and uh and this is where the book starts and and and alfred and saga. 02:32 They know this is going to have detrimental effects on both kind of the local wildlife and and and and whoever is in this forest and, of course, on the whole fairy world, and so they kind of set out to see what can be done about it, and they quickly discover that the fairies are not going to take anything from the humans anymore and they are going to fight back. So they kind of have to both mediate with the fairies and make sure that they don't do anything drastic towards the humans and then also find a solution to stop this project being an enormous thing, and part of that is that they need to search for this changing child of the title and in this book. The first book was told entirely from Alfred's perspective, but this book is told in a dual point of view, from the two children also, because they are separated for part of the book and need to do some things on their own and they have some slight conflicts between them as well, which is so much better to explore when it's told from two points of view. 03:51 - Julia Golding (Host) Yeah, just to sort of point out to the listener that the kind of fairy we're talking about here is the fairy which is very much a sort of Midsummer Night's Dream style fairy Not pretty little fairies of the flower, not the Disney kind. 04:06 - H.S. Norup (Guest) No, this is really the dark, older folklore, with quite scary creatures, like really powerful creatures, some of them. Some of them are small and tricksy and spiteful and some of them are very powerful. And there's a whole range of fairy creatures in this story. 04:32 - Julia Golding (Host) And, of course, the folkloric origins of environmental concern is perhaps where we could start because in a way, a lot of the tales that were told about the little people in the Green Hills, the ones who spirit you off when you get lost in the forest, I mean some of these are embodiments of our distrust and our fear of the wild and how it can actually be very dangerous. So there is already in folklore, it's mainlining, it's completely plugged into, uh, our human responses to the environment. If you just think through any fairy tale, for example, uh, little red riding hood the wolf there of course is there were wolves, it's that thing where it's captured a moment when you really did have to be worried going through the forest to Granny's cottage. 05:26 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yeah, and a lot of these fairy tales and stories about fairies. They were used to explain also some of the dangers, maybe in nature. Going back, and I think one of the thoughts that I've had behind this series is also thoughts that I've had behind this series is also like what if the things that we as human do to the environment and and and to our world, what if that also damages the fairies realm, which is what happens in this story? And then kind of the second question is that what if these fairies and they are not these Disney fairies, they are, they are fearsome fairies what if they decide to fight back against, uh, what we are doing, uh to to their world as well? Um, so, so I think that's kind of the. 06:16 The thoughts that came and and and and the initial thoughts about these books was something I had in a writing workshop 10 years ago or something when I thought about this water sprite in a river with very, very long hair and her function was to filter the water in this river where she lived and of course, she would be immensely deserved by rubbish that was thrown in the water and whatever was found in there. So I think it's this about nature, spirits and I think, like all of these kind of water sprites, tree sprites and whatever we call these creatures, they are nature spirits and they are linked to healthy nature in a way. 07:11 - Julia Golding (Host) And this was kind of my starting points for writing the books as well. 07:13 And, yes, I suppose, if people are thinking, where are the new stories, thinking about the old creatures in conjunction with our modern, changing climate is a very fertile place. You can't open a newspaper without or read it online more often these days, I suppose without thinking what would that be like as a story? This morning I was reading about a huge bleaching event going on in not the Great Barrier Reef, but another coral reef in Australia, which they called like an underwater forest fire. It's a beautiful but awful image, and you could imagine an Australian writer really running with that as a story. So yeah, so okay, then we've sort of touched on the fact that our relationship with nature has come through story, handed down through folklore, shakespeare, all sorts of sources. But should we talk about what the sort of fantasy novel and we'll include within fantasy sci-fi, because so much of this will be projections into the future um, who has been the big markers of care or concern about the environment, would you say, writing in the fantasy genre but referring to our treatment of the environment? 08:39 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I think something like Watership Down is probably one of the earlier novels that go in and look at what happens when our home is destroyed, and I remember reading that when I was a child it was called. Translated from Danish, the Rabbit Mountain is the title in Danish, so quite interestingly, it was. 09:05 - Julia Golding (Host) So I think, there was a big film, wasn't there? I don't feel the same vintage as me, but there was a big animated film of this I don't think I ever saw that. 09:15 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I think we are kind of the same age, but I I don't remember seeing it um people have People in their later decades like tale. 09:24 - Julia Golding (Host) The framing in that fantasy, in this sort of microcosm of what happens to a colony of rabbits really, really did strike a chord for that generation. I'm not sure so many people know about it now. 10:00 - H.S. Norup (Guest) But there was a recent version like Netflix or something did a recent version actually, so I think the newer generation will have seen some of those and animated, so definitely something like that. 10:19 But I think for me it's also wider. I think the way I approach it is also through showing the beauty of nature in a way, and it's not so much going in and talking about climate change in the books, but showing the details like a butterfly can be absolutely magical, or a tree or a little flower or something like that be absolutely magical, or a tree or a little flower or something like that, and showing this beauty, because I think, especially as children's authors, going in and kind of conveying this beauty of nature. Not all children have access to nature and I think they need to also see this. And if we look at it from that perspective, then I think I mean you know that better than anyone that Tolkien in his nature descriptions that are just so evocative, is something that also some of them are very scary, but his imagery is something that also makes you long to go out in nature and see these places for yourself to go out in nature and see these places for yourself. 11:29 - Julia Golding (Host) Yes, he was the first on my list, of course, about this and the thing about the Shire in particular, because there are other beautiful places which are passing, so there's a sense that Lorien is passing. It's going to eventually become a special but ordinary wood. You know, the elven moment is passing. Shire can stay because it's a hobbit slash kind of human place, and so it's when the shire gets scoured, when the shire gets its industrialization and the trees that shaded the road to buy water are cut down and the pool is polluted, that you really feel the pain, similar to Treebeard lamenting the fallen trees. They actually did this quite well in the Peter Jackson movie version, because I think so. Yes, yeah, I mean it's a filmic shorthand, but when they step out and see the cut down trees they just cry yeah. 12:34 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yeah. 12:36 - Julia Golding (Host) Definitely, yeah. So you know that's or hoot, or groan or whatever the equivalent elf, entish, the Ents, yeah. So Tolkien was thinking about the early stage. Well, the early 20th century industrialization, where many things spread. So where he lived on the outskirts of Birmingham was swallowed up by that big city, suburbia. And if you visit it today, funnily enough it's the mill. That is the one thing that's kind of in a little country park with a bit of greenery around it and everything else is roads and suburban houses. So he wouldn't be impressed and that's what he was warning against and that in itself goes back to a sort of Victorian movement and a romantic going back. I'm going back, aren't I? 13:34 Romantic movement of valuing the countryside because industrialization was leaving scars on the landscape. We now have the power to really radically change the places we live in railways, roads, factories, killing rivers and all that kind of thing. But the Victorians also had the sense there were some solutions. So if you kill the River Thames, you build a decent sewer system. You know, they thought of engineering solutions. So they weren't completely hopeless. They weren't just throwing up their hands and saying no, we can't do anything about it. They did begin to think. 14:16 And I think where we are now as environmentalists, knowing that the problems are so much bigger now with the galloping climate change and the moment where things are tipping so that ice sheets melt and all that is that we also need to have a sort of Victorian solution focus of what can we do about it. And sometimes fantasy can model that. So in Tolkien's term, it's kind of well, you replant, you rewild the shire, you get a special little bit of earth from Galadriel, which I suppose stands for care and love and concern, and you repair the fault. So I think we're moving into a phase where we're looking for solutions because we all know there's a problem and sometimes fantasy can model potential solutions. So let's go back and have a think. So we've agreed that Tolkien, yes. So we've agreed that Tolkien, yes, because of the way he writes about just the countryside and the value of the wild is part of the reason for wanting to preserve it and love it. 15:34 I think that, looking at CS Lewis, who's less known for this, it actually just struck me today that that hideous strength which I don't know if you've read his science fiction trilogy, for I haven't no, they're quite interesting in this way because the first one, Out of the Silent Planet, has a version of Mars which is called Malacandra, where there's two species sort of living in harmony and it's the exploitative humans who bring death to that world. And Perilandra, which is the second one, is about Venus, which he calls Perilandra, and that's an unfallen world with a green lady and a green man. 16:16 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Sounds interesting. 16:17 - Julia Golding (Host) Yeah, it's a plot which feels quite medieval in a way, which is that's very that would fit for him. It's an incredible world-building exercise, that one, but the one which had the most application, I think, to sort of the more environmental campaigning side of it is that Hideous Strength, which is the last of this group, not my favourite novel of his, I must admit. I found it quite difficult when I first read it. Enjoyed it more the second time, but it does have a strong anti-vivisection message in it and it also has a message about the damage you can do, the stirring up of old travels, if you cut down woods, because Merlin basically, basically, is dug up again. 17:02 Okay, and this particular corporation. So it's interesting, he's modeling a corporation rather than a government, a corporation who is the rot of. It is spreading through the governments. That feels a bit like today's scenario, so it has a present-day resonance which it may not have the first time when I read it. So I think that's quite interesting from looking at it through an environmentalist viewpoint. But moving on from the Inklings, I was thinking well, what are the seminal books? Well, we've got the. In the nonfiction world, you've got Rachel Carson's the Silent Spring, which kind of was the one that crystallized the problem and I was looking at books that other people mentioned and they start early this worry. So you've got in the 60s or something 50s, 60s. 17:58 The Drowned World by JG Ballard, yeah, yeah. And then of course, you've got the Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. I've not read those two, but I have read the Margaret Atwood Oryx and Crake yeah, from 2003. 18:17 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I honestly haven't read them. I worry too much if I read dystopian novels. Children's dystopia is okay because they're usually hopeful. 18:30 - Julia Golding (Host) Getting onto those in a second RxV Freak is an interesting one because it's got a world of people sort of in gated communities who are privileged. Yeah, and then I did wonder if we should count. I was talking about this with my son, who reads a lot of sci-fi. Does Dune fit here? Because it's not our world but it's also about living in harmony in a desert world. So it's certainly, and there's people exploiting that In a way. 19:01 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yes, Because it is set in a bleak nature, in a landscape, but it is, as you say, about adjusting to this landscape where you are. And, if I recall, I mean I haven't read Dune since I was a teenager, but I think there are other landscapes and other planets that are very different as well- I was also wondering about the Dispossessed, which is the Ursula Le Guin book, though I think what she's really modelling is communism and capitalism. Well, her books have so much. 19:36 - Julia Golding (Host) Anyway. So it's easier to see when we move over to Jordan's fantasy. You mentioned Watership Down. I was thinking of I don't know if you've read or seen the film of the Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve. I've read the first book, yes. So for me that's like a metaphor, because you've got the cities that are moving around and they're eating up other cities. 20:03 - H.S. Norup (Guest) It's like exploiting them, and it's also in kind of this strange landscape where it's only the cities where you can actually live in, right as far as I remember, yeah. 20:15 - Julia Golding (Host) And then I was thinking about Philip Pullman. Got to keep going with the Oxford people. 20:20 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yes. 20:21 - Julia Golding (Host) And the Book of Dust, the second of his. 20:24 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Where it starts with the flood. 20:26 - Julia Golding (Host) Yes, Anyone who lives in Oxford know we're worried about the floods Because when the Thames rises it's big problems in Oxford. 20:35 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Okay. 20:36 - Julia Golding (Host) And then there are quite a few younger, more recent titles like the Last Bear by Hannah Gold, and there are others in this area of children encountering. 20:49 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I would also say the Last Wild Trilogy by Pierce Tordy yes, it's very much that's dystopian and about this, where the animals have this red-eye disease and humans can't move around about nature. And Nicola Penfold I don't know if you've read her books. They're also very much about rewilding and climate change and really beautiful nature descriptions as well that are really evocative. I think they take place in the Lake District, some of her books and it's just this fantastic landscape, but again there's a virus that means that humans can't move outside the cities. 21:40 - Julia Golding (Host) I was thinking about what you were saying about you sort of don't want to read it because it's depressing, whereas you can cope with it in children's, and I was thinking this is a problem for us. There was that Al Gore film An Inconvenient Truth. It's like when I watch a Richard Attenborough documentary fantastic documentary but it soon becomes that every documentary is about how we're losing all of this, how the world is, you know. So after a while you think, oh, I don't do I you know? Shall I watch that? Or shall I have a laugh and watch Ted Lasso, where I don't have to think about climate change? I don't remember an episode in Ted Lasso where they you know, carbon counted football matches or anything. 22:21 - H.S. Norup (Guest) No no. 22:23 - Julia Golding (Host) And, of course, when it comes to the decisions about making big films, uh, it seems to me as though things like superhero films sometimes touch on it, but they don't really go for it Cause there's a opposition. People don't want to hear it it's a fingers in the ears, la la, la, la, I'm not listening. So they have to be quite sly about the way they put it in. But the two that stand out as having gone straight for it one is Avatar, yes, which did it on another planet, but clearly, clearly, lessons apply, and WALL-E, which is just the most clever, beautiful bit of animation warning what the future could be. 23:08 Doing it with humour, but also you can recognise the world that WALL-E is working in. 23:15 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yeah. 23:16 - Julia Golding (Host) Yeah, so that was where I was thinking, and I think also the original Planet of the Apes. 23:23 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I remember that so vividly. I don't know if that was in the 80s or something like that Might have been older because it was Charlton Heston riding down. Maybe I don't know, I've probably not seen it until like the early 80s or something. 23:38 - Julia Golding (Host) Yeah, they probably made it to television by then. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I remember it was the head of Statue of Liberty, wasn't it? Yes? 23:46 - H.S. Norup (Guest) yes, and that was such a powerful image. I think that was something that stayed with me for so many years. 23:55 - Julia Golding (Host) So I think, yeah, but films as well, books as well yeah, so my thoughts when I was doing a little sort of I'm doing my literature review here was that almost any recent series deals with it. I've certainly dealt with it all the way through my career. My first book I wrote was called the Secret of the Sirens, and it has a lot in common with your series because it's about children who belong to the secret society for the protection of mythical creatures, and each book has a different environmental issue that they have to solve to protect creatures from. So it's full-on. It's right in there. One of them's a campaigner and I wrote this back in the 2000s. Okay, because I remember yeah, I was working for Oxfam and I remember hearing from Greenpeace colleagues and whatever, that if we don't get this sorted by 2020, we're stuffed. So that was worrying. 24:51 So I and it might be true, and so I wrote these books to frame a problem I found really interesting, a cause of anxiety. I was also, having just begun my own family, I was thinking what kind of future am I getting them into? And then, um, in the 2010s, I wrote a series of Joss Sterling called Peril, which, um, is about a flooded world not too far in the future. It's it's sort of how the world might look in 50, 80 years' time. And then, more recently, I've written a series which is 1,000 years in the future, called Magic no More, and that's not out yet, is it? Yeah, it's a Joss Sterling book which is out, okay, and that one is about. 25:47 So, in a fantasy world, they saw the problem of climate change. Somebody invented the magic particle, a conscious particle, like a wish particle, and basically the magic took over, a bit like AI, but it was magic, took over and fixed the problems. Oh, that sounds good, but in itself has created problems. So it's at the end of this period. So you do be careful what you wish for, so you get one kind of solution which then brings in its own yes, which is great fun to write about. 26:23 So I was thinking well, why do I write on a fantasy theme? I'm going to ask you the same question in a second. For me it was to frame a problem. That is the one I found I was almost paralyzed by, and I found, by moving into that world in my imagination, rather than sticking my fingers in my ears and wishing it away, I was able to find something constructive, some ideas, some comfort. Um, not not writing to preach to the younger generation, because it's not their fault. They probably know it's more working it out. I think, yeah, it's working it out. So does that chime with you? Uh? 27:07 - H.S. Norup (Guest) it does. But I would also say that for me, it's very much about, yes, highlighting the problems but, in a hopeful, bringing hope as well, making sure that they have characters in the stories that can empower them and not make them feel like there's nothing they can do. And I think, like the whole issue of climate change, it's such a huge thing and for these 10 to 12 year olds it's just insurmountable. And, in any case, I think the first step for us is to kind of instill a love of nature and show them the beauty of nature, show them that it's worth protecting in a way, and then maybe show them small steps that you can take in order to help moving this world, and I know small steps. It's not going to be enough, but we can't put the burden on children at that age. It's, I mean, it's our problem, our parents' generation, our generation, maybe the previous generations as well. We have created these problems and I don't think we can we can't put the full scale on them. I think they know quite a lot how bad it is, so it's also about showing them something that can give them some hope also, and if they are just told about these carbon levels and targets and water rising and in 50 years the water will have risen so much and so on. It's terrifying, I mean, that's really terrifying for them. I was actually at a book launch for a friend of mine who has co-written a book with a workbook about how you can work on your own carbon emissions and kind of go in and you can look at the World Wildlife Foundation. They have these calculators. You can see where your carbon emissions are coming from, see how you can adjust your own small contribution. We all know there are big corporations and things that are so much bigger, but at least we can do some small contribution. We all know there are big corporations and things that are so much bigger, but at least we can do some small steps. 29:32 And at this launch there were some children there as well, around this age 10, 13 to 13 year olds, and one of the girls asked the question and she was so near to tears because she was like because of course the speakers had really been hanging in this message about if we don't do something it'll be all horrible. And this girl, she was in tears and she was like so is there no hope? When are we going to die? Almost, I mean, and we cannot put that on them, I think. I think we need to show them that whether that is enough, I don't know, but at least at that age it has to be enough that they can ease into the problem. They know the problem, but that they can understand that there's something worth saving, there's something that they can fight for, but also that there's small things they can do. And then, when they get a little bit older, they can get the full barrel and understand, like we do, even though I mean honestly, in our generation, do we really understand how much it matters now that what we're doing? 30:52 - Julia Golding (Host) I'm not sure the missing factor, because there's the feeling of is it worth me doing something? Because it's not just one, you know, it's not enough for me to. I don't go off grid, or whatever it might be, um, because that won't actually move the dial. Um, it is true, this has to be at the level of nations and global changing ways, because if one country is doing something and another country is increasing emissions, you're back to the same problem. 31:38 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Back to the same, yeah. 31:40 - Julia Golding (Host) But I think we're still, oddly, in a phase where people don't want to recognise the problem there's certainly more people moved over to. We see there's a problem. Yeah, people who are happy in a world of fact, there are quite a lot of people in power who are not at that stage yet and are not to admit it. 32:02 - Speaker 3 (None) But I think I mean I really commented when I write. 32:07 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I commented for this level of like for the children and I think it is what we can do in fantasy goes back to I think it's a a Chesterton quote about fairy tales. Show us that, or show children that monsters can be beaten. Right, they know they're monsters. There's no doubt Most children 10 to 12 year olds. They do know there are climate change problems and they do know there are huge environmental challenges and so on. But through fantasy we can kind of reframe the problems a little bit. We can show a part of the problem that can seem maybe, um, that's that's, that's finite in in a different way from reality and and they can see that in this, in this world, we do something it is possible to kind of beat the monster that is these environmental challenges we're facing. 33:14 - Julia Golding (Host) Yeah, and I think as well that because of the nature of fantasy, we're often, with an emphasis on a hero or a group of heroes, beating impossible odds that in a way it does suit this problem, because the problem is so big that you need to actually believe that if you have courage, if you have faith, if you have heart, that actually there is a chance you can succeed. So it's quite an optimistic genre often, um, not talking about dystopia, uh, no, no, no, no even in general kind of middle grade for this age group. 33:53 - H.S. Norup (Guest) I think endings they don't have to be happy, they can be sad, they can be a lot of things, but I think they have to be hopeful. I think books for this age group that's my personal opinion, I think they have to be hopeful in some way. 34:09 - Julia Golding (Host) I was thinking about the fantasy genre, not just for children, because obviously we hopefully don't depress and demotivate our children, but we also need to do that for our adults. We need to say it's not all impossible. I've got a friend who runs an institute in Cambridge called the Climate Repair Centre, so I'm often following his news stories and he's off at the Arctic looking in ways of preserving Arctic ice and all these other. He talks about these things. There are people coming up with solutions and we need to actually start thinking about that because I think and we need to actually start thinking about that because I think changing our personal behavior plus solutions like that are going to be the way forward and adaptation. 34:55 So we're going to be doing all these things together hopefully if people would actually notice there's a problem or stop saying oh, it's a freak weather event, it's not, it's now. 35:09 - H.S. Norup (Guest) No, no, no. 35:11 - Julia Golding (Host) That's now our weather. Welcome to the new world. So I've got a sort of rather depressing question here is do you feel personally, when you're writing, that you're rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, and are we as writers part of the problem? Because of course we, we are. It could be said to be encouraging escapism away from the problems rather than face up and deal with the problems in the real world, because the problem isn't in the real world, isn't with fairies. Problem in the real world is with you know, um with the real world. Yes, yeah, the real world. 35:46 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yes, I'm putting the real world is with you. Know um with the real world? 35:48 - Julia Golding (Host) yes yeah, the real world. Yes, I'm putting the real world in, so that's? I'm purposely being provocative. I don't think that myself, but, um, it is a criticism that can be made of people who disappear off into their uh computer game or their favorite fantasy series without actually engaging with politics or campaigning or any of the other things that might make a difference. 36:15 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yes, I don't think we are. I don't think we are just rearranging deck chairs. I think there are people that are better at going out maybe and telling the hard facts. But I think also there's a need for kind of showing different. I'm coming back to this about showing the beauty in nature, because unless you have feelings for butterflies and want to make sure they are conserved and we look at endangered species and make sure that they are preserved and whatever we can do Unless you can kind of convey this love of this natural world, then you can't get anyone to fight for it. So I think that it's kind of the first step and maybe that's just as far as I feel that I am able to go in the kind of stories that I tell. But I'm also not sure that we need to, Of course. 37:24 I mean they have biology, geography, different lessons in school where they hear about these messages as well. They are told these messages and I think what we can do with fantasy books is kind of show, show a version, show a version of nature, show that nature is also magical and whether some children will read it and only see the magic and only escape into the books, or whether they will think about it and, of course, if we have like, in your series you have an activist and I have Saga as an activist. You have an activist and I have Saga as an activist you have someone who is also gently trying to kind of tell them that message on top of this kind of showing the world. Is it enough? I have no idea. 38:22 - Julia Golding (Host) It's something I have no idea. 38:23 - H.S. Norup (Guest) It's something it's something, and I think it is something that it's really about showing them something in a way, and not just, I don't think, see it just as escapism. Yes, it can be escapism, but there are things in there that is more than escapism. 38:45 - Julia Golding (Host) And I think, going back to where we were discussing at the very beginning about a book like Dune or the series Dune, one thing fantasy does do is it allows you to model the interconnections of how a natural world works. So the world there, the way some of the peoples have adapted to live in a world with these sandworms and the lack of water and spice and all of that kind of thing, it shows you A bit similar to the beginning of I was being struck the very first Star Wars film. It's really interesting that his aunt and uncle Luke Skywalker's aunt and uncle, are moisture harvesters. 39:34 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yeah, that is brilliant, and that's also a sand world, right. I mean, that's also really, really desert, all of it. 39:42 - Julia Golding (Host) So, putting it in fantasy, you can actually say look at this, you can understand it in a fantasy world. You've got time to sort of pause and think about it. And then you sort of think oh, hang on a minute, how does that apply to what we now call ecosystems? How does that apply? And what you were saying reminds me of a saying by CS Lewis, which I'm going to slightly paraphrase, which is a person who reads about enchanted woods doesn't fall out of love with woods, but for him every wood becomes enchanted. Oh, I don't know that one. 40:20 - H.S. Norup (Guest) That's fantastic. 40:21 - Julia Golding (Host) He said it more succinctly than that, but the idea if we fall in love with Fangorn or um Lorien or Narnia, when we're walking in our local woods we might turn to our companion and say, oh, this reminds me of, reminds me of Tom Bombadil's house, or this reminds me of um Welling Hall, where Treebeard lives and suddenly an ordinary wood, an everyday wood is. Has that magic light um on it? So we can value it even more? Because there are the stories, there's the magic, it's all there. Yeah, yes, so, um. Thank you, heli. 41:07 That's a fascinating discussion and I wish you all the best with the Changeling Child, which is a great adventure story. We've been talking mainly about the environmental theme, but I don't want to get away from the fact that it's a gripping read and there's some very scary mountaineering in it. That too, yes, there is lots of action as well as issues and swimming, uh, swimming and climbing, so it's very active book, um. Just as a final question, we always think about where in all the fantasy worlds and we can add, in the sci-fi, dystopian worlds as well where in all the fantasy worlds is it a good place to be an environmental campaigner? 41:50 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Yes, yes, I mean now we have actually already touched on this, but what I was thinking about, and it is a little on the nose love to be in Fangorn with Pippi and Mary and Treebeard and kind of get all the Ents on the march and see them march and see them destroy Isengard. That is something that I would find that so satisfying, being with the trees and with the Ents, but it is perhaps a little I. I mean, they're doing it already. So what would my contribution be? 42:34 - Julia Golding (Host) no, no, I think, I think I'm with you there. It's a great place to go. I was wondering about one place that might be quite amusing to be, and dangerous to be, an environmental campaigner. Um is, uh, in alice in wonderland to try and stop those servants of the Queen of Hearts painting the roses. 42:53 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Ooh no no, don't paint the roses. Off with her head. 42:58 - Julia Golding (Host) Exactly. It may be a very short-term job as an environmental campaigner, I think so yes, that would be quite fun, though you could imagine a funny scene, a modern day version of that, where Alice becomes a green activist. 43:17 - H.S. Norup (Guest) And that would be very much interesting. I was also thinking about kind of in the Artemis Fowl world, because I think Artemis Fowl would be kind of a very good ally to have in some kind of environmental campaign. He would be able to think out some great scheme, but I don't know if there are environmental challenges in that world as such. 43:40 - Julia Golding (Host) Well, holly the detective, the fairy, yeah yeah, she gets her power from green spaces, that's true, so it is connected. You'd have to get Artemis found when he was actually in his good phase, because I think he gets reset as a villain at some point, doesn't he? I think he starts off as a villain becomes good, and then I think he has a reset, I think, if I remember right. 44:06 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Maybe. Yeah, it's been a while Already a while. 44:08 - Julia Golding (Host) Yeah, thank you so much, heli, and it was a joy talking to you and thank you for going on. This little environmental exploration with me. 44:21 - H.S. Norup (Guest) Thank you so much for having me. It was really interesting to have a discussion around fantasy and environmentalism. Definitely Thank you for listening. 44:33 - Speaker 3 (None) Thank you, thanks for listening to Mythmakers podcast brought to you by the oxford center for fantasy. Visit oxfordcenterforfantasy.org to join in the fun. Find out about our online courses in person. Stays in oxford plus. Visit our shop for great gifts. Tell a friend and subscribe wherever you find your favorite podcasts worldwide.