The Weather in the Imagination

The weather has always been a traditional topic of conversation; it is probably the most common dialogue between human beings. But even at this everyday level, there are indications that it is regarded with unease. Yet our apparent dread of the weather is puzzling, as we generally adapt to it remarkably well.

The Weather in the Imagination analyses the theories and scenarios caused by climate. These fall into three main categories: anthropological and psychological; historical; catastrophic. The weather has long served as a means of explaining human diversity: other people are different because they live under different skies. Climate has also been used to explain the dynamic of the historical process, the rise of certain civilizations and the stagnation or regression of others. Catastrophe is also invoked in theories of the weather: what could destroy a civilization - or arouse the fear of humanity's total extinction - more effectively than a good climatic 'jolt'? The prototype of this kind of upheaval is the Flood, one of the most gripping and influential myths the human imagination has ever produced.

Lucian Boia does not take sides in the current debates about climate; he does not exaggerate or play down global warming and its consequences, or try to forecast the future. What he does tell is a story that runs parallel with the 'true' story of climate and its future: the story of a human imagination that has been stimulated, baffled, infuriated, and sometimes even terrified, by the weather.