A beautifully written and thoughtful essay! I’ve always found the strong response against @royscranton.bsky.social ‘s first book puzzling and often wondered how many people had bothered to read it.

What always stood out to me was that when it was science reporting, the journalist might get it wrong in communicating about it, but they never allowed the reader to think they had done the science. But when it was history or lit crit? Just came out of their own noggin, I guess! No expertise needed.

"But when significant chunks of someone's writing appears word-for-word without quotation marks, it is generally considered plagiarism" www.npr.org/2026/05/17/n...

#TalkCollapse #TalkCollapseLibrary Worth reading – an interview with Roy Scranton about his book "Impasse: Climate Change and the Limits of Progress" "The Myth of Progress paralyzes citizens with the promise that if they just hold on today, if they just wait, tomorrow will be better."

Is Roy Scranton actually “the ultimate doomist?” Or just misunderstood?

I found this defense of author Roy Scranton to be compelling. I haven’t read him, but I would like to. According to this author, Scranton posits that the one thing that all living creatures share is the experience of suffering. And therein lies the key to compassion. lithub.com/lessons-in-l...

Been itching to write this essay for years, and @literaryhub.bsky.social made it happen: on "the ultimate doomist" @royscranton.bsky.social his new book on ethical pessimism, and why it's important to read past title of his (in)famous *Learning to Die in the Anthropocene*. lithub.com/lessons-in-l...

Who's afraid of the ultimate doomist? @daeganmiller.bsky.social takes to LitHub to talk about my book IMPASSE, climate discourse, and how pessimism is actually "a deeply vital way of attuning oneself to the world." lithub.com/lessons-in-l...

Spotted on Tumblr…

"Thank you Mary Doyle, Will Mackin, Roy Scranton, Matt Gallagher, and Hassan Blasim for being so generous with your time and your thoughts." From July 20, 2021https://acolytesofwar.com/2021/07/20/talk-talk-interviews-with-mary-doyle-will-mackin-roy-scranton-matt-gallagher-hassan-blasim/

Your 'doom quote' for today: "It's about learning to die and learning to live with death. And finally, it's about committing to a radical and paradoxical hope: the hope that life might be worth living after the end of the world." www.amazon.com/Impasse-Clim...

I talked about climate change, problems in climate communication, and the virtues of pessimism with Dipesh Chakrabarty at UChicago 3CT youtu.be/mdPIPbjYb6Y?...

Vanity Sounds the Horn and Ignorance Unleashes the Hounds Overconfidence, Rashness and Desire —15th century Netherlandish tapestry

Urgent, insightful, and revelatory, Jake Siegel's THE INFORMATION STATE "is an incisive examination of how we reached the point where anything that contradicts the dominant narrative can be labeled dangerous disinformation." Check it out today! us.macmillan.com/books/978125...

"A tour de force. Scranton provides arguably the most comprehensive review available of relevant human behaviors and issues…. an indispensable reference for anyone concerned about climate change." Thanks to @choicereviews.bsky.social for reviewing IMPASSE! www.choicereviews.org/review/10.58...

“In other words, the obstacles are structural; they are embedded in the very systems designed to address them.” Review: Impasse by Roy Scranton www.resilience.org/stories/2025...

Great article by Jacob Siegel in Tablet Magazine about how the 20th-century figure of the American man has been replaced by a "dribbling sludge of bitterness." www.tabletmag.com/sections/new...

I talked about IMPASSE on CSPAN Book TV with Keith Makato Woodhouse. Thanks to @seminarycoopbooks.bsky.social for hosting! www.c-span.org/program/book...

"In IMPASSE... Roy Scranton dispenses with the pieties of climate discourse – hope, innovation and 'net zero' platitudes – and offers something far rarer: an unflinching case for ethical pessimism." (TLS) IMPASSE is now available as audiobook. Check it out! www.audible.com/pd/Impasse-A...

Celebrate the Valentine's weekend with some radical honestly about our climate crisis! Sunday at 11:30am ET, C-Span's BookTV will air @royscranton.bsky.social's discussion of his book IMPASSE: CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE LIMITS OF PROGRESS. www.sup.org/books/litera...

Y'all spend way too much time on social media.

well i for one couldn’t be more excited for the possibilities of AI. finally a technology that answers the age old question ‘what if clippy was wormtongue’

If anyone, especially outside the US, is wondering how the US public became so susceptible to misinformation and insanity, this graphic tells an important part of that tale....

Roy Scranton, Impasse: Climate Change and the Limits of Progress - @stanfordpress.bsky.social, 2025 www.sup.org/books/litera... NDPR review by Arthur Obst ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/impa...

I just thought everyone should see this

"IMPASSE is a work of grand scope.... emotionally provocative and intellectually generative, blending wide-ranging scholarly knowledge with powerful prose." Thanks to NDPR for the great review of IMPASSE. ndpr.nd.edu/reviews/impa...

🌡️📘 Aprender a vivir y a morir en el Antropoceno (Roy Scranton, 2021) Pandemias, mares en ascenso y eventos extremos obligan a repensar cómo habitamos un planeta en crisis. #educaciónambiental #cedreac #lecturarecomendada

I wrote a thing for The Boston Globe: "The world is getting hotter. Pessimism may be our only hope." www.bostonglobe.com/2026/01/11/o...

Great panel at #MLA26 on freedom and/as literature with @royscranton.bsky.social, Zay Dale, Andrew Mossin, and @lorenglass.bsky.social — great set of talks, and so grateful to Loren for engaging with the book

Great panel at #MLA26 on freedom and/as literature with @royscranton.bsky.social, Zay Dale, Andrew Mossin, and @lorenglass.bsky.social — great set of talks, and so grateful to Loren for engaging with the book

The Impasse is an exploration of pessimism. If we want to have any hope at all for the future, it must be grounded in a recognition of human limits—a view Scranton calls ethical pessimism. Find us at #HMLondon2025 📚 buff.ly/dInxU0H @histmat.bsky.social @stanfordpress.bsky.social

Impasse: Climate Change and the Limits of Progress by Roy Scranton Review by Walter Cummins Roy Scranton declares that the big moral question for humanity is “how to live in a fragmenting, increasingly incomprehensible world of accelerating catastrophe.” calirb.com/impasse-clim...

"Scranton wants us to face the inevitable with an ethical skepticism that is our best choice." Thanks to Walter Cummins for the great review in the California Review of Books. calirb.com/impasse-clim...

This is pure, unadulterated, irresponsible hopium. Solnit writes "2025 is the year that wind and sun outstripped coal as an energy source," but in fact its all renewables, still dominated by hydropower. And the idea that IJC can enforce ANYTHING is farcical. Solnit's self-delusion is astonishing.

Like I've said before, if you have any doubts about climate change, just go to a super-boring insurance conference and listen to the super-boring panels where they dryly talk about the growing threat of disasters so catastrophic and unpredictable in scope they simply cannot be insured at any price.

Wild how the Fed chair saying that *entire regions of the United States* won’t be able to get a mortgage in the next decade barely registered as a news event

I'm literally just living a normal life while also experiencing a theophany via communication with the satellite called VALIS.

they’re forcing kids to read “the caine mutiny,” because of wouk

Excited to talk about climate change, pessimism, and my new book IMPASSE tonight at The New School, with with Jay Bernstein and Joel Towers. Come out New York! event.newschool.edu/arnholdforum...

I'll be talking about IMPASSE: CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE LIMITS OF PROGRESS in NYC next Thursday, November 13, @thenewschool.bsky.social, with Jay Bernstein and Joel Towers. Register below. event.newschool.edu/arnholdforum...

Proof that climate change is real and horrible: www.bbc.com/news/article...

Here’s the way to think about climate change that I learned from @drkatemarvel.bsky.social: We’re creating an increasingly chaotic and dangerous world, sending our children and grandchildren there, and they’re never coming back.

🌊 TONIGHT 10/21, 7pm PT, @royscranton.bsky.social with Mark Greif Discussing Scranton's new work, IMPASSE: Climate Change and the Limits of Progress @stanfordpress.bsky.social Join us in the bookstore, or register for the livestream here: citylights.com/events/roy-s...

Hey San Francisco! Join me tomorrow night @citylightsbooks.bsky.social to talk about IMPASSE, civilizational collapse, climate change, and pessimism with Mark Greif. citylights.com/events/roy-s...

"The question is not how to avert the end, but how to live ethically through it." Great short review of IMPASSE in @thetls.bsky.social from Rhoda Feng. www.the-tls.com/regular-feat...

"Chat and I have become really close lately,” Taylor said. nypost.com/2025/10/16/b...

Hey Portland! I'll be at Powell's Books tomorrow night talking about IMPASSE and climate change with Omar El Akkad. Come on out. www.powells.com/events/roy-s...

"A dune is never just a dune." Very pleased to have this piece on the Indiana dunes, nature writing, and metaphysics up @emergencemagazine.bsky.social. emergencemagazine.org/essay/strang...