This article considers the ways in which selected contemporary novels represent the limitation of options as a primary consequence of climate change. I will offer an ecocritical literary analysis of the following four novels by female authors: The New Wilderness (2020) by Diane Cook, A Children’s Bible (2020) by Lydia Millet, Weather (2020) by Jenny Offill and The Last Migration (2021) by Charlotte McConaghy. The novels present worlds where very definite choices, in already severely constrained contexts, need to be made. These choices are matters of survival and they have nothing to do with fulfilling constructed consumer dreams. The texts offer worlds in which characters navigate radically new terrains where survival is an urgent imperative. I will consider how the notions of limitation and shrinking (of their worlds and their options) recur as leitmotifs throughout the novels and I will explore how this shrinkage forces them to reconsider not only their own actions but also the consequences of the actions of people in general, with a specific focus on the causal relationship between those actions and climate change.

本文考虑了选定的当代小说如何将选择的限制描述为气候变化的主要后果。我将对以下四位女性作家的小说进行生态批评文学分析：黛安·库克 (Diane Cook) 的《新荒野》 (2020)、莉迪亚·米勒 (Lydia Millet) 的《儿童圣经》 (2020)、珍妮·奥菲尔 (Jenny Offill) 的《天气》(2020) 和《最后的迁徙》(2021) 夏洛特·麦康纳吉 (Charlotte McConaghy)。小说呈现的世界需要在已经受到严格限制的环境中做出非常明确的选择。这些选择事关生存，与实现既定的消费者梦想无关。这些文本提供了一个世界，在这个世界中，角色们在全新的地形中航行，而在这些地形中，生存是当务之急。我将考虑限制和缩小（他们的世界和他们的选择）的概念如何作为贯穿小说的主题反复出现，我将探讨这种缩小如何迫使他们不仅重新考虑他们自己的行为，而且重新考虑人们行为的后果一般而言，特别关注这些行动与气候变化之间的因果关系。