The Weird and the Meta in Jeff VanderMeer's Dead Astronauts

Abstract

Originating in the works of early twentieth-century authors such as H. P. Lovecraft and Algernon Blackwood, weird fiction is experiencing a renaissance in contemporary literature. Several scholars have presented this literary mode as uniquely suited to speak to the anxieties generated by the current ecological crisis. In this essay, we examine Jeff VanderMeer's Dead Astronauts (2019) as part of a wave of recent works that mark a sharp departure from the immersive strategies with which weird fiction is typically associated. We argue that this encounter between the weird and the "meta" is particularly effective in bringing out the strange entanglement of human societies and the nonhuman world in times of climate crisis, serving as a powerful model for future iterations of the weird.