Bibliography 2015 Ashley Thomson and Shoshannah Ganz This year’s bibliography, like its predecessors, is comprehensive but not complete. References that we have uncovered—almost always theses and dissertations—that are not available even through interlibrary loan, have not been included. On the other hand, citations from past years that were missed in earlier bibliographies appear in this one so long as they are accessible. Those who would like to examine earlier bibliographies may now access them full-text, starting in 2007, in Laurentian University’s Institutional Repository in the Library and Archives section zone.biblio.laurentian.ca/dspace/?locale=en. The current bibliography has been embargoed until the next edition is available. Users will also note a significant number of links to full-text items. That said—and particularly in the case of Atwood’s own commentary and opinion pieces—the bibliography reproduces much if not all of what is available online, since what is accessible now may not be in the future. There has also been a change in editing practice—instead of copying authors’ abstracts, we have modified some to ensure greater clarity. We have not, however, standardized the spelling. There are a number of people to thank: Drs. Reingard M. Nischik, Shannon Hengen, Libby Marinilli (an Italian specialist), and Desmond Maley (a librarian at Laurentian University). Thanks as well to Dorothy Robb of the library’s interlibrary loan section. Finally, thanks to the ever-patient Karma Waltonen, editor of this journal. As always, we would appreciate that any corrections to this year’s edition or contributions to the 2016 edition be sent to [email protected] or [email protected]. Atwood’s Works Adam Ha-Aharon [MaddAddam]. Translated by Ya’el Akhmon, Or Yehudah: Mahbarot le-sifrut, 2015. Hebrew translation of MaddAddam. Als Laatste Het Hart [The Heart Goes Last]. Translated by Lidwien Biekmann and Tjadine Stheeman, Amsterdam: Prometheus, 2015. Dutch translation of The Heart Goes Last. “Artificial Intelligence: Our Long Love Affair with the Robot.” Turning Points, Jan. 2015, p. 10, s.mg.co.za/1JFIdnx. Accessed 1 Aug. 2016. This is the original year-ahead publication produced by the New York Times and the Mail & Guardian. Reprint of “Robots Take Over the World. Again.” International New York Times, 6 Dec. 2014 Section: Editorial, p. 206. The original text is reproduced in the 2014 edition of this bibliography. “Can Canadian Oil Green-Clean Itself?” Globe and Mail 8 Sept. 2015, Section: Comment: A14. Excerpt: Canadian oil has a problem; or rather, it has several problems. Those problems are: 1. the low price of oil; 2. the dirty image of oil-sands oil; 3. inept political leadership; and 4. the new forms of energy coming on stream. Because Canadian oil has problems, Canada has problems, too. We’ve been joined at the hip: If it’s in a mess, Canada’s in a mess. Or something of a mess. What should we do? Margaret Atwood Studies 10 (2016) 32 The first problem—the low price of oil—is beyond our control, but the extent of our investment in it is not. Unfortunately for us, the Harper government overinvested in oil. This once seemed like a plausible gamble, which must be why we didn’t flinch while Stephen Harper backed oil with sack-loads of subsidies: $34-billion a year, according to the International Monetary Fund, that covers the societal costs of the industry in Canada. Jobs and prosperity would both abound, we were assured. Anyone who breathed a negative word against the subsidy flow was viewed as unpatriotic and treated as next door to a terrorist. The return never offset the investment, but who was doing the hard math? Now, the price of oil is in the cellar and the Canadian dollar has been dragged down with it, meaning that most of our imports now cost us 30 percent more. If we had spread our investment bets over more sectors, we’d have more to prop us up now. The second problem is the “dirty oil” image. Oil-sands oil has attracted a Yuck aura, despite the efforts made to frame it as more “ethical” than other oil and the assurances that pipelines are safe, cleanup is effective and so forth. What might a smart oil company do to improve the “dirty” image? First, Big Oil should actually come through on its promises and environmental undertakings. It, rather than the Canadian government, should take the initiative, since Mr. Harper does not appear very interested in enforcing existing regulations. Or the oil sector might follow the lead of BP and ConocoPhillips and invest in CoolPlanet, which makes carbon-negative gasoline. Imagine being able to tank up while knowing you’re actually reducing the CO2 in the air. That combo has broad consumer appeal. Or oil might offset its carbon emissions with any one or more of the over a dozen carbon-capturing techs and plans now available. Restoring degraded tropical forests is one of the cheapest and most effective ways to capture carbon, and has the added benefit of creating wildlife habitat and helping local communities. There are several companies that offer forest restoration as a carbon trading/offsetting plan. Big Oil could partner with them, turn itself green, and hardly miss the cash. There are a number of other carbon-capture plans on offer. If enough of them roll out, the human race could actually start removing a net amount of CO2 from the atmosphere instead of adding a net amount. And oil companies could be part of that solution. As for the inevitable spills, a smart pipeline company would demonstrate that it has ample crisis-management staff and mop-up gear in place. It could even help save monarch butterflies by using Protec-style’s superior made-in-Canada milkweed-based oil soaker. Imagine the video: a river of oil slick replaced by a river of monarchs! And a really smart company would avoid running pipelines through really stupid places. The third problem is political leadership. If you were a leader promoting Canadian oil, maybe you should avoid annoying every other leader whose co-operation or territory is needed for your favoured projects—such as pipelines—to go ahead. Instead, Mr. Harper has threatened the U.S. President, treated First Nations with contempt, gone out of his way to antagonize the Premier of Ontario and sullied Canada’s reputation abroad through foot- dragging over carbon-reduction treaties. The oil patch must be wondering whether they backed the right champion. A leader able to admit to the CO2 “problem,” support practical tech, and avoid demonizing other points of view would be a wiser choice. The fourth problem is rapidly approaching. Simply put, the world is transitioning from fossil fuels. The transition is driven by our very human fear and desire. The fear, that we’ll kill our life support system: our planet. The desire, to find a substitute for fossil fuels that will produce enough cheap energy to keep us from plunging into economic woe and anarchy. Efficient electric cars that run on solar-charged batteries are a reality and the price is coming down; solar home-storage batteries, ditto. Non-toxic solar panels and batteries are being made. Cheap algae-growing energy-creating panels are being marketed by Grow Margaret Atwood Studies 10 (2016) 33 Energy. If the price is right, consumers will choose these options because individuals are just as interested in energy self-sufficiency as countries are: Why be subject to oil cartels and price manipulation if you don’t have to be? And why stay on the grid if you can get off? Huge installations—mega wind farms, solar farms, hydro dams—may soon be going the way of the cassette tape deck and the floppy disk. If every home or small community can generate its own cheap, non-toxic energy, why run electricity through an expensive grid system? Every new technology creates new jobs and the new energy technologies are no different. But how much of our tax money has gone into fostering this rapidly expanding sector? Almost none, because if your only god is oil you will try to stifle any competition. You will also try to stifle any data about climate science, as well as the kind of evidence- based, creative scientific data-gathering and technological thinking that is crucial for this new phase. And that is what Mr. Harper has been doing: stifling. It looks like panic. We aren’t served well by a frantic one-trick pony. To manage both the oil we have and our transition into the rapidly approaching alternative energy era, both Canada and the oil patch need a different kind of leader: one who can understand the new world we are now entering and can help us navigate intelligently and prosperously within it. Dire Cartographies: The Roads to Ustopia and The Handmaid’s Tale. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2015. In In Other Worlds: SF and the Human Imagination (3) [Kindle version]. Retrieved from Amazon.com. “The Eye of Heaven.” Nevermore!: Tales of Murder, Mystery and the Macabre: Neo-Gothic Fiction Inspired by the Imagination of Edgar Allan Poe. Nancy Kilpatrick and Caro Soles, editors. Calgary: Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing, 2015, pp. 237-240. This Poe-inspired story was written by Atwood when she was 16. “[Excerpt].” UK: The Telegraph, 23 July 2015, www.telegraph.co.uk/goodlife/11730754/My- favourite-books-Sir-Tom-Stoppard-and-Margaret-Atwood.html. Accessed 1 Aug. 2016. In an excerpt from The Pleasure of Reading: 43 Writers on the Discovery of Reading and the Books that Inspired Them, Eleanor Doughty includes part of the section on Atwood: “When I hit high school, I read Pride and Prejudice and Wuthering Heights, and developed what was, in those days before rock stars, a standard passion for Mr.