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Abstract

At this point in human history, those with the power to make decisions that effect the planetary climate often seem to be acting against the long-term survival of most humans. Given that globalized capitalism is more or less the law of the land, a situation wherein drinkable water and breathable air are acquired solely through transactional means is no longer inconceivable. At the same time, the promotion of technology as a distraction — either from humanity's imminent demise, or from the opportunism of those who would stop at nothing to retain power — becomes more and more pervasive. This thesis is roughly one-half of a pre-apocalyptic novel-in-progress entitled The New Color, which attempts to imagine a world in which the above scenario has already come to pass, and explores the effects that such a world might have on the individuals living in it. The plot can be most succinctly described as a simple love story that orients around the discovery of a new color. Three characters share the narrative point of view; these characters' individual arcs intersect within the larger narrative in ways both tangential and direct. I have done my best to balance the genre influences of speculative and/or dystopian fiction by creating and writing characters whose behavior and points of view are as psychologically realistic as those found in so-called "literary fiction," even if the situations and settings in which they find themselves have been exaggerated for rhetorical effect.