In a time of climate breakdown and mass extinction there is a new urgency to environmental writing, both as literature and as science. So In their series, Meehan Crist and Peter Godfrey-Smith consider some of the most significant books published in the last few years, along with classic texts by Rachel Carson, James Lovelock and Robin Wall Kimmerer – tracing a loose arc from biology to society via questions of plant intelligence, biodiversity loss, the rights of nature, ecofascism and green capitalism.

Meehan Crist is writer in residence in biological sciences at Columbia University.

Peter Godfrey-Smith is a professor in the School of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Sydney

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Books featured in the series:

Rachel Carson, Silent Spring

Zoë Schlanger, The Light Eaters

Helen Czerski, The Blue Machine

Sunil Amrith, The Burning Earth

James Lovelock, Gaia

Robert Macfarlane, Is a River Alive?

Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

Emily Raboteau, Lessons for Survival

Roy Scranton, Impasse

Alex Moore and Sam Roberts, The Rise of Ecofascism

Thea Riofrancos, Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism

Venomous Lumspcuker by Ned Beauman and Helm by Sarah Hall