SFPL On the Same Page presents Sea Now
Koret Auditorium, Main Library
Author Eva Meijer and translator Anne Thompson-Melo visit the San Francisco Public Library
As part of San Francisco Public Library’s Everybody’s Climate programming, Sea Now is the July-August selection for their bi-monthly featured book program, On the Same Page. The program will culminate with a reading from author Eva Meijer, visiting from the Netherlands, and translator Anne Thompson-Melo, visiting from Scotland. They will be in conversation with Gregory Hom. Join us in the Koret Auditorium at the Main Library for this climate-focused reading and discussion on Tuesday, August 18 at 6:00 pm. Purchase books and meet the readers in the lobby after the program.
About Sea Now
What happens when the delicate balance of nature tips in favor of the sea.
The catastrophe that everyone knew was coming has arrived—the dykes are breached, the tideline rises a kilometer a day, and the citizens of the Netherlands are forced into gyms and shelters in Germany and Belgium. The foxes and rabbits head inland across the dunes. The politicians make empty speeches and fret the optics. The Hague—“the center of peace and justice”—slips beneath the rising water. Online retailers do flash sale promotions on disaster kits. There is violence and looting, but some people are too tired to start over again and simply walk into the rising tide.
Not willing to simply move on, three women get into a small boat and ride back out over the flooded cities, looking for loved ones they know are likely drowned. On the way, they witness a world retaken by seabirds, whales, and kelp forests. The sea has spoken, and there’s nothing left to be done but listen.
Philosopher and cross-species linguist Eva Meijer’s new novel redefines both nature writing and climate fiction by bringing the power and resilience of the natural world to the fore.
Eva Meijer is a visual artist, writer, philosopher, and singer-songwriter. They wrote more than twenty books, including novels, poetry and philosophical essays. Their writing has been translated into over twenty languages. Politics, madness, nonhuman animals, and language, including silence, are recurring themes in their work. Meijer works as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam, writes for Dutch newspapers, and is a member of the Multispecies Art Collective.
Anne Thompson Melo is a Scottish-based translator who studied Dutch and German and spent many years translating brochures for a German car manufacturer. She was longlisted for the John Dryden Translation Prize in 2022 and shortlisted for the Goethe-Institut Award for New Translation in 2023. Winning the 2024 Peirene Stevns Translation Prize gave her the opportunity to work on her first literary translation.
Gregory Hom is Program Manager of the San Francisco Public Library’s Wallace Stegner Environmental Center, a role he has held since 2023. He has worked with SFPL since 2008, supporting public programming and community engagement.