Sensational News about Nature: Risk and Resilience in Satirical Ozone Poetry of the Victorian Era

Abstract From the perspective of the Environmental Humanities, ozone exerts a special fascination that is rooted in its ambiguity. It is assessed quite differently depending on whether it is encountered in the stratosphere, where the ozone layer protects us from ultraviolet radiation, or near the ground, where it is classified as a harmful substance and pollutant. Since humans cause both its formation near the ground and its destruction in the stratosphere, ozone is perceived not only as a natural phenomenon but also as an anthropogenic problem. Ever since Friedrich Schönbein discovered ozone in 1839, chemists, meteorologists, and educated citizens alike have tried to understand its ambivalent effects. In the second half of the nineteenth century, a lively debate developed in popular media to sound out the risks for human beings and the possibilities of building resilience – long before the interdisciplinary career of these concepts that we can witness today. Among the various factual and fictional texts that participated in the controversial debates about ozone, satire plays a special role, functioning per se as a meta- and counter-discourse. In the English satirical magazine Punch in particular, we can observe the emergence of satirical ozone poetry as an inventive subgenre. Presenting unknown ozone poems, this article analyses how they playfully question the emerging natural sciences and ridicule media coverage, humorously reveal insecurities, and mock cultural practices. At the same time, I argue, they should be considered an artistic medium of building resilience.1