APOCALYPTIC PANDEMIC IN YANA VAGNER'S TO THE LAKE

The article offers an analysis of Yana Vagner's bestselling novel To the Lake (Epidemiia) focusing on the ways in which this speculative text reflects on contemporary apocalyptic anxieties and fascinations unleashed by the global COVID-19 pandemic. Following Priscilla Wald's contention that over the last hundred-plus years the knowledge about epidemics within different realms has been shaped by the outbreak narrative that arrives in scientific, journalistic, and fictional incarnations, I consider how the novel spotlights the mutually reinforcing relation between a longstanding and increasingly globalised cultural imagination about contagion and the medical and political interpretations of an actual pandemic.& COPY; 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Automated summary

The article analyzes Yana Vagner's bestselling novel To the Lake (Epidemiia) and its reflection on contemporary apocalyptic anxieties and fascinations caused by the global COVID-19 pandemic. It discusses the impact of outbreak narratives on the understanding of epidemics in various fields and highlights the mutual reinforcement between the cultural imagination of contagion and the medical and political interpretations of a real pandemic.