KSR happenings in 2026

There’s a lot of ground to cover! It’s been so long that this website has been updated that things have accumulated.

World Inequality Conference

Kim Stanley Robinson visited Paris for the World Inequality Conference 2026, celebrating the launch of the World Inequality Lab’s Global Justice Report: A Plan for Equality & Prosperity
Within Planetary Boundaries, by Lucas Chancel, Gabriel Zucman, Thomas Piketty and colleagues.

The report doesn’t just go about making an overview on where we stand on various forms of inequality, it doesn’t just make a list of policy recommendations to decision makers, it goes way beyond that: it imagines bold global solutions, discusses specific reforms for national and international institutions, addresses specific clauses in how institutions’ charters are written and how conditions might change in the future, proposes all-new types of institutions to enact the changes it envisions, and also quantifies all that with all sorts of simulations for the remainder of the 21st century.

It is a sweeping vision of transformation towards a better future, one that is anchored to our present and enacted through incremental reforms, and so reads like a complement to The Ministry for the Future. In fact, KSR’s Ministry is referenced in the report’s introduction! Quite an achievement for this novel to influence the world’s issues of our time.

In that conference, Piketty was in discussion with Robinson. Their talk is titled “Utopia and Dystopia in the XXIst Century” (4/Jun/2026);

UNESCO

While in Paris, KSR appeared at UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization)’s Thought Leaders series of events: Designing a Just Climate Future (3/Jun/2026):

Even more interviews

As per KSR, he has done around 600 talks, panels, podcasts, etc since The Ministry for the Future came out some five years ago (no, that’s not a typo) and I’ve been trying to track them and list them here on this site. I’m sure I have missed some and some are not uploaded online, but still the list is long!

19/Oct/2025 KSR on Future in Review: Scenario Planning Climate Solutions (YouTube).

9/Jan/2026 KSR on The BMJ for a special issue on the climate emergency:

The interview: The Ministry for the Future author on climate fiction, political imagination, and health (also on YouTube)
The editor’s introduction to that issue, inspired by Ministry: New Year’s resolutions for the climate emergency
A review of Ministry: What can’t wait: climate triage and The Ministry for the Future

29/Jan/2026 KSR on the Blind Spot Podcast (YouTube).

2/Mar/2026 KSR on No Small Endeavor: this one sticks out as KSR goes through some rarely heard topics, like his upbringing, ethics and religion. Abridged (YouTube) and unabridged (YouTube full video, YouTube podcast version).

17/Mar/2026 KSR on Crisis and Critique: on his work, utopic realism, the future of Mars, Fredric Jameson… and so on (YouTube).

Recording of a 17/Apr/2026 event: KSR at the Nevada Museum Of Art for the A+E Summit: Under Pressure: Proposal for the Future (YouTube).

21/Apr/2026 KSR on the Berkeley Climate Change Network (YouTube).

28/Apr/2026 KSR on Dreaming Against The Machine (YouTube).

16/Jun/2026 KSR on How To Train A Happy Mind: “What If the Future Is Better Than We Think?” (YouTube).

19/Jun/2026 KSR and Cory Doctorow on a livestream of the UN Human Rights Council‘s Independent Expert on International Order: Imagining the Future of the World and the UN (YouTube), unfortunately the video is cut short at a spicy moment.

24/Jun/2026 KSR on Anne Therese Gennari’s Hey Change Podcast (YouTube).

Along with climate scientists, Robinson chimed in to give his opinion on the summer heat waves in two articles by the Associated Press (24/Aug/2026 and 17/Sep/2026). On that infamous first chapter of Ministry:

I just have this instinctive sense, no, this is too harsh. This is too … I’m not willing to read this one aloud.

2026/Sep/26 KSR in discussion with Janna Levin on Pioneer Works‘ Science+Ficton series: on Science, Fiction, and the Power of Speculation (website):

10/Oct/2026 KSR quote in this article by Futura Sciences on climate disasters.

Also, Liam Young‘s climate-focused exhibition In Other Worlds at the Barbican Centre, London, included quotes from KSR (The Reviews Hub, The Hollywood Reporter, Kill Screen).

Essay in “Living, Together”

Samantha Paige Rosen edited a collection of essays, “Living, Together: Reimagining Community in the Age of Disconnection“, which was published in July 2026 (Beacon Press).

KSR’s contribution is on “describing the magic of communities that are led by everyone”.

Rosen did a presentation (Popville) and several interviews (Bomb Magazine, The Rumpus, Boston Globe) to promote the collection.

The Ministry for the Future recommended

Here is Ministry‘s much-discussed first chapter read by Verbum Dictum: 35°C Wet-Bulb (YouTube):

The Week: Slavoj Zizek recommends Ministry!

Cleaning Up (influential podcast on climate and energy finance): recommends Ministry!

Down The Tubes: Ministry for a graphic novel adaptation

Also, recommendations of Ministry by Big News Network, Make Use Of, Nautilus.

Tom Clegg

Tom Clegg has sadly passed away. He was an editor and translator that worked a lot to get KSR’s work recognised and published into French, at Bragelonne SF. Locus Mag has an obituary and an appreciation by KSR. Read more on Clegg on DreamSaga and read his review of The Years of Rice and Salt at Noosfere (in French).

6 October 2026

Upcoming publications: The Best Journey in the World

Coming December 1, 2026 by Hachette’s Little, Brown and Company: Kim Stanley Robinson’s The Best Journey in the World: An Antarctic Story!

Similar in spirit to his previous non-fiction book The High Sierra: A Love Story, this one focuses on the continent of Antarctica. Robinson visited it twice in his lifetime and set his 1997 novel Antarctica there.

Here is the official synopsis, from the official Hachette page:

Interweaving memoir, some never-before-published photographs, and good old fashioned ice adventure, Kim Stanley Robinson takes readers along on the Arctic journeys that have happened before and the journeys that may never happen again.

In May of 1911, Robert Scott and the twenty-four men under his command said good-bye to the sun and settled in for the long Antarctic winter. When the sun returned in September, they were going to try to become the first people to reach the South Pole. However, a week past the winter solstice, Scott’s second-in-command took a team on a trip to Cape Crozier to man-haul two sledges through the perpetual night of the Antarctic winter, exposed to the coldest temperatures human beings had ever traveled in. This side trip was, at best, a dangerous distraction and at worst, a disaster. Yet, chronicled by zoological assistant (and major expedition funder) Apsley Cherry-Garrard, it became The Worst Journey in the World, one of the best adventure books ever written.

Kim Stanley Robinson first read Cherry-Garrard’s book in his twenties and re-read it again in 1995, as part of his preparations to Antarctica that he made that year as research for his Mars novels. It was a dream excursion: he traveled around the continent, by snowmobile and helicopter and airplane. All the while, Cherry’s book loomed larger and larger in Robinson’s mind, and he tried to follow in their ill-fated footsteps.

Ultimately, in The Best Journey in the World, we see Robinson stepping on ice and finding an earthly holy place. As he searches for what can—and cannot—be found again, he takes readers on a journey of realization that is not just about being the first to get somewhere but about falling in love with what the world has to offer us. That being with people who also feel a kinship to a place worthy of preserving is itself, an act of devotion. Replete with gorgeous photographs taken in a place many will never set foot, and woven throughout with Robinson’s sharp, funny, and personal voice, prepare to take the best journey in the world.

One of the New Yorker’s Most Anticipated Fall Reads

The book comes out as hardcover (448 pages), e-book and audiobook on publication day.

Here is the full cover:

2 October 2026

KSR.info 3.0

The website’s look has had an update! This is not just a new look, it is an in-depth rebuilding of the website that ensures the long-term survival of the site. Nothing is eternal and certainly not in the world of software, which forced us to do this.

Things might still change a bit as we find our footing. With fewer software issues to deal with, we should be able to concentrate on what matters, the content: info on the books, news and interviews, comments and analysis.

This is the third refurbishment, after the website’s launch in July 2009 and a previous iteration in November 2015. Over seventeen years already!

With many thanks to Stephen Fernie.

Stay tuned for new things, and drop us a line in the comments or in the “forums“.

15 December 2025

COP30, next novel tease, new covers

KSR at COP30

Humanity’s best hope to combat climate change. Green capitalism’s annual gathering. Multilateralism in action. A big circus. Science and policy coming together. Yet more lack of progress. An opportunity for civil society to be heard. An open door to oil and agriculture lobbyists. A semblance of order. A sensation of chaos. The UN COP process is all of that at the same time, a reflection of how complex the climate change issue is, something that The Ministry for the Future tried to reflect.

KSR went to COP26 in Glasgow in 2021 as an invitee of the UK government. This year he went to COP30 in Belém, Brazil, November 10-21, as part of the United Nations organization itself (given that the US had no delegation whatsoever, a stupid decision that however did not sabotage discussions). He participated in various panel events, had several interviews, met various people. Where to start?

A highlight was his 17/Nov reading from MftF at the UNFCCC pavilion, under the noise of a tropical thunderstorm (also echoed by the UNFCCC convenor, Gaurav Monga, on his LinkedIn):

Some more events with KSR, not always recorded, and I’m quite sure this is only a partial list:

UNFCCC process proper 12/Nov: Nairobi Work Programme Focal Point Forum on Co-Creating Knowledge Systems for a Resilient Future: keynote “Imagination as a pillar of visioning future resilience” (UNFCCC recording + IISD photos)
UN pavilion 15/Nov: “Futures at Stake: Storytelling, Disinformation, and the Fight for Climate Truth”, with, among others, Johan Rockstrom (YouTube recording)
The COP Resilience Hub 15/Nov: “The Ministry for the Future: Imagining innovative models for adaptation finance” (YouTube recording + Instagram clip)
TED Countdown House at Casa Mia Eventos 13/Nov: “Intergenerational town hall: the Global South lights the way to the future” (event page, UN Foundation) + 16/Nov: MftF reading (event page)
Malaysia pavilion 17/Nov: Narratives of Hope & Resilience with writer Jan Lee (Facebook recording + Genevieve Hilton LinkedIn, Sunway Centre LinkedIn, Malaysia Pavilion Instagram, Facebook poster 1 & 2)
Ocean Pavilion 17/Nov: keynote to introduce the Belém Ocean Declaration (UCSD news, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution news, Instagram mention)
C.A.S.E. Coalition house 11-17/Nov: (unknown event participation) (Lourenço Bustani LinkedIn, Instagram)

+ various sightings of KSR around the COP premises (Hunter Lovins at Climate & Capital Media, Guido Núñez-Mujica Instagram, John Muligan LinkedIn, Carbon News report)…

+ facilitated by Bloomberg/Zero podcast host Akshat Rathi, KSR met the “Minister for the Future” himself, i.e. the President of the COP, André Correa do Lago! (Akshat Rathi LinkedIn, Bloomberg)

On top of those, there are some interviews in various outlets to report as well. Chronologically:

3/Nov Resonance FM’s The Heat with Geoff Ryman https://www.mixcloud.com/Resonance/micro-clear-spot-3-november-2025-the-heat-1/
4/Nov Germany’s Die Zeit: “Wir alle stecken heute mitten in einem Science-Fiction-Roman” (in German, “Today, we are all living in the middle of a science fiction novel”)
13/Nov Brazil’s piauí: “Agora as pessoas têm que ler ficção científica para entender a própria realidade” (in Portuguese, “Now people have to read science fiction to understand their own reality”)
18/Nov surprise appearence of KSR in The Guardian‘s COP30 live feed + quote relayed on Instagram
21/Nov Andy Revkin interview with KSR and Brazilian environmental journalist Cristiane Prizibisczki, reflecting on this COP and the whole COP process (YouTube recording, Facebook video, Substack video, LinkedIn post)
27/Nov The Outrage+Optimism podcast co-hosted by ex-UNFCCC President Christiana Figueres (Pocketcasts), with this insightful quote: “Reading is like a dream you remember”

Next novel tease

As mentioned before, KSR’s non-fiction book focused on Antarctica should be published soon, in the same format of mixing forms and images as his The High Sierra: A Love Story.

Now KSR is also working on a fiction novel, this one focused on the Arctic! This is teased in both the first and especially the last two interviews above. This would be looking at climate interventions for sea ice in the Arctic, a region he has focused on less than the Antarctic. After the MftF rush, he now has a plan, characters and plot, and he will be working on it this winter. This is too early to give more details, so to be continued.

New editions with new covers

Hot off the press: Del Rey/Penguin Random House has just re-edited the paperback editions of three novels with beautiful new covers. Here they are: Antarctica, The Years of Rice and Salt, and Galileo’s Dream, click for HD versions:

Cover of Del Rey's edition of Galileo's Dream, showing the planet Jupiter on a background gradient blue at the top and purple at the bottom

KimStanleyRobinson.info

Upcoming Events

KSR & Brian Eno: A History of Utopia

The Best Journey in the World publication

Litquake San Francisco Literary Festival

November 2026