Environmentalism Theme Analysis

One of the central paradoxes of Klara and the Sun is that, while Klara is a robot created by humans out of artificial materials, she gets nourishment from nature: in particular, the Sun. Even though Klara is a product of industrialized human society, then, she appreciates nature more than many of the humans around her. One of the recurring images in the book is the Cootings Machine (which seems to be some sort of construction vehicle that spews pollution while fixing roads). The humans that Klara observes all dislike the Cootings Machine, but none of them ever take action against it. This represents how many people have become complacent and have accepted the consequences of “progress,” which in the case of the Cootings Machine means putting up with air and noise pollution in the name of construction and further industrialization. Klara, however, sees the Cootings Machine as an evil that shouldn’t be tolerated, envisioning the conflict between the machine’s pollution and the Sun in religious terms. Klara’s outsider perspective helps illuminate how normal people have gotten used to ideas that, from the outside, seem intolerable. The fact that Klara takes action by destroying the Cootings Machine—and that people are happier when the machine goes away—suggests that there are ways to resist an environmentally destructive status quo. Nevertheless, the fact that the sabotaged Cootings Machine is soon replaced by an even larger Cootings Machine suggests that the challenges environmentalists face are formidable and can create a feeling of helplessness. While it is debatable whether Klara’s destruction of the Cootings Machine actually caused the Sun to cure Josie of her illness, Klara and the Sun nevertheless implies that there are benefits to protecting the environment, even when strong opposition makes these efforts seem hopeless.