Ecofeminism during Pandemic: A Study of Amitav Ghosh’s Sundarbans Trilogy (Published)

As a distinguished novelist and an eminent anthropologist, Amitav Ghosh exhibits his deepest concern about the inability of the present generation to deal with the crisis of climate change in literature. In The Great Derangement, he forecasts the looming disaster that may arise from such carelessness. His Sundarbans trilogy (The Hungry Tide, Jungle Nama, Gun Island) surpasses all his previous works as he combines his personal voice with a factual and accurate description of the mangrove forest. In his novels, he notes that the emission of carbon dioxide, discharge of dangerous levels of methane, greenhouses gases by some developed countries, and the resulting rise of sea levels increase the frequency of natural disasters that jeopardize the natural phenomenon of the Sundarbans-the biggest mangrove forest of the world. Thus, Ghosh’s novels are intended to play a significant role in raising South Asian consciousness about climate change at a time when the pandemic becomes a life-threatening issue for the whole region. In Gun Island, Ghosh forebodes scarcity and pandemics due to ecological disruption that may result in migration in the both natural and human worlds. The Covid-19 pandemic is but one of the most recent disasters to ravage the entire world. As a South Asian writer, Ghosh also highlights the doubly threatened situation of women in this region that arises from natural calamities. The pandemic has made us worried about the repression of nature and women in particular. Thus ecofeminism, a practical movement for social change arising out of the struggle of women, is a thriving branch of academic research now. The joint oppression of women and nature is not a natural connection but a constructed connection that has been created by patriarchy as a means of oppression. In this paper I will show how an appreciation of the connection between women and the natural world and an understanding of ecofeminism that advocates their liberation during the pandemic period can enhance strategies of action for change. The trilogy tends to reveal the light of his seminal work The Great Derangement and his published interviews as well as his nonfictional works.

Citation:  Ferdous M.  (2022) Ecofeminism during Pandemic: A Study of Amitav Ghosh’s Sundarbans Trilogy, European Journal of English Language and Literature Studies, Vol.10, No.8, pp.33-41

Keywords: Amitav Ghosh’s Sundarbans Trilogy, Ecofeminism, pandemic

Ecofeminist Colourings in the Works of Chinua Achebe and Thomas Hardy (Published)

The current global environmental crises urged me to investigate the manner in which writers from different backgrounds represent man’s relationship with nature in their texts and how they tie it to feminist dynamics. More precisely, the work focuses on the Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe’s trilogy Things Fall Apart, No Longer at Ease and Arrow of God and the English writer Thomas Hardy’s The Mayor of Casterbridge, Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure. The research question that guides the work is: how do Chinua Achebe and Thomas Hardy represent the connection between environmental issues and gender considerations? The hypothesis is based on the premise that the two authors represent the environment and feminine realities with hints to the need for more protection. Second Wave Ecocriticism as outlined by Lawrence Buell and Ecofeminism according to Paul Sanders Quick constitute the theoretical framework while the Comparative Approach of Tötösy de Zepetnek that stresses on an international dimension is the methodology used to bring out the ecofeminist visions of the two writers in the above-mentioned texts.

Keywords: Comparative Analysis, Degradation, Ecocriticism, Ecofeminism, Environment, Fiction, Protection, Vision