Looking at Thanatic Tendency of Nature: A Study of Amitav Ghosh's The Hungry Tide and Gun Island through Ecocritical Lens

Satyasundar Pradhan

Nature, Environment, Wrath, Colonialism, Industrialization, Exploitation

Nature is the mother of all living beings. It has the capacity to bring animation in inanimate objects. At the same time, it has the ability to destroy everything. Whenever a living being first comes in the lap of the earth, nature starts nurturing it from birth to death. At the beginning, there had been a healthy relationship between human beings and nature. But when people started claiming themselves as the supreme creation of the world, they began exploiting nature. Especially after colonisation, European people started creating problem in natural environment. When colonialism came to an end, independence brought independence in Eastern people for exploiting nature. At the beginning, nature was tolerating the exploitation like a loving mother. But when people start increasing the exploitation, nature begins punishing the humans like an angry mother. This has been reflected in literature. At the beginning, the erotic tendency of nature had been clearly visible in literature. Being influenced by nature, writers presented its creative purposes. Nowadays the outcome of nature's anger is painted in literary works. Writers intend to show the destructive wrath of nature for correcting the behaviours of human beings towards nature. Nature has always been presented as a main theme in Indian English writings. From the ancient times to the contemporary era, nature serves as a guiding force to Indian writers. It encourages them to produce creative works. At the present time, the thanatic tendency of nature is presented in Indian English writings because the natural healthy environment is decreasing day by day by our malpractices. Amitav Ghosh is one of the writers who display nature's deadly reaction against the malpractice of humans.

Volume 13 Issue 8, August-2025

Pages : f461-f465