How many times have we daydreamed of sitting under a tree reading a book while having a hot drink or at least wished to escape into nature? At least once, for sure. Books, movies, and songs are some mediums that let us forget reality, letting us enjoy escapism. But these not just let us escape or keep us entertained, but also educate us. Recently, there is a surge in concern for ecology as authors and artists are some souls that remind us about the environmental changes happening around us. Do you know that Ecocriticism is a discipline that relates Literature and Ecology? Yes, and there are lots of brilliant books having ecology as their prominent theme.
To begin, let’s start with children’s novels. The Sound Machine by Roald Dahl is about a man named Klausener who wanted to prove that trees communicate as humans do. While proving so, he goes to cut a tree and hears the tree crying in pain but the branch falls on his machine and breaks it. Though the story ends in an ambiguity whether his mind played tricks or trees actually communicate, it delivers the ideology that plants are living beings just as humans are and that no human has agency to inflict pain to plants.
Alice in Wonderland exoticizes animals and attributes human-like qualities to them to make the story interesting. Works of Ruskin Bond are filled with ecological connections too that reflect his own life. Some more amazing suggestions are Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax, The Curious Garden by Peter Brown, City Green by DyAnne DiSalvo-Ryan, We Are Water Protectors by Carole Lindstrom, and Better than New: A Recycle Tale by Robert Broder.
But how can we not credit our very own Indian authors who have nailed through Ecocritical novels? Amitav Ghosh’s The Hungry Tide is set in Sunderbans, which is prone to storms, famines, and floods. The book represents interconnections between animals, the environment, and humans that antagonistically affect each other – the surviving victims of the Marichjhapi Massacre who escaped to Sunderbans are open to attacks from wild animals, or they are killed under the name of ecological protection.
While a whole lot of people wonder that saving nature or the planet is all words and no action, Meera Subramanian proves it wrong with her work A River Runs Again. Subramanian’s discovery of people who are determined to revive nature by resurrecting a dry river or growing organic food or other efforts is announced to the world through this novel.
To point out that ecological problems affect humans as adversely as it affects animals, Kamala Markandaya’s Nectar In A Sieve is a good example. It is about how starvation is a result of not only nature’s punishment but also the unjust choice of society. The establishment of industry and the laws of ownership of lands predominantly leading to farmers’ death and starvation is the thought of the protagonist Rukmini, which is already the concern of a large population in reality.
Bengaluru had a long history behind its metropolitan present and for this development to happen, nature has played an active role which is researched and published through Nature In The City by Harini Nagendra. Amita Baviskar’s In The Belly Of The River enlightens us about the struggle of tribes during the Narmada Valley development. Villagers have taken impactful actions throughout history, and Chipko Movement is one of them which is elaborated in The Unquiet Woods by Ramachandra Guha.
Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay’s Pather Panchali is about the story of a poor priest’s suffering yet narrates how his children never starved because of the nurturing and generous qualities of nature. But its sequel Aparajito – The Unvanquished brings in the notion of how his son lost himself to urban culture leaving behind nature and his mother who nourished him.
Technological progression subtly bringing about changes in humans’ lives is weaved in The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. To recall, for example, Baby Kochamma gives up her favourite hobby of gardening to watch television while the weeds in her garden suppress the once well-grown plants. Roy has delivered the guilt of exploiting nature beyond its regenerative capacity in true essence.
Some more recommendations:-
- Animal’s People by Indra Sinha
- Kanthapura by Raja Rao
- Fire on the mountain by Anita Desai
- So many hungers by Bhabani Bhattacharya
- Voices in the City by Anita Desai
- Staying Alive: Women Ecology and Survival in India by Vandana Shiva
- Kiran Desai’s Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard and The Inheritance of Loss
- Cry, the peacock by Anita Desai
The following are some books recommended by Gosh himself.
- The Swarm by Frank Schätzing
- The Man with the Compound Eyes by Wu Ming-Yi
- The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World by Jeff Goodell
- Roman Ghosts by Luigi Malerba
What are we waiting for? Let’s go grab a book!
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