Analysing Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island as a Climate Fiction: Transgressing ‘Borders’ and ‘Orders’ by the Humans and Nonhumans

Authors

  • Iftakhar Ahmed Department of English, Mawlana Bhashani Science and Technology University, Tangail-1902, Dhaka, Bangladesh Author

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.69728/jst.v10.44

Keywords:

Climate Change, Human and Nonhuman Migration, The Marginalization of Environment, Environmental Apocalypse, Environmental Injustice

Abstract

Amitav Ghosh has a tendency to write literary pieces focusing on climate issues. This aspiration is also manifested in his novel Gun Island (2019). The author allegorizes the myth of Manasa Devi, which creates a wonderful connection between humans and natural environment in this novel. Gun Island (2019) explores the conviction of diversified environmental issues, such as environmental injustice, migrant ecologies, and climate refugees.  Although natural disasters occur more or less everywhere in the world, the poor pay the highest price. The harsh reality is that the most affected are the most marginalized regions of underprivileged countries. Developed countries can still cope with its effects, but people in poor countries are persistently being displaced. The Sundarbans is one such magnificent instance in Gun Island. Overall, Ghosh has shown that migration of humans and nonhumans occurs simultaneously as a result of climate change. Humans and nonhumans transgress the precincts of ‘border’ as well as ‘order’ to migrate from one place to another eco-friendly place. His perplexing story of Gun Island is inexplicably mythical but contextually practical because it resonates with a group of Asian and African people’s own experiences, emotions and their yearning for migration to Europe due to climate change. This borderless migration cannot be stopped by any means of order.

References

Allen, M. (Ed.). (2017). The SAGE Encyclopedia of Communication Research Methods. Sage Publications.

Bose, T., & Amrita, S. (2021). The Crisis of Climate and Immigration in Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island. Litera: Journal of Language, Literature and Culture Studies, 31(2), 473-489. https://doi.org/10.26650/LITERA2021-871879

Buell, L., Heise, U., & Thornber, K. (2011). Literature and Environment. The Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 36, 417–40. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-environ-111109-144855

Bullard, R. D. (Ed.). (1993). Confronting Environmental Racism: Voices from the Grassroots. South End Press, Boston.

Butler, O. E. (1993). Parable of the Sower. Four Walls Eight Windows: New York.

Cuddy, A. (2023). Migrant boats in the Mediterranean: Why are so many people dying?. BBC. Retrieved on 13 August 2023 from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66478091

Fibisan, V. (2019). The great derangement: climate change and the unthinkable. Green Letters, 23(1), 110-113. https://doi.org/10.1080/14688417.2019.1586142

Francis, A. (2021). Gun Island: A Tale of Myth, Migration and Climate Change. IJELLH, 22-35. https://doi.org/10.24113/ijellh.v9i9.11163.

Garrard, G. (2023). Ecocriticism. New York. Routledge.

Ghosh, A. (2019). Gun Island. Penguin Random House: India.

Ghosh, A. (2016). The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable. Penguin Random House: India.

Ghosh, A. (2021). The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis. John Murray.

Gilson, E. (2019). Planetary Los Angeles: Climate Realism and Transnational Narrative in Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island (2019). Comparative American Studies: An International Journal, 19(2–3), 269–88. https://doi.org/10.1080/14775700.2022.2114286

Grewe-Volpp, C. (2013). Keep Moving: Place and Gender in a Post-Apocalyptic Environment. In G. Gaard, S. C. Estok & S. Oppermann (Eds), International Perspectives in Feminist Ecocriticism. Routledge, London.

Kanjirathingal, S., & Banerjee, S. (2021). Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island: An Ecocritical Exploration, 10(2), 54-62. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/372406010_ Amitav_Ghosh’s_ Gun_Island_An_Ecocritical_Exploration.

Khan, R. H. (2024). Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island: The Climate Crisis and Planetary Environmentalism. Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, February, 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/00111619.2024.2314094.

Kingsolver, B. (2012). Flight Behavior. London: Faber & Faber.

Martínez-Alier, J. (2014). The environmentalism of the poor. Geoforum, 54, 239–241.

Mishra, S. K. (2016). Ecocriticism: A Study of Environmental Issues in Literature. BRICS Journal of Educational Research, 6(4), 168-170.

More than 2,500 dead, missing as 186,000 cross Mediterranean in 2023. (2023, Sep 17). Al Jazeera.https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/29/more-than-2500-dead-missing-as-some-186000-cross-mediterranean-in-2023

Moslund, S. (2024). A Study of Climate Change Realism in Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island. University of Florida Press: Journals. https://journals.upress.ufl.edu/jgps/article/view/2213

Murphy, A. (2012). Apocalyptic Desire and Our Urban Imagination. University of Southern California. /https://www.acsa-arch.org/proceedings/International%20Proceedings/ACSA.Intl.2012/ACSA.Intl.2012.19.pdf

Murugavel, T. (2020). Climate Fiction – A Genre of Literature for the Earth’s Future. The Indian Review of World Literature in English, 16(II), 1-6.

Samkaria, A. (2022). Postcolonial Nonhuman Blurring (b)Orders in Migrant Ecologies: A Postanthropocentric Reading of Amitav Ghosh’s ‘Gun Island’. European Journal of Literature, Culture and Environment, 13(2), 26–40. https://doi.org/10.37536/ecozona.2022.13.2.4671

Šarčević-Todosijević, L., v, K., Malivuk, A., Perić, M., Popović, V., Golijan, J., & Živanović, L.. (2023). Environmental pollution - the leading challenge of the 21st century. In Proceedings, 27th International Eco-Conference and 15th Environmental Protection of Urban and Suburban Settlements, 27-29.09.2023, Novi SadNovi Sad: Ecological Movement of Novi Sad. (pp. 387-394). https://hdl.handle.net/21.15107/rcub_fiver_4082

Schlosberg, D. (2007). Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements and Nature. Oxford University Press, New York, 2007.

Schneider-Mayerson, M. (2018). The Influence of Climate Fiction: An Empirical Survey of Readers. Environmental Humanities, 10(2), 473-500, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1215/22011919-7156848

Downloads

Published

30-10-2024

How to Cite

Ahmed, I. (2024). Analysing Amitav Ghosh’s Gun Island as a Climate Fiction: Transgressing ‘Borders’ and ‘Orders’ by the Humans and Nonhumans. MBSTU Journal of Science and Technology, 10(2), 1-7. https://doi.org/10.69728/jst.v10.44