The Sundarbans in Amitav Ghosh’s Fiction: A Bioregional Perspective

Abstract

Bioregionalism encourages intimate knowledge born out of dwelling in place, community, and local culture. The bioregional approach regards the region as a “physical and cultural ecology of place where ecological and cultural systems interact to shape one another” (Bunting 1997, 3). Following this line of thought, this paper explores the theoretical perspective of bioregionalism, positing “place as a complex of nature and culture” (Ryan 2012, 81). The paper reads the two novels by Amitav Ghosh, The Hungry Tide (2004) and Gun Island (2019), as two representative texts to demonstrate this theoretical perspective of bioregionalism. These two narratives primarily engage the readers with the interior landscape of Sundarbans as the literature of place. Interestingly, Ghosh’s ecological orientation ranging from issues of nature, place, human settlement, local culture, species’ lives, the dominant religion, and the folk deities, are all situated within the context of Sundarbans, creating an integrated land mosaic.

Keywords: Ecocriticism, Bioregionalism, Sundarbans, Forest Deities, Land Reclamation.