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| Photo credit HERE |
Reader Beware! This is not a review, but my thoughts on
Amitav Ghosh’s latest book launched only recently, The Great Derangement: Climate Change And The Unthinkable, which ends the drought, as Tabish Khair says
in his review, after Ghosh’s extraordinary non-fiction, ‘In an Antique Land’
“On the afternoon of
17 March, 1978, the weather took an odd turn. I was studying MA at Delhi
University while working part-time journalist…Glancing above my shoulder I saw
a grey, tube – like extension forming on the underside of a dark cloud; it grew
rapidly as I watched, and then all of a sudden it turned and came whiplashing
down to earth…The noise quickly rose to a frenzied pitch, and the wind began to
tug fiercely at my clothes…I saw to my astonishment that my surroundings had
been darkened by churning cloud of dust…I saw an extraordinary panoply of
objects flying past – bicycles, scooters, lampposts, sheets of corrugated iron,
even tea stalls…Buses lay overturned, scooters sat on treetops, walls had been
ripped out of buildings…” Amitav Ghosh in The Great Derangement: Climate Change
And The Unthinkable
The passage cited above, experienced by him in 1978, could
have made Amitav Ghosh, write a novel, where the main protagonist was going through
what he experienced, which undoubtedly can be quoted as a tornado, as a result
of climate change. But, in The Great
Derangement, Amitav Ghosh, laments the sheer dearth of fiction in the genre
of what we call Cli-Fi, meaning
fiction on Climate Change. While there is non-fiction material available on the
subject, and discussions across nations on this subject, there is very little
among fiction writers, including himself who have been able to situate their
stories in the midst of extreme devastation that is the nature of storms,
tornadoes, tsunami, floods, excessive rains, absolute drought, etc etc, all
arising out of climate change. His one serious engagement was in The Hungry
Tide, the excerpt being available HERE.
In the recently launched and latest book by Amitav Ghosh, The Great Derangement: Climate Change And
The Unthinkable, Ghosh, mines deeply into literature from the present and
the past to establish that not only is there very little literature in fiction
on this subject, but also, how climate change cannot be looked at honestly
without looking in depth on ‘empire and
imperialism’ and of course politics.
It is the thirst for wealth that made European countries
like England, France, Portugal expand their empire across the globe. They built
harbours and cities close to the sea in order to continue their trade across nations.
The wealthy businessman affected the politics of the land and indeed
imperialism is key to climate change, as cities were built too close to rivers
thus making them, open to the ‘uncanny, improbable’ weather, we now experience
as climate change. As wealthy sections of people formed the government, we know
that politics and policies are so made that they continue to protect industry
even in the face of hugely catastrophic affects on people and ecosystems. It is
this ‘unholy nexus’ that is for
centuries engaged and involved in keeping the status quo even though in global
conferences, the catch word is to arrest climate change. However, this
responsibility is always on ‘the other’.
The book is an excellent read for academics and people
interested in Climate Change and environment. To me it read more like a paper
on Climate Change citing history and politics of it all. The beginning might
have been an addition at a later stage, which brings focus on the dire need for
more fiction on Cli-Fi.
The book however does not put light on the fast vanishing keystonespecies like wolves, beavers and the like, who help to preserve the environment.
Read also: Tabish Khair’s Review: Outside Imagination HERE
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