An Eco-critical Reading of Eric Barnes’s The City Where We Once Lived (2018)
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Date
2022
Authors
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Publisher
Université Mouloud Mammeri
Abstract
This dissertation investigates the abuse of nature, climate change fiction, revenge of nature and the representation of refugees in Eric Barnes’s The City Where We Once Lived (2018). This study aims first to explore the relationship between humans and nature in the novel. It scrutinizes how man’s abuse of nature brought about a post apocalyptic world. The dissertation discusses the abuse of nature, climate change fiction, revenge of nature and the representation of refugees in the above mentioned novel by applying ecocriticism. It relies on some theorists and their concepts; it relies on Cheryll Glotfelty, Stephen R. Kellert and Ladelle McWorther’s definition of ecocriticism. It also focuses on Adam Trexler’s Anthropocene Fictions: the Novel in a Time of Climate Change (2015), Gregers Andersen’s Climate Fiction and Cultural Analysis: A New Perspective On Life in the Anthropocene (2020) and Antonia Menhert’s Climate Change Fictions: Representations of Global Warming in American Literature (2016). Our investigation of the issue under study has led us to some findings. Humans debase and exploit nature through activities like pollution, use of chemicals, petroleum plants, smokestacks, pipes, storage pools and different substances that have a negative impact on the world and country. These actions have caused the rise of climate change in different parts of the world as USA; the novel depicts a rise in sea levels, changes in precipitation patterns which cause heavy rainfall and cold weather. Besides, we have noticed that nature is described as an active agent that avenges itself on society through powerful natural disasters such as storms, floods and tornadoes by actively shaping their social lives and destinies. It has a negative impact on the protagonist and citizens lives since it causes the alienation of characters, rise of violence and the total absence of law to restrict people. These events push the characters in the novel to feel insecure because there is no power to insure their own protection. Consequently, we have found that natural disasters oblige people to become refugees in order to seek safety, stability, and the opportunity to rebuild their lives in the surrounding countries.
Description
57p. ; 30cm(+CD+Rom)
Keywords
abuse, ecocriticism, refugees, revenge of nature, novel.
Citation
Literature and Interdisciplinary Approaches