Global Journal of Human-Social Science, A: Arts and Humanities, Volume 22 Issue 4

Volume XXII Issue IV Version I 60 ( ) Global Journal of Human Social Science - Year 2022 © 2022 Global Journals A An Ecocritical Reading of Syed Manzoorul Islam’s Shakuner Dana of their coherence and usefulness as responses to environmental crisis (5; cited in Garrard 4).’ Another prominent ecocritic Kevin Hutchings (2007) expands the definition and says, One of ecocriticism’s basic premises is that literature both reflects and helps to shape human responses to the natural environment. By studying the representation of the physical world in literary texts and in the social contexts of their production, ecocriticism attempts to account for attitudes and practices that have contributed to modern-day ecological problems, while at the same time investigating alternative modes of thought and behavior, including sustainable practices that would respect the perceived rights or values associated with non-human creatures and ecological processes (172). All these definitions of ecocriticism highlight the environmental issues, ecological concerns, interspecies relationships, and the earth-oriented visions and activist attitudes of environmentalists. III. S hakuner D ana as an E cocritical T ext The novel Shakuner Dana (Wings of the Vulture) charts the development of its protagonist Orin and other characters, such as Safia, Azam, Hanif, and Mahin vis-à-vis an increasing eco-consciousness leading to a mass upsurge. The story of the novel is primarily set in a haor area spanning the villages Chandipur, Mahiganj, Bhadartek, Sitakut, and a rural town called Dhulaura. This area is crisscrossed by three natural water bodies: the Tishna River, the Patijuri Haor, and the Mainar Bil. The area’s people are almost entirely dependent on these water sources for life and livelihood. They are primarily a community of peasants and fishermen. Of them, Hanif is a farmer, Shailen is a boatman, and Manu Miah is probably a farmer. Irrespective of their profession and vocation, everyone here in the area is profoundly connected with the natural environment. This natural space, extremely crucial to the life and living of the local people, encounters an imminent threat posed in the shape of the proposed CMB project. The implementation of the project, as all textual evidence and estimates suggest, will affect the whole community, humans and non-humans alike. Considering all these issues, the ongoing paper intends to scrutinize the text Shakuner Dana from various ecocritical viewpoints and launch an eco-discourse highlighting fiction as a potent tool in the process. Sections below will unfold different aspects of Shakuner Dana (2013) as a formidable piece of eco-fiction emerging out of Bangladesh. a) Title as Symbol The title of the novel having “shakun” (vulture) in it bears symbolic significance. The vulture is an endangered species in Bangladesh. So, the use of the bird’s name brings to our attention the destruction of biodiversity and ecological balance in Bangladesh. In the novel Shakuner Dana , when the Dutch environmentalist Von Hoffman comes across a vulture flying up in the sky, he gets wonder-struck. The narrator says, ‘It’s an endangered species numbering less than one hundred in Bangladesh, he heard. This one must be among the hundred (Islam 14).’ However, it also signals the subject matter of the book. The vulture, which is a predatory bird, carries both negative and positive connotations. It symbolizes gluttony, jealousy, opportunism, and power-mongering in Bengali culture. So, when the Dutch scientist expresses his surprise at the chance sight of such a species on the verge of extinction, he receives a more surprising response from Orin, a delegation member in the scientific team. Orin claims, laughing, ‘The vulture is not a dying species.’ She also adds, ‘Vultures are not up in the sky but available all over Bangladesh, and their number is increasing at a rate higher than the birth rate of the Bangladeshi populace (Islam 15).’ Here Orin sarcastically and metaphorically refers to the burgeoning greedy section of Bangladeshi people. The vulture metaphor also foreshadows how the plot of the novel is shaping up. Curiously, the vulture also bears positive connotations and symbolic value. In certain cultures, ‘vulture symbolism is associated with purification and rebirth (Green).’ The novel seems to have incorporated both meanings, however apparently contradictory, to set the eco-discourse in motion. While the negative tropes associated with the vulture lay bare the indomitable greed and destructive force of a section of Bangladeshi people, the positive ones pertaining to purification and regeneration highlight environmental resilience and revival. The positive aspects of the vulture symbolism also gesture towards the re-enactment of balanced relations between human and non-human elements of the environment. In the novel Shakuner Dana , we can see an environmental disaster, ecocide to be precise, looming large under the guise of the development project, which is a nasty human intervention in nature’s domain. That the project is finally discarded in the face of synergistic endeavor by different groups of people speaks of the affirmative aspects foregrounded by the vulture symbolism. The title choice involving the vulture is worth it as far as ecocriticism is concerned. b) Sense of Place Attachment to place plays a crucial role in the life and order of a community. In his The Future of Environmental Criticism (2005), Buell says, ‘Ecocriticism, however, has tended to favor literary texts oriented toward comparatively local or regional levels of place- attachment (68).’ He maintains that for contemporary environmental criticism ‘place often seems to offer the promise of a “politics of resistance'' against modernism’s excesses-- its “spatial colonizations”