AN ECO- CENTRIC READING OF AMITAV GHOSH’S ‘THE LIVING MOUNTAIN: A FABLE FOR OUR TIMES’

Eco centric discourse is characterised by an unprecedented ongoing concern of the latest technologies over the traditional ethnic society or its cultural ‘other'. This accounts to the contemporary techno-savy life situation of diasporic cross-cultural exchanges, its function is conducive to the marketing strategy of globalized community culture. It is in this perspective of the globalized cultural imbroglio that Amitav Ghosh's fictional creations become significant as post-colonial eco-centric critiques of contemporary polity. Eco centrism is a philosophy or perspective that places intrinsic value on all living organisms and their natural environment, regardless of their perceived usefulness or importance to human being. In most of the works, Amitav Ghosh indicates the relationship between nature and human being. Environmental deterioration has assumed alarming dimensions worldwide with global warming, carbon emissions and acid rain, and portrays a very grim picture of the future mankind. ‘The Living Mountain' is about the loss of an ecological way of life. It combines the element of science, fiction, fantasy and magical realism to modify the reality and make the readers to think from an outsider's perspective. This paper attempts to explain the relationship between man and nature and how the destructive activities of human beings affect the ecology. It also aims analyse the postcolonial aspects of struggle for salvation, culture and tradition, social, political and ecological developments.