ENVIRONMENT IN NIGERIAN LITERATURE: ECOCRITICAL STUDY OF NGOZI CHUMA-UDEH’S FORLORN FATE

Abstract

The discovery of oil in Nigeria has paradoxically brought both fortune and destruction to its people. Several communities where oil has been discovered in the country have continued to suffer the negative impacts of oil exploration and exploitation in their areas. This study examined the relationship between literature and the environment and exposed the negative impacts of man on his environment. The data for this work was collected by critically analyzing Ngozi Chuma-Udeh’s Forlorn Fate using the Niger Delta experience to reflect the tragedies equally experienced in most oil producing communities in Nigeria. The theoretical framework adopted for this study is eco-criticism, which is the study of the representation of nature in literary works and also of the relationship between literature and the environment. The findings exposed environmental degradation, oil spillage, deforestation, pollution, exploitation and unemployment as some of the direct consequences of abusing nature. Finally, it was recommended that Nigeria as a country should review and reconsider how its Government has steadily and painfully devalued and devastated its oil producing communities through the activities of not only the expatriate oil companies and their Nigerian connivers but equally by the Government itself in their failure to adequately compensate the host communities.