Khaled Hosseini’s And the Mountains Echoed: An Eco-critical Interpretation

Authors

  • Himadri Shyam, Tarulata Pegu,

Abstract

Ecocriticism as an area of interest re-emerged after the 1990s. It gained worldwide popularity
due to the rapid dwindling relationship between man and nature in the name of development. However,
it is noteworthy that the environment had been a constant issue from early times. The term
"ecocriticism” itself has its first usage in William Rueckert’s essay “Literature and Ecology: An
Experiment in Ecocriticism” in 1978. Ecocriticism simply means the study of a relationship between
man and environment as reflected in literature. Apart from literature, it has its sway in various
disciplines like anthropology, science, sociology, psychology, etc. The urgency to discuss the issues of
environment is realized by writers and intellectuals in the contemporary world resulting in the
production of numbers of literary classics. This paper attempts to explore how Khaled Hosseini in his
novel And the Mountains Echoed (2013) highlighted the relationship between man and his physical
environment. The paper also attempts to study the attitudes of different characters towards nature in And
the Mountains Echoed. Further, the paper will analyze and interpret how the environment is deeply
rooted in the blood of a man and the paper concludes situating the interconnectedness of man and nature

Published

2020-11-01

Issue

Section

Articles