An Ecological (Re)presentation of Depravity and Environmental Depletion in Adamu Kyuka’s The Death of Eternity

Abstract

The notion that the environment has always served as a thematic and aesthetic base for the production of texts in the literary enterprise, globally is inarguable. In attestation, of the afore claim, this paper draws cogent data from Adamu Kyuka’s The Death of Eternity to closely examine the natural world and the environment as underscoring the relationship between man and his environment. The paper is exponential in its portrayal of man’s symphonic interaction with the environment as a blessing or a curse. Going forward, this paper builds a composite philosophy around the intersection between literature and environment. Where it argues that Nigerian literature has become more conscious of issues arising from resource control, as it especially relates to the devastating effect it melts on the environment. In concretizing these arguments, the paper deploys Ecocriticism as its analytical/investigative mechanism to explore the selected text as a fair representation of the environmental degradation Nigeria suffers at large. Seemingly, the choice of Ecocriticism as the investigative tool identifies the selected author as keenly aware of the devastating effect of industrial pollution as portrayed in the text under study as an expression of the commitment of the course of environmental preservation. The paper therefore finds that, Kyuka’s The Death of Eternity is critical in its examination of the social injustices, greed, corruption, political crisis and economic setbacks as social ills which are inspired by the scramble for natural resources.