The Kindness of Nature in Aboulela’s The Kindness of Enemies: An Ecocritical Reading
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1512.28Keywords:
diaspora, nature, ecocriticism, identity, AboulelaAbstract
This paper aims at studying Leila Aboulela's The Kindness of Enemies through an ecocritical lens. The study investigates how environmental and postcolonial themes intersect in the novel, emphasizing the destructive colonial effect on the environment and on personal and cultural identities. The study also highlights how nature shapes the personal and collective identities of indigenous people. It shows how colonial exploitation of the land and the people leads to the destruction of the environment and the marginalization of people. Nature also is portrayed as a space for resistance and a means of healing.
References
Aboulela, L. (2015). The Kindness of Enemies. New York: Grove Press.
Achebe, C. (1958). Things Fall Apart. London: Heinemann.
Afzal, A. (2017). Ecocritical Postcolonial Studies on Humans, Land and Animals. University of Northern Iowa.
Aladylah, M. (2018). Dislocating narrativity: hybridity, culture and identity in Leila Aboulela's The Kindness of Enemies. Annals of the Faculty of Arts, 46, 478-485.
Al-Khayyat, A., & Abu Amrieh, Y. (2023). Islamic identity and weather conditions in Leila Aboulela’s The Translator and The Kindness of Enemies. Cogent Arts & Humanities, 10(1), 1-13.
Alkodimi, K. (2021). Islamophobia, othering and the sense of loss: Leila Aboulela’s The Kindness of Enemies. AWEJ for Translation & Literary Studies, 5(1), 144-158.
Benlahcene, M., Henni, I., Hellalet, S., & Alfino, J. (2025). From Inadequacy to Becoming in Leila Aboulela’s The Kindness of Enemies. Journal of Languages and Translation, 5(1), 208-217.
Boughey, A. S. (1975). Man and the Environment: An Introduction to Human Ecology and Evolution (2nd ed.). New York: Macmillan.
Carvalho, I, & Steil, C. (2008). The Sacralization of Nature and the ‘Naturalization’ of the Sacred: theoretical contributions for the comprehension of the intercrossing between health, ecology and spirituality. Ambient, 4, 1-22.
Chaoui, S. (2023). Ensouling Agential Praxis in A Secular World: A Sufi Spiritual Turn in Leila Aboulela’s The Kindness of Enemies. Critique Studies in Contemporary Fiction, 65(1), 1-13.
Doosti, F., & Nojoumian, A. A. (2019). Of Hideous ‘half-and-halfs’: reading the grotesque in Leila Aboulela’s The Kindness of Enemies. Language Horizons, Alzahra University, 3(1), 115-137.
Glotfelty, C., & Fromm, H. (1996). The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology. Athens, Georgia: The University of Georgia Press.
Harrison, K. D. (2023). Environmental Linguistics. The Annual Review of Linguistics, 9, 113-134.
Huggan, G., & Tiffin, H. (2015). Postcolonial Ecocriticism: Literature, Animals, Environment. New York: Routledge.
Johnson, L. (2009). Greening the Library: The Fundamentals and Future of Ecocriticism. Choice Reviews Online, 47, 623–631.
Junejo, M., & Shaikh, T. S. (2022). Land Deterioration and Environmental Damage: A Postcolonial Eco-Critical Study of How Beautiful We Were. Journal of Linguistics and Literature, 6(1), 67-88.
Kerridge, R., & Sammell, N. (1998). Writing the Environment: Ecocriticism and Literature. USA: Zed Books Ltd.
McHarg, I. (1969). Design with Nature. New York: Doubleday.
Mukherjee, P. (2006). Surfing the Second Waves: Amitav Ghosh’s Tide Country. New Formations, (59), 144-57.
Rueckert, W. (1978). Literature and Ecology: An Experiment in Ecocriticism. In C. Glotfelty (Ed.), The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology (pp. 105-123). Georgia: The University of Georgia Press.
Said, E. (1994). Culture and Imperialism. New York: Vintage Books.
