A review by ela_lee_
The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable by Amitav Ghosh
3.0
The world was void,
The populous and the powerful was a lump,
Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless—
A lump of death—a chaos of hard clay.
The rivers, lakes and ocean all stood still,
And nothing stirr'd within their silent depths.
-Darkness by Lord Byron (George Gordon)
The Great Derangement is an interesting discussion on climate change and unlike any other environmental books I’ve read. It touches on vast subjects such as geography, history, poetry, literature, and religion, encouraging a more philosophical approach on how society views climate change. Ghosh is a fiction novel writer and it shows (especially as he name drops several of his other books throughout, which I found tacky.)
This book helped me research climate change in a unique way, but overall it was way too wordy and dry for me. It took a couple weeks to finish (which is rare) especially since it is a shorter book. As someone else mentioned in the comments, I could see this novel fusing better as an essay or detailed article.
Overall, I appreciated learning about natural disasters from the 1800’s, how climate change has and continues to affect Asian countries, and a more detailed look at The Paris Climate Agreement suggesting it may not be as effective as we’d hoped.
The populous and the powerful was a lump,
Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless—
A lump of death—a chaos of hard clay.
The rivers, lakes and ocean all stood still,
And nothing stirr'd within their silent depths.
-Darkness by Lord Byron (George Gordon)
The Great Derangement is an interesting discussion on climate change and unlike any other environmental books I’ve read. It touches on vast subjects such as geography, history, poetry, literature, and religion, encouraging a more philosophical approach on how society views climate change. Ghosh is a fiction novel writer and it shows (especially as he name drops several of his other books throughout, which I found tacky.)
This book helped me research climate change in a unique way, but overall it was way too wordy and dry for me. It took a couple weeks to finish (which is rare) especially since it is a shorter book. As someone else mentioned in the comments, I could see this novel fusing better as an essay or detailed article.
Overall, I appreciated learning about natural disasters from the 1800’s, how climate change has and continues to affect Asian countries, and a more detailed look at The Paris Climate Agreement suggesting it may not be as effective as we’d hoped.