HUMAN SUFFERING AND ENVIRONMENTAL SILENCE: AN ECOCRITICAL EXPLORATION OF AND THE MOUNTAINS ECHOED

Abstract

And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini (2013) is a powerful work that delves deeply into human suffering, displacement, and moral accountability in the fractured ecological and cultural landscape of Afghanistan. The novel goes beyond a traditional family narrative to show how family war-related wounds, poverty, and migration reverberate through time and space. Hosseini interweaves the lives of Abdullah, Pari and Nila Wahdati, each of whom represents the fragmentation of identity, place of residence and nature. Not just as a backdrop, but as a living being that is torn with human greed and historical violence, Hosseini reveals the Afghan landscape superbly. The silence of women, of the land, of memory become the recurring metaphor of alienation and ecological loss. This paper analyzes Hosseini's work through the lens of ecocriticism and existential humanism, arguing that the novel turns the geography of Afghanistan into an ethical and spiritual landscape that positions humanity as an outsider to nature. Finally, And the Mountains Echoed is an ecological allegory of redemption, implying that healing, whether personal, cultural, or environmental, starts with empathy and with returning to the world of the living.