51 pages • 1 hour read
The Hungry Tide
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Themes
Man and Nature
In The Hungry Tide, humans have both a symbiotic and an antagonistic relationship with nature. The Sundarbans are an inviting yet deadly place for human society. As Kanai remembers, Sir Daniel Hamilton came from “harsh and rocky Scotland” and believed that “even mud” could be conquered (42). When he saw the vast, uninhabited Sundarbans, he was determined to place humans there, despite the dangers of “tempests and tides, tigers and crocodiles” (42). He imagined the islands as a utopia for land-starved Indians. Though they were besieged by predators, early settlers pressed on, killing tigers and cutting down trees for farmland. Sir Daniel’s struggle had been to harness the power of the land by changing it forever. Many years later, the settlers on Morichjhapi want the same thing: a place to grow crops and raise families, cut off from a society that shunned them.
Piya experiences both the heights of man’s relationship with nature as well as the inescapable dangers. In this isolated, dangerous part of the world, she is able to observe the freshwater dolphins she has longed to more fully study. The Sundarbans, Piya tells the reader, is “a floating biodome filled with endemic fauna and flora” (104). There are limitless possibilities for exploration and study—“the work of a lifetime” (105). Piya spends much of the book marveling at the dolphins, trying to figure out their patterns and relationships. Her relationship with nature is one of joy and amazement; but when the storm hits, Piya also discovers that she is powerless in the face of nature’s power. A tidal wave sweeps in, destroying everything in its path. “It was as if death had announced its approach and there was nothing to do but to wait for its arrival” (315). Through Piya’s eyes, the reader sees that the natural world is a symbol of life itself—it contains the purest of joys, the most frightening of dangers, and the inevitability of death.
The “Other”
Practically every major character in The Hungry Tide experiences feeling of being “outside” or “the other,” somehow divided from the rest of the society they find themselves in. Kanai and Piya are both outsiders in the Sundarbans, Piya for her Americanness and lack of conformity to Indian gender expectations; Kanai for his education and urbanity. Nirmal and Nilima were once outsiders themselves, having left the city due to political tensions. Fokir, when around Piya and Kanai, is unable to understand their conversations.
Piya experiences constant crises of identity . She is born in Seattle to immigrant parents and so is always an outsider to white, Western culture. She bristles when classmates assume she loves river dolphins because she is Indian. In her graduate program, she feels out of place among other “rawboned and finely muscled” students—“a minnow among the whale watchers” (62). When she travels to India, she finds a greater sense of belonging. She is obviously American and cannot speak Bengali. Kanai pegs her as a foreigner right away—she has “close-cropped black hair” and “no bindi on her forehead” and her clothes are “those of a teenage boy” (3), at least in Kanai’s mind. In America, she was too Indian to find identity. In India, she is too American. Oddly, she feels most comfortable with Fokir, perhaps because both are the “other” to one another. Piya possesses money, technology, and education. Fokir possesses skill and practical knowledge. They are both undervalued in their respective societies, but find identity as a team.
Language
Language and language barriers are an important theme in The Hungry Tide. The theme presents itself most fully in Piya and Fokir’s wordless relationship. Despite their inability to speak one another’s language, they manage to communicate. Gestures and miming are universal, and though Piya and Fokir have practically nothing in common, they do share their humanity. Their humanity is something separate from language, though Piya acknowledges that much is lost in the language gap. Early on, Piya sees the language gap as almost romantic. Stripped of their words, she and Fokir must revert to older, purer, “more honest” (132) methods of communication—gestures, touch, and sound. “Speech was only a bag of tricks that fooled you into believing that you could see through the eyes of another being” (132). When Kanai joins them as a translator, he quickly shuts down Piya’s view that she and Fokir are connected. “‘If you were about to be struck by a bolt of lightning, he’d have no way of letting you know,’” Kanai tells her (221) Piya is hurt by his dismissal, but comes to see that while common language is not a necessity, it underlies common understanding. She nearly breaks a cultural taboo of not mentioning tigers and is traumatized when villagers brutally kill one. Fokir, for his part, cannot understand why she is upset. When Fokir and Piya are caught in the storm, their lack of communication could mean their deaths. Though Piya is quick on her feet, it takes her precious seconds to understand Fokir’s wordless instructions. As Fokir dies, Piya hears him say the names of his wife and son. In his last moments, language is forgotten, even words. “She had tried to find the words to remind him of how richly he was loved—and once again, as so often before, he had seemed to understand her, even without words” (323).
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