Tanimomo Oluseun

Narrating the Ocean: Figures of Environmental Degradation, Multinational Imperialism in Helon Habila's Oil on Water

Beyond the evident description of the environmental pollution of the Niger Delta, Helon Habila’s 2010 novel, Oil on Water fictionalizes the socio-political effect of petrol-dollar on the country, Nigeria. In the novel, the Atlantic ocean is a complicated sign of belonging and dispossession, tranquillity and disorder, and wealth and poverty. Furthermore, the Lagos beach off the Atlantic ocean, islands in the Niger Delta are narrated as spaces of environmental, ethical, and economic pollution.

The novel which tells the story of the adventure of two journalists along the Atlantic shows the mechanisms of multinational hegemony, media power, class discrimination and race in making some catastrophes more visible than others. It is in fact through the kidnap of the British lady, Isa bel Floode that much narrative attention is given to the intersection of environmental pollution, class and racial hierarchies in the novel. Consequently, Habila’s novel, Oil on Water communicates the privilege of certain bodies in the context of multinational imperialism, spatial militarization, and dispossessions. Accordingly, a close reading of Oil on Water yields positive results in engaging with literary ocean studies because the novel creatively interacts with human rights, political, racial and ecological concerns. Rob Nixon’s conceptualization of the environmentalism of the poor is important for the analysis of the novel. By drawing from Richard Nixon and from Pablo Mukherjee’s works on environmental justice, I intend to engage the Atlantic Ocean, its beaches and islands as spaces where multinational conditions of imperialism, asymmetrical power relations thrive. Habila’s fictional representation of two islands: Irikefe and Agbuki reflect the class and racial power differentials in accessing the ocean. The ocean, the land surrounding it, and the land around it will be examined as complicated spaces of hybridity, conflict, governmental corruption, and environmental pollution narrated through a complex non-linear mode.