Digital Object Identifierhttps://doi.org/10.66376/criterion.v17.n5.8
https://orcid.org/0009-0005-0443-2024The research work examines dissonance and nihilism, arguing that the select poetry collection evokes a profound sense of existential crisis through a sustained interplay of mortality, emotional split, alienation, isolation, violence, ecological precarity, and meaninglessness of life. It analyses artificial urban life and offers a nuanced yet unembellished representation of Nagaland’s emotional experiences. Drawing upon the existentialist perspectives given by Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre, the study employs textual analysis methods to explore the relationship between existentialist consciousness and lived experiences portrayed in poetic form. The study foregrounds that dissonance not only acts as a mere thematic representation of psychological conflict but also serves as a formal poetic strategy through which fragmentation, juxtapositions, silence, and the tension between remembered experience and present reality are articulated. The study further establishes that nihilistic impulses are shaped by confrontations with mortality, violence, ecological uncertainty, and the perceived instability of meaning.
Lodhi, Nawal Kishor, and Nitin Saxena. “Poetics of Dissonance and Nihilism: Negotiating Existential Crisis in Nini Lungalang’s The Morning Years.” The Criterion: An International Journal in English, vol. 17, no. 5, Oct. 2026, pp. 100-12, https://doi.org/10.66376/criterion.v17.n5.8.
© 2026 The Author(s). Published by the Research Centre for English Language and Literature (RCELL) under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence.
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