Spatializing Poetry through Evaluation of Ecocritical Spaces in Tony Afejuku’s A Spring of Sweets

Abstract

This essay explores the interplay between spatial literary criticism and ecocriticism and how they help present the poet’s representation  of ecological destruction in the Niger Delta. It reads the poems of Tony Afejuku in the collection: A Spring of Sweets (henceforth  abbreviated as ASOS). Through textual-analytic method, the poems are critically read to unveil the various connotations evident in the  construction of ecocritical spaces. The spatial configuration of the poems reveals that two main ecocritical spaces are framed to  underscore the poetic vision of the Niger Delta environment. The article concludes that Afejuku spatialises Warri River as well as oil  companies as ecocritical spaces through which the reader can appreciate the depth of ecological hazard happening in the Nigerian  coastal region, the Niger Delta.