The Nutmeg’s Curse

Authors

  • Amitav Ghosh

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5282/rcc-springs-14636

Abstract

This article takes us to the Banda Islands to unravel “The Nutmeg’s Curse.” Narrating the violent history of the spice trade in the area and the nutmeg’s power to “decide the fate of human beings,” the author advocates for the acknowledgement of “humanity’s ever-increasing servitude to the earth.”

Author Biography

  • Amitav Ghosh

    Indian writer and anthropologist Amitav Ghosh—winner of the 2024 Erasmus Prize—has addressed the human cost of today’s planetary crisis in his fictional and nonfictional work. He is the bestselling author of 10 novels, including the Ibis Trilogy (2008–2015), The Hungry Tide (2004), and Gun Island (2019), and of several works of nonfiction, from The Great Derangement (2016) to The Nutmeg’s Curse (2021). Amitav holds a PhD in social anthropology from the University of Oxford and has been a full-time writer since 2004. In 2024, he was a short-term visiting scholar at the RCC, giving talks including the one published here.

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Published

27-05-2025

Issue

No. 7 (2025)

Section

Articles

License

Copyright (c) 2025 Amitav Ghosh

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.