Slow Memories of an Emptying Landscape: Readings from Sheela Tomy’s Valli

Slow Processes like colonialism and capitalism set off highly consequential ecological chain reactions, including deforestation, ecological destruction, climate change, and species extinction, and as the world grapples with their impacts, the “fast memory techniques” that we have so far relied on for commemoration prove to be insufficient. This chapter regards extraction as a slow change that changed the ecological and socio-political landscape of South Asia; It employs Jenny Wüstenberg’s concept of slow memory to reflect on the accounts of extraction in Sheela Tomy’s Valli. The paper contemplates the capacity of fiction to depict the slow process of extraction, as it explores the novel’s attempt to capture the ecological transformation of Wayanad over the years and the affective response of its vulnerable population. The study finds that, in Valli, slow memories are rendered through two politically charged quotidian acts: mourning and daylighting. It argues that Valli creates a space to articulate and reinstate ecological relationships, and offers a strong critique of hierarchical structures and discourses that enabled extractivism. The chapter concludes that depiction of slow memories in Valli is an act of resistance—a deliberate effort aimed at cultivating hope, awareness, and environmental action.