Masking pain: Narcotics as a negative coping mechanism in Jeet Thayil's Narcopolis and low

This paper examines narcotics as a negative coping mechanism in Jeet Thayil's Narcopolis (2012) and Low (2020), with the primary aim of analysing how substance use intensifies psychological trauma, alienation, and crises of identity and gender rather than enabling recovery. In both novels, narcotics function not as agents of healing but as illusory escapes that ultimately magnify suffering and isolation. In Narcopolis (2012), marginalized figures such as Dimple, shaped by poverty, social exclusion, and bodily trauma, turn to opium and heroin to numb pain and dislocation; however, addiction deepens their psychic fragmentation and forecloses the possibility of recovery. Similarly, in Low (2020), Dom Ullis resorts to hallucinogens following his wife's suicide, only to confront a distorted reality that exacerbates his existential despair rather than alleviating it. Beyond individual pathology, Thayil's representation of narcotics critiques addiction as a cyclical and self-destructive response to unresolved trauma within unequal urban and social structures. Through qualitatively sustained close reading of narrative voice, character interiority, and representations of urban space, the study further aims to examine the intersections of addiction, marginalization, and urban precarity. Additionally, Anthony Giddens's theory of ontological insecurity is employed to elucidate the role of the modern urban environment in intensifying the characters' existential crises. This paper contributes to a nuanced understanding of addiction as both a personal and socio-cultural condition in Thayil's fiction.