228. Wizard of the Crow by Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Few authors are able to keep their theme running for such a long time as Ngugi has done. As a critic of the post-independence politics of the new wave of African leaders, Ngugi wa Thiong'o knows more about the tricks, chicanery, and shenanigans of these people than most people. He has observed and written about it both in fiction and in essays. His keen interest has always been the lack of socialisation of government efforts and the endemic corruption that has strangulated several African countries, including his home country of Kenya - which had to go through a series of Constitutional reforms after the 2008 electoral crisis - from developing. Ngugi's observations, from the the dawn of independence when the capsule of euphoria burst and evaporated all at once leaving behind a blanket of realities, are encapsulated in his works. From his first novel Weep Not Child (1964), which studied the hostile relationship between the colonialists and the colonised to Wizard of the Crow (2006) Ngugi has tried to point out that the requisite tools for development have nothing to do with colour. It has all to do with harnessing the resources within the borders of one's country and using these resources efficiently to provide the goods and services the people needs. According to Ngugi, the traits of a good leader has nothing to do with tribe or ethnic affiliation but his selflessness, objectivity and integrity - his ability to bring the resources within the country together; that blackness is not all that makes a man.

In Wizard of the Crow (Anchor Books, 2006; 768) Ngugi wa Thiong'o brings together years of studies and observation in one swoop of a pen into a compelling novel. Wizard of the Crow brings together all the issues Ngugi raises in all his novels - from that carpenter (and the Jacobos) who wanted to have it all, in Weep Not Child, to John Boy and his collusion with the second generation colonialists in Matigari to the betrayal of the freedom fighters and the people by the new elites and that MP in A Grain of Wheat.

However, whereas his previous books centred somewhat on the coming of the colonialists and more on the nefariousness of the first wave of leaders, Wizard of the Crow strictly analyses the behaviours of African dictators and autocrats and the complicity of donor institutions and countries in that ginormous corruptions that have engulfed our countries. In some way it collaborates Dambisa Moyo's Dead Aid thesis when she argued that conditionalities and the type of government - autocrat, dictatorship, monarchy, endemically and openly corrupt - matter little as to who gets the World Bank and IMF loans and that governments use huge projects to siphon resources into their personalised off-shore bank accounts.

In WOTC, in that fictional country of Aburiria, we meet the head of state - known simply as the Ruler and his cronies - Sikiokuu, Tajirika, Big Ben, Machokali, Kaniuru and other obsequious grovellers; bootlickers who would sing praises if those praise-songs and appellations will enable them to steal more. In this set up, affiliations and alliances are capricious and lasts as long as dew would in harmattan. In the Ruler's government, positions are given to those who can steal more and those who excelled are made governors and managers of central and national banks, put in places where they can siphon more and share with the leader. Those who are hounded and described as enemies of the state are the poor selfless souls whose only crime is that they won't participate in pillage; that they are pure and seek the healing of the souls; people like Nyawira (the Limping Witch) and Kamiti (The Wizard of the Crow). The corruption described gets to such a level that it becomes abnormal to be moral, to be seen doing the right thing, like the situation Achebe described in his tiny green book The Trouble with Nigeria.

Regardless of the satirical nature of the write and the mirth it can engender in the reader to the point of hiccups and uncontrollable dribbling of tears, what Ngugi described in this novel is the reality of most African countries including those that have taken on a semblance of democracy (and this was also discussed in the book). There are leaders who today refer to the country the rule's natural resources as 'my oil' and run the country like their bona fide property, an extension of their hopeless homes. In WOTC, the bootlickers have decided to honour the Ruler with a mansion bigger and taller than what the biblical Babylonians attempted, and failed. Consequently, this birthday project was christened Marching to Heaven; the vision was for it to become the largest project and to show the world that the people of Aburiria can, and are able to, challenge the developments of developed countries. Now where will the funding come from? The Global Bank had to be convinced to release the resources for this mind-boggling project. And even before the Global Bank agreed (or disagreed) contract seekers have already bribing the chairman of the committee responsible for the project. On the other hand, all the macroeconomic indicators of the country are poor: unemployment is of such levels that the entire country is queuing for nonexistent jobs; inflation is so high that it has rendered the Buris worthless and trading is virtually conducted in dollars.

But the Ruler was a friend of the United States and the West for his dedication towards their cause during the Cold War. (Exactly what Dambisa stated in her book when she proved, with data, that during the Cold War, it mattered not the type of government one practiced, so far as one showed he is in favour of capitalism or communism one got funded; so that from Mobutu of now DR Congo to Mengistu of Ethiopia to Bokassa of Central African Republic - whose coronation as an emperor is reputed to have cost US$ 22 million - all received donor monies). However, again exactly as Dambisa wrote, the tides have changed. The West, perhaps on a guilt-trip, now wants to see some changes before advancing the required resources for this ginormous Marching to Heaven project. But what type of change do they want? Is it superficial or deeper? The answer came when the leader, after several failures in accessing the required funds, declared the State of Aburiria a democracy where free and fair elections will be held; thus succumbing to the requirements of the West. But with one catch: He will be the Ruler of whichever party that won elections. Thus, regardless of the elections, he is bound to stay in power forever. This sends applause and congratulations to all quarters including donor countries and institutions. In no time the money required for the project was released and work began. Autocracy then was replaced by dictatorial democracy.

Is this therefore a political dystopia fraught with that Orwellian doublethink-doublespeak, where words are democratic and deeds autocratic? What it shows clearly is how the idea of democracy fosters timidity and inaction, allowing the same folks to be in power and do the same things. It also shows that democracy can and do accommodate the negativities inherent in autocracy and dictatorial regimes: the outward morphing of dictatorships into democracies whilst leaving their deeds intact.

Thus, the Ruler in this case symbolises two main practices across autocratic states. The first is leaders who have democratise autocracy so that they win every election and can contest as many times as they want till they drop dead. The other symbolism is that there could be changes in leadership but because they are all corrupt and corruption has become the norm rather than the exception, it matters not who wins the election, the end will be the same: more corruption, less provision of goods and services and the cycle continues unabated. Just as Dambisa said, what a young country at the nascent stages of development needs is not democracy as these leaders democratise and institutionalise corruption in a way that is difficult to challenge; rather such countries need benevolent dictators, perhaps the likes of Mahathir of Malaysia. However, in Africa there has been more of the dictator and less of the benevolence.

In the end, the excessive corruption in the Aburiria government bred jealousy and vile machinations leading to several deaths and palace coups. Though Ngugi derides autocracy in this satiric thesis, he clearly exposes the dangers of excessive capitalism and American imperialism. He showed the multiplicity of American interests and how it can change over time to suit its objectives: from slavery to colonialism to capitalism to globalisation, all to its benefit; in so doing, as clearly articulated, it can befriend the vilest autocrats - the likes of Mobutu (who stole a humongous sum of US$ 5 billion) and Idi Amin (whose atrocities in his home country of Uganda makes his name almost synonymous to Hitler) when it suits them and if these leaders can best serve these interests. Once these interests are served, they quickly withdraw, wipe their hands, and attack that country as if they never dealt with, or know them at all. They launch a vilification campaign against them - sometimes including war, like it happened to Saddam Hussein of Iraq (when they had claimed that this man is the best person to rule his people and later accused him of a crime he had already committed when this accolade was showered on him).

Finally, Ngugi shows the gradual corporating of the world, through globalisation; the gradual recolonisation of the world through the use of corporate or private capital, with Non-Governmental Organisations playing the roles of the wolfish missionaries.

But there are certain distinctions that should be made regarding the actions of the Ruler. Was everything that he implemented bad? The answer is a huge no; however, the ends they were to achieve was what made them bad. For instance, he was somewhat nationalistic, which is not negative if you know your strengths; after all, some call it patriotism, others call it socialism. But nationalising to the benefit of cronies and family is not the way to go. Again, the Ruler streamlined the health system to include traditional healers, but doing it so you can arrest your enemies - Nyawira and Kamiti in this case - serves no end.

Ngugi's disaffection from his characters (even from the protagonists - Kamiti and Nyawira) brought out the humanity in them; that they are not gods (and therefore are fallible and have epistemic limitations) and alone are incapable of taking on the whole country. It might be seen as an unsolvable conundrum, an inextricable knot but what Ngugi is seeking are changes among a large section of people; changes that are major, conscious and directed at a positive end. You can make a change in your circumstances but it's impossible to make it in the world alone if not supported; besides, a lighted country will light up a room but not a city. 

Anyone who reads this book will come to understand their governments better. The reader will come to appreciate the ways of politics, governance and corporations. It should be a manual for the hoi-polloi so that they are not taken in by those apples dangling before their eyes. It is highly recommended.

187. Cut off My Tongue by Sitawa Namwalie

Cut off My Tongue (StoryMoja, 2009; 80) is a bold collection of poems by Kenyan author who writes under the name Sitawa Namwalie. My first encounter with Namwalie's poems was when I saw her perform this entire set of poems at the Museum in Kampala, Uganda. That performance will live with me for a very long time. I describe Sitawa's poems as bold because of its subject matter. She is not afraid to call a thing by its name. Yet, in been blunt she didn't sacrifice the musicality and artistic requirement of poetry. All these ingredients are present in this excellent anthology.

Whether she is writing about the deeply tribalistic nature of her Kenyan compatriots, an issue that isn't peculiar to that country alone and which has been capitalised by politicians to achieve their personal goals, or she is talking about her identity as a Kenyan and an African, Sitawa minces no words and does so brilliantly. Though her writing covers wide subject matters, the common thread weaving the parts together - that ensured a flawless performance and seamless transitions between poems - is identity: identity of the self, of the tribe, of Africa and of Africans. She writes candidly about the post-electoral tribal violence that engulfed Kenya; here one sees the tribe-based chasms at display. The funny thing is that we all came from somewhere and nowhere. We cannot claim absolute ownership of no piece of land for in our migration we came to meet it. This issue of tribe is the subject matter of Language of Tribe. In this opening poem, the author '...wanted to know/ What is this thing/ That has us all by the neck:/ What does it look like?/ How does it feel?/ How do we live with it?' In this search for meaning and reason Sitawa questions why someone who has friends across all tribes will suddenly be '...glaring at each other/Across a wide abyss, a yawning space/Unbridgeable by the smiles of my former friends.' But did she find out the reason? Did she discover the secret?

But all these issues and problems with Tribe is linked to the issues and problems with lands. In Land of Guiltless Natives, Sitawa explores what land means to the Kenyan and whence that obsession came from. In this, Sitawa sarcastically blamed the colonists for imbuing into us their passion for the land. She writes: 'But let's not blame all the British./ The set that came to Kenya/ Is guilty of this particular mania./ Lords and Ladies of the real/ From a tiny island of 60 million souls/ On only 244,820 square km/ And those lordly few still managed to own large chunks of that!' And truly this is what was replicated when Africa was colonised. Lands in Africa became the gifts for those British soldiers who had been deemed to have served well in Wars. 'They carved out chunks of that empty land,/ 100,000 hectares for this Lord,/ 200,000 hectares for that Lord...'

Cut off My Tongue is a line in the poem I come from everywhere. In this poem, Sitawa shows that we are all from everywhere and nowhere for we have journeyed across rivers and mountains and have settled here; that characteristics that we associate to a given tribe suddenly becomes the characteristics of another tribe in a far off place. The metaphor 'Cut off My Tongue' shows how much rooted she is to everywhere. She writes: 'There is no purity in my people;/ We're a blend from everywhere./ So what should I do with your call to hate?/ Must I cut off my tongue,/ All silky smooth and full of words so sweet?' Science has shows us that we are a product of several gene-combinations and crossings and it is this combinations of different genes that ensures our survival; in fact, it is the very reason why incest is a taboo in every culture. Thus, if you want to be pure, why not marry your sister and allow your children to marry themselves. Since we cannot and don't do these, since we marry across streams and rivers and mountains, we are the product of many. 'There is no purity in my people/ I come from everywhere./ /You now tell me I must hate and kill?/ Must I cut off my tongue?/ Then tell me this,/ How do I mutilate my soul?' 

In all her writings, Sitawa Namwalie's audience is everyone, more especially the politicians who have capitalised on these divisions. But she also talks to the proletariat who is always deceived to carry out the butchering and the burning. This insanity associated with tribal conflict is what is addressed in Would You? and The Carcass of the House. In the former Sitawa wants to know if you 'Would seek a loving wife/ Give her one hour to leave her home,/ Depart from all she knows and those she love?/ And you call that an act of charity,/ When she pleads with you to kill her then,/ To wield a blunt blade...'. Similar sentiments are expressed in the latter, where 'Walls stand brooding alone/ The carcass of a house still stands...'. 

This entire anthology seeks to address the unity of humanity. That humanity has nothing to do with the tribe you come from. What is the colour of a tribe's blood? Interspersing the poems are essays addressing each set of issues. These essays do not deviate from the poems but expand ones understanding and appreciation of them. The themes covered in them matches what the author covers in this book. 

My favourite poem is Say My Name where the author questions the delocalisation of names. It is from this piece that she gets her name 'Sitawa Namwalie'. Nameless is another poem on the same issue. This book - made up of twenty-five poems and four essays - is a must read. It has the power to challenge your thinking and make you look at life with a different eye. It is my ardent hope that those who need this second-look will actually get to read this book or to listen to it performed to them. Alternatively, if possible this book should be translated into every Kenyan (or African) Language and be taught in schools. It is that good and germane to the development of a tolerant society. How do we address the issue of tribe? Is it by teaching your child English at home or by living among non-tribe folks? Sitawa Namwalie addresses all these. 

174. SHORT STORY: Urban Zoning by Billy Kahora

Urban Zoning by Billy Kahora is a story that is difficult to place, that is categorise. Not that categorisation is needed to understand a story nor that it is necessary in and of itself. But Kahora has written a story so simple that it becomes complex in a way that is not easily attainable. The story, to me, is different and unique in the sense that it takes one man, tells of his idiosyncracies in an almost surreal manner; or should I say mental, for Billy's protagonist achieves notoriety beyond the realms of the physical. The title itself is proof. In this story, 'Zoning' has nothing to do with apartheid or any form of physical separatism or quarantine; yet, it does. His - that is, Kandle's (the main character's) separatism is from the reality of this harsh world, its troubles and its gloom and doom, through alcohol.

Kandle is a man of unique character: though he drinks and gets drunk he is able to control himself from going over the edge; he is a controlled-drunk, if there is such a description. He wells himself with alcohol, at levels that have proven devastating and sometimes deadly to some of his colleagues, and yet never gets so drunk that he couldn't hold an intelligible conversation or put himself together and go home. And he never sways, not even imperceptibly. But Kandle is not a street drunk. He works at a bank. And it is this occupational affiliation that makes his personality different. For he is described as an industrious worker, one who has never-missed a day at work. At least never, until he did so in a way that is stunning and cunning in equal measure. And that is the crux of the story.

Billy's Kandle puts the states one attain after getting drunk into two: the Good and the Bad. The Bad State is when one loses control of oneself and go on doing things that disgraces oneself or could potentially result in ones' death. The Good State - which is where Kandle always work to place himself - requires mastery, like any other art. It calls for controlling the stable state to suit oneself even after one has gone drinking continuously for a week. But Kandle - a young man with several sobriquets - did not just get to this stage in life. Like everyone, he has gone through many situations in life and this has shaped his personality.

As a student - in the boarding house - he had dreamed of becoming a rugby player; even now, he day-dreams about being the best and winning the girl of his heart. This aspiration remained intact until it was shattered by an incident that would further proved devastating to him, alienating him into the world of alcohol and imprisoning him in his own zone.

With this story, Kahora has provided another angle for the gossips who never tire of describing and tagging the cause of every individual's problem. The story is worth the read.

__________________

About the author: Billy Kahora is the Managing Editor of Kwani? He also writes fictioin and completed an MSc. in Creative Writing with distinction at the University of Edinburgh as a Chevening Scholar in 2007. Before that Billy studied and worked in South Africa for 8 years and in between worked as an Editorial Assistant for All Africa.com in Washington D.C. He has a Bachelor of Journalism degree and post-graduate diploma in Media Studies from Rhodes University. His short story, Treadmill Love, was highly commended by the 2007 Caine Prize judges. He has recently edited 'Kenya Burning', a visual narrative of the Kenya post-election crisis published by the GoDown Arts Centre and Kwani Trustin March 2009. His extended feature, The True Story of David Munyakei, on Kenya's biggest whistleblower has been developed into a non-fiction novella and released by Kwani Trust in July 2009. Billy was a Regional judge for the 2009 Commonwealth Writers' Prize. (Source)

154. SHORT STORY MONDAY: Set Me Free by Clifford Chianga Oluoch

Set Me Free, published in the Caine Prize for African writing 2010 anthology - A Life in Full and other stories - is a story based on the 2007-2008 Kenya electoral crisis that resulted when Mwai Kibaki was declared winner of the December 27, 2007 elections and Raila Odinga and his supporters claimed there has been electoral fraud leading to a somewhat Orange Revolution but worsened when some politicians invoked the tribal differences leading to violence. The resolution of the crisis led to the Kibaki-Odinga power-sharing government where Odinga became the prime minister and Kibaki remained the president. In this parallel story, narrated by the daughter of one of such rogue politicians whose name is on the list of the names the ICC has released, the woman tells of the events that took place within the next two days when the list came out. When as a temporary single-mother she had to make a lot of life-and-dead decisions amid threatening calls and text messages, and women who all want to be part of his father's wealth and so are reporting having had children with him. It also moves alongside the woman's five-year old son's eagerness to keep a fallen bird.

David Mavita collapsed in his room by his housemaid, already he was hypertensive and diabetic, after the ICC list came out and is on life support. He has been deserted by both family and friends; friends because none of them wanted to be associated with him after his name came up. His wife has divorced him and absolutely hates him, believing the greatest mistake she had made in her life was marrying David. His sons - Joni and Jerry - have been both disowned by David and having gone their own ways want to have nothing to do with him. Joni became a homosexual prostitute and Jerry was now in the US with her mother who was there to look after his children.

This breakdown in the family left his only daughter as the controller of his estate and by default the next of kin who had to ensure that the next few days after the event will pass smoothly. She had to decide to keep his father on life-support or not; and had to ward off all unnecessary and threatening calls. She made calls to all known family members but none was willing to help: her mother (David's wife) cut the line after she offered her tuppence, an uncle had his problem with David already and would not help him even in death, an Aunt (David's sister) would echo what his brother said and would also cut the line, she could talk to Jerry, and Joni was nowhere to be found. Friends have suddenly whittled and she is left alone. Finally, she set out to look for Joni in Nairobi's Red Light District. When she found him, he also had nothing to do with him; according to him he'd been dead since and that he had no father. But he followed her to the hospital and also advocated for the removal of the life-support which was the decision she had to make that led to her canvassing for opinions from family members. A call from her husband, Tim, from abroad also supported the removal of the life-support since there is no use keeping him alive: is it so that he would face trial by the ICC?

In all there were twelve women who called at the hospital claiming to have had children with David and that should be part of the funeral preparations. They also came with a fake court injunction on the cremation, but David's daughter also has her way around these things. She would take her father off life-support, watch him breathe his last breath, outwitted the authorities and the vulturing women and get him cremated. Together with Joni, they spread his remains over parliament building - the place their father had spent much of his life.

The story is also about the uselessness of earning all such stupendous wealth and gaining nothing in return; rejected by friends and family. In the end his ashes fitted in a little urn which fitted in her hand and when she asked if that is all, the usher responded:

Yes. Human beings are very small.

________________________

About the author:

152. SHORT STORY MONDAY: The David Thuo Show by Samuel Munene

This short story is taken from the Caine Prize for African Writing 2010 anthology,  A Life in Full and other stories.

David Thuo runs a column in the Sunday News on social issues; actually, he claims to be a consultant on social issues. He is also the head of the Thuo family comprising of his wife, two daughters and a maid. For the first time mother and father quarrelled, the wife was accusing the husband of cheating and the husband was counter-accusing her for sleeping with her boss. The household dynamics seems to be weaker and there is no single bond binding them together. Again, there seems to be great tension among them so that even watching television becomes a platform to inflame passions.

The degeneracy of the family is not limited to the parents suspecting each other. Sharon the first child has two boyfriends and shares her time between them. The narrator, the second child, who pretends to be the best member of the household secretly reads a pornographic magazine she purchases every week.

Shinko, the maid, knows most of the things going on in the family. For instance she knows that Sharon has two boyfriends and the mother too keeps kissing a young boy who has been dropping her off every night. One evening, she came home late only to meet her maid sleeping with her husband on the sofa. A quarrel ensued and it was during the exchange of words that Dave got a hard evidence that the wife cheats on him using the demanding nature of her work as an excuse.

Author in green (Source)

The story seems to show how everything is not right with the Thuo, and for that matter every, family. The plot was difficult to follow and the story lacked something to connect all the different actions. Like most short stories, it remained in its nascent form and would have worked better if it had been fledged out.

________________

About the author: Samuel Munene is a young Nairobi poet, short story writer, and contributor to Kwani? as well as various literary online magazines. He holds an economics degree from the University of Nairobi, and currently earns a living as a freelance writer. (Source)

143. SHORT STORY MONDAY: Soul Safari by Alnoor Amlani

Soul Safari by Alnoor Amlani, published in the Caine Prize 2010 anthology, is a story about a well-planned but botched marriage proposal between former high-school lovers, Adam and Zara. Adam has carefully planned a Safari trip for his long time high-school who had just a terrible break-up with his boyfriend that required the police to literally uproot him from her apartment.

Adam seemed not to have taken the psychological consequences of such a horrible incident into consideration when planning for this romantic adventure. Upon reaching the place the relationship between the two went sour when Adam openly expressed his love for Zara. Zara on her part let it known to him that she loves him too, but only as a sister would love a brother. This statement broke the last string that held them together. Red with jealous and almost annoyed with anyone who dared hold a conversation with Zara that kept him out, the relationship was descending farther and farther into an irremediable state. And Adam was bent on pushing his proposal through. He was virtually obsessed with her: dreaming of her being chased by lions and he working to save her.

But Zara also has her career before her. She's yet to complete her degree in Film Studies in London, where her parents have migrated to five years ago and Adam is already settled with a well-paying job. Petty quarrelling ensued during their journey towards the last park they had to visit. When a bulbul settled on their car and looked at itself in the mirror, Zara asked "I wonder whether it knew it was looking at itself" and Adam responded "Maybe it thought it had found a girlfriend". This, or another, bulbul would later settle on their table after Zara had told Adam that she thinks she is in love and Adam had smiled for the first time since the time he professed his love to her and she had brushed it off. Did that smile and that acknowledgement of love mean the two would get involve?

This is a love story of sorts though not the romance-soggy types. It portrays the relationship between a man, set to marry, and a woman, set on her career. Yet, it doesn't lead to much estrangement as each is not holding to an entrenched position. Zara might be acting it out per her previous encounter, Adam could wait for her. But, definitely, there was a flicker of hope in the end.

________________

About the author:  Alnoor Amlani is a third-generation Kenyan of Indian origin who lives in Nairobi. He has worked in East Africa as a management consultant and written articles and opinion pieces for over a decade. He began writing fiction in 2009. He is currently writing his first novel. (Source: anthology)

NEW PUBLICATION: How Shall We Kill the Bishop and Other Stories by Lily Mabura

Slated to be published in March 2012 is Lily Mabura's short story anthology How Shall We Kill the Bishop and other Stories. The title story How Shall We Kill the Bishop was shortlisted for the 11th Caine Prize for African Writing in 2010. I read the story but got lost along the way; however, I know of other individuals who loved the story. The challenge is now to revisit this short story and have a second reading.

From the Publishers:

An artist mourning for a brother who died in Bosnia, a restless young woman alerted to the possibility of life outside her tight knit community, an unemployed lawyer lingering in a Kenyan hospital - Lily Mabura's first collection of short stories deals with characters whose fates fascinates and alarm. 

Set in Kenya, the USA, Namibia and the Congo, these brief, evocative tales demonstrate an acute sensitivity to the globalised trajectories which increasingly distinguished our world.

One of Kenya's most promising authors, Lily Mabura's Story 'How shall we Kill the Bishop?' was shortlisted for the 2010 Caine Prize for African Writing. 

Visit the publishers site and download Man in ultramarine Pyjamas for free. The book is published under the African Writers Series.

Brief Bio: Lily Mabura is an African and African Diaspora scholar and writer at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Her literary awards include the Jomo Kenyatta Prize for Literature and Kenya's National Book Week Literary Award. She has published several short stories, a novel, The Pretoria Conspiracy (Focus Books, 2000), and three children's books. She is currently working on a fictional exploration of Kenya's 2007-08 post-election violence, Man from Magadi. (source: A Life in Full and other stories)

107. A Grain of Wheat by Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo

Title: A Grain of Wheat

Author: Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo

Genre: Fiction/Colonial Literature

Publishers: Heinemann (AWS Classics)

Pages: 267

Year of First Publication: 1967

Country: Kenya

A Grain of Wheat has been noted as Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's best novel. It was voted as one of the Best 100 African Books in the Twentieth Century by the Zimbabwe International Book Fair. As the third published novel, A Grain of Wheat embodies distillates from Ngũgĩ's two previous novels: Weep Not Child (1964) and The River Between (1965). In this story, the fight for independence, started in Weep not Child and The River Between converges and hints of elitism, greed, and discrimination against the independence fighters that blossomed into the novel Matigari had just begun. 

Mugo wa Kibiro's prophecy (in TRB) that 'there shall come a people with clothes like butterflies' had come to pass and Waiyaki - the protagonist in TRB - is reported to have been 'buried alive at Kibwezi with his head facing into the centre of the earth' to serve as a 'living warning to those, who, in after years, might challenge the had of the Christian woman whose protecting shadow now bestrode both land and sea.' The natives have fought the colonial government and the Queen had agreed to independence. With few days to Uhuru - independence - the people of Thabai and Rung'ei areas are making all the necessary preparations to make the day a memorable one whereas party leaders and freedom fighters are looking for speakers to mark the occasion. This is the setting and period - December 10 and 12, 1963 - within which A Grain of Wheat placed.

To make the celebration memorable, the leaders of Thabai are impressing upon Mugo to be the main speaker. Mugo through his actions and, mostly, inactions have climbed to a certain status that he himself is afraid of. He is scared of accepting the appellations women shower on him. Something is bothering him. He does not see himself worthy enough to lead the people. He asks himself

Yes, could they really have asked him to carve his place in society by singing tributes to the man he had so treacherously betrayed?

But women continued to sing Mugo's praises at the market, in their homes. His queerness and taciturnity increased his popularity. Something he did not expect. He was regarded as the equal of Kihika, achieving hero-status when several beating after days of hunger-strike, to confess the oath, left eleven detainees at Yala Camp dead leaving him.

However, behind this openly mirthful - seemingly impeccable - preparations for Uhuru lies the search for the ultimate traitor; the individual behind the betrayal of the Movement's leader, Kihika, by General R. and Lt. Koina. Kihika had ran into the forest to fight the colonial government and natives who worked for colonial government, like Teacher Muniu and Rev. Jackson both of whom - using the bible - spoke against the struggle for independence. Reverend Jackson Kigondu - a native pastor - had

called on Christians to fight side by side with the whiteman, their brother in Christ, to restore order and the rule of the spirit.

And with such lines, Ngũgĩ showed the role Christianity - through some native pastors - played in dividing the natives and subjecting them to colonial rule. After several search, analyses, and elimination, Lt. Koina and General R settled on Karanja as the perpetrator of this unforgivable crime. 

Using a back and forth narrative style, Ngũgĩ provided the reader the background of most of the characters involved and their role for or against the uhuru struggle. And through this we get to know that most of the so-called freedom fighters had at one point in time betrayed the Uhuru cause. They had denounced their oath in detention and quietly come home to their family or had denounced the oath and openly joined forces with the colonial government in its fight against the natives. The motivating factor amongst the latter group of people was that Uhuru does not imply the end of white rule. And Karanja belonged to this group. 

Karanja loved Mumbi but before he could open his mouth, Mumbi had accepted Gikonyo's. Years later, after the two had married, Gikonyo was taken to detention, Karanja capitalised on this opportunity to win Mumbi. He denounced his oath, became a homeguard - killing people natives at will - and later a political chief drawing his power directly from the District Officer John Thompson. And it was during Karanja's position as a political chief that Mumbi begot him a child. Coming from detention after six years, and seeing his wife with a child, Gikonyo shut himself up: working hard to raise his economic status.

As preparation towards Uhuru gathered pace, people began asking questions. People, in their minds, wanted to know if after the departure of the whiteman and the introduction of black rule:

would the government become less stringent on those who could not pay tax? Would there be more jobs? Would there be more land? The well-to-do shopkeepers and traders and landowners discussed prospects for business now that we had political power; would something be done about the Indians?

Gikonyo was to discover, painfully, that nothing much had changed. Having planned, together with his friends, to obtain a government loan through their MP to purchase Burton's farm, and the MP having promised them, they were later to find when they visited the farm that the MP had acquired the property. And this was before the uhuru celebrations. During the uhuru celebration itself, General R observed that

those now marching in the streets of Nairobi were not the soldiers of the Kenya Land and Freedom Army but the King's African Rifles, the very colonial forces who had been doing on the battlefield what Jackson was doing in the churches.

Early on, Gikonyo had remarked:

You have a great heart. It is people like you who ought to have been the first to taste the fruits of independence. But now, whom do we see riding in long cars and changing them daily as if motor cars were clothes? It is those who did not take part in the Movement, the same who ran to the shelter of schools and universities and administration. And even some who were outright traitors and collaborators.

In the end, as a sign of resignation and helplessness, Mumbi reminded her visitors that they '... have got to live', to which Warui - an elderly woman in the village - responded 'Yes, we have the village to build'. And again, just like the fight for Uhuru, the building of the country became the burden of the ordinary people and not the elites who had inherited everything.

How dirt can so quickly collect in a clean hut!

The title 'A Grain of Wheat' is symbolic. A verse underlined in black in Kihika's Bible reads:

Verily, verily I say unto, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit (St. John 12:24)

According to bible.cc, a corn is the same as 'a grain'. Thus, Kihika knew that the struggle for independence, or uhuru, would require the utmost sacrifice on the fighters' part. And that except they are prepared to fight and die, their situation would not change. He was therefore the 'grain of wheat' that died and brought forth much freedom. Using Christian analogies, Ngũgĩ compared colonialism to the enslavement of the Israelites in Egypt. And several biblical pages were quoted to support this.

Though Ngũgĩ used an omniscient narrator, there were several places where the use of 'we', 'us' and 'you' pointed to a narrator who is one with the natives' cause. This hidden character was there at independence and was there when the struggle started; he or she seems to be the spirit of the Kenyans identifying himself with the people whenever he or she addresses the reader.

This is a story filled with symbolisms, metaphors and analogies. It shows hope, hopelessness, and hopefulness in a stochastic distribution. It also gives voice to the unknown soldiers of Kenya's past and present; those who have made it their aim to fight the war until the end is attained. It is recommended.

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For a biography of the author, click here.

For the Top 100 Books Reading Challenge

102. How Shall we Kill the Bishop? by Lily Mabura

Lily Mabura's How Shall we Kill the Bishop was shortlisted for the 11th Caine Prize for African Writing in 2010. The story was first published in Wasafiri Vol. 23 No. 1, March 2008. It is also part of the Caine Prize for African Writing anthology A Life in Full and Other Stories published in 2010, together with Alex Smith's Soulmates.

How Shall we Kill the Bishop is a story about the lives of four priests, a bishop and a cook at a vicarage in a desolate town in Kenya. In fact the author's description of the town where the vicarage is set is similar to Andre Brink's Praying Mantis. For instance the military base was a

remnant of the colonial legacy standing amongst stunted acacia trees and withered shrubs of solanum. The stunts of sparse grass surrounding the base were too brittle for cattle to graze on - too brittle even for camels. 

and it is this military that provides the 

distraction from the sick dogs that would not stop howling, from the dry animal carcasses in the bush and watering holes caked with mud.

In this town, inhabited by natives virtually begging and scouring for food and military, life seems to happen spontaneously and during the periods where life and access to sustenance seem to be unbearable, the natives who are unable to migrate away from the town, to literally seek greener pastures, turn to the bishop and his four priests for help. Yet these priests have their own problems. Each has something he is eager to forget. According to Fr. Yasin Lordman:

Fr. Ahmed, ... , was hard bent on forgetting cigarettes; Fr. Seif, in his determination to forget the woman he loved, intruded on everyone's quiet time because he could not stand his own; Fr. Dugo determined to forget that the bishop had tested him most before admission; and Dafala [the cook] determined to forget that the bishop was sick at all and carried on as usual.

And so too is the bishop as he lay dying on his bed. The bishop wanted someone to confess his sins to before he passes on. In his determination he writes a confessional letter for Fr. Yasin to post to the Nuncio Felice in Nairobi . Early on, it was Fr. Yasin who had asked the question 'How shall we kill the bishop' - as a joke - when they realised that he was the one who is preventing them from going back to their old ways. Fr. Yasin on his way to posting the letter saw Salima, a girl who had become part of the life of the priests and the bishop after she scaled the wall onto the compound and was asked, as penance for her sins, to serve as the altar girl, since the vicarage had lost all their altar boys to the unending drought. Following Salima, perhaps to verify why she has not been coming to the vicarage, Fr. Yasin misses her in the military crowd.

Fr. Yasin exchanged the bishop's envelope for the promise (from a woman in charge of the place where the military were dancing) of seeing Salima. Then suddenly, on the vicarage's compound was an armed military man with his boot on Yasin's neck. And in one censer swing of his gun, dropped the bishop.

This story is an enigma. What caused the military man who was keeping Salima to come to the vicarage and kill the Bishop? Was it a competition for Salima? Or revenge? Since the content of the envelope was removed, the military man could not be acting on revenge as initially one might think that the bishop had known Salima carnally. This story is somewhat above my head. I hope you read it and point this out to me, perhaps I am missing something. I think this story was shortlisted because of its enigma.

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Brief Bio: Lily Mabura is an African and African Diaspora scholar and writer at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Her literary awards include the Jomo Kenyatta Prize for Literature and Kenya's National Book Week Literary Award. She has published several short stories, a novel, The Pretoria Conspiracy (Focus Books, 2000), and three children's books. She is currently working on a fictional exploration of Kenya's 2007-08 post-election violence, Man from Magadi. (source: A Life in Full and other stories)

ImageNations: 3.5/6.0

Other Caine Prize Shortlist: Soulmates by Alex Smith (2010)

99. How Kamau Wa Mwangi Escaped into Exile by Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ

Mukoma Wa Ngugui's How Kamau Wa Mwangi Escaped into Exile was shortlisted for the 10th Caine Prize award in 2009. It is the fourth in the list of five shortlist to be reviewed here. The itself was published in Wasafiri Volume 23, No. 2 in June 2008.

Kamau is a member of the Second Independence Democracy with Content Forum (SIDCF), a group that has been asking questions of their dictatorial government. He has been arrested and tortured on several occasions and has become immune to the fear exuded by military officials. One evening Kamau was visited by an army officer who presented him with a list of people who should be on the run, in case an impending insurrection fail:

'I ... we do not want to see more people dead. Especially the young people and even though we anticipate more trouble from the likes of you, you professional agitators, this is our country and your needed. Protect yourselves and your friends. We shall deal with each other later. Like men ... eye to eye. If you do not leave tonight, there is a chance you will be dead by tomorrow morning.'

That evening Kamau knew that he has no time left, if he should be arrested again torture would be the starting point, not the end. The remaining of the story follows Kamau on his way across the border, and into exile, under the guise of a Maasai warrior. It was on his escape that he witnessed the assassination of the coup plotters, including the man who presented him with the list.

The political tension in the country from which Kamau is running is not merely political but one mixed or influenced by tribal affiliations so much so that if a Gikuyu understands a Luo, he is considered to be

diluted, to be on the fence, to be compromised. It was to be dirty.

Even then it was the conversion into one of the least regarded and most abused tribes, Maasai, that saved his life as checkpoints increased and the police hunt for him, searching every corner including cigarette boxes.

Mukoma wa Ngugi's short story with its political overtones and ethnic undertone, is worth the read. He makes the psychological effects of exile on the life of the escapee and the people he leaves behind palpable, as was visible in the silent communication between Kamau and Wambui. This story reminds us of the ultimate power wielded by most leaders and how difficult it is for the people to come against it without facing, first, the might of the government.

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Brief Bio: Novelist, poet, and essayist Mukoma Wa Ngugi is the author of Nairobi Heat (Penguin, SA 2009), an anthology of poetry titled Hurling Words at Consciousness (AWP, 2006) and is a political columnist for the BBC's Focus on Africa Magazine. He was short listed for the Caine Prize for African writing in 2009. He has also been shortlisted for the 2010 Penguin Prize for African Writing for his novel manuscript, The First and Second Books of Transition. Nairobi Heat is being released in the United States by Melville Publishing House September, 13 2011. (Continue reading)

ImageNations Rating: 4.5/6.0

Other Caine Prize shortlist: You Wreck Her by Parselelo Kantai

97. You Wreck Her by Parselelo Kantai

Parselelo Kantai's You Wreck Her was shortlisted for the 10th Caine Prize for African Writing in 2009. The story appeared in Issue 2 of St. Petersburg Review.

Parselelo's You Wreck Her covers a lot of issues in a few pages, from human trafficking to prostitution and fraud. Right from the beginning the reader is confronted with a sleazy sexual encounter between our character who is a malaya (prostitute) and an mzungu (light-skin tourist).

You do not know how far you have fallen down in this world until you see yourself crawling up a karao's face on a Friday night. You are slobbering and gagging over your short-time, ignoring the after-taste of condom coming into your nostrils from the back of your throat, like Goort's coffee bubbling in the machine on a Sunday morning a long time ago. You lather and stroke. Your head bobs like a bar of soap in bathwater. You can feel he is getting close. There is a commotion far away, beyond the squeak of rubber screaming in your ears, and your short-time is fumbling around you like he lost something important in your pubic hair. He finds your breast. He is clutching you like a handbag thief on Moi Avenue. His thing grows larger in your mouth, then trembles and the thin in your mouth grows soft and your jaws are aching and there is a tap on the window. And right there, on the uniformed policeman's face you see yourself.

This imagistic scene sets the tone and landscape of what is to be a story of hope and hopelessness, of exploitation and reverse-exploitation. Our nameless character referred to throughout the story only as 'you' - and here the reader could insert himself or herself or imagine the description of our protagonist who is said to be

too tall, too skinny and too dark,

had left home after the death of her mother and sexual molestation by her father. Inserting herself into Kenya's night-life, the protagonist joined a growing number of malayas, not only from Kenya but also from Rwanda, Sudan, Congo and from far off countries like Benin, in the hope of being spotted by an mzungu, entering into his life and being carried away to Europe. This is every malaya's  dream. However, due to her tallness, skinniness and darkness, the protagonist is almost at the last rank of the ladder. Attracting only the sad customers with gasoline-leaking cars who rant and ramble about their sadness.

Then she met Goort at a pub. Goort was the mzungu she had been looking for, for Goort - a war photographer and an arranger of 'dramas' - bought her new clothes and was willing to give her a new identity. Except that this new identity would require a lot of fabrication and genealogical engineering. Promising to make her a model - like Alek Wek - and take her to Europe, the protagonist agreed. She was to

remember that you are a child soldier from Sudan whom I discovered resting under a tree in Yei County, near the border and not having eaten in three days. He said you have to remember that. Also do not forget that your mother was raped by soldiers and got pregnant with you only to die in a hail of bullets at childbirth. He said drama was what would make the world love you, such a beautiful creature rescued from such ugliness.

And that was how our protagonist found her way into Europe as a star with no education: her pictures covering several magazines. Things however turned on its head when Goort brought in another girl, this time from Angola, because that is where the drama was now, not Sudan. This new girl took her position and soon the protagonist was back home, and together with the karao (police), ripping off mzungus.

Parselelo panders not to any side of the divide: malaya or mzungu. This is strengthened by his use of an unnamed character, which created some form of detachment to the character. Yet, a named and relatable character would have increased the impact of his delivery. As an investigative journalist, Parselelo Kantai might have done a lot of research in this subject matter to deliver it as he did. He showed how people get on the street and remain on the street and the exploitation that goes on by people who pretend to offer help only to rip, exploit and degrade them further. Most of these exploiters are drawn by the helplessness, ignorance and expectations of these penury street girls. Yet, in the end these girls become something else. No one would enter this business and be the same. The initial shyness is the first to go, at least facially - though deep down they aspire to be something better than what they currently are. The erased shyness, timorousness and timidity is replaced by another superficial trait: temerity, the only requirement of this trade.

Parselelo Kantai's short story is worth the read and good enough to be, not only on the shortlist, but to win.

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Brief Bio: Parselelo Kantai has a flair for sounding the alarm. Formerly the editor of the East African environmental quarterly Ecoforum, Kantai wrote and oversaw the publication of "A Deal in the Mara," which shed light on the corruption in the management of the Maasai Mara. Kantai, one of Kenya’s most pointed investigative reporters, has contributed to a series of East African magazines and dailies and is currently working on a novel set during the 1970s Kenyatta years. In 2004, Kantai was runner-up for the Caine Prize for African Writing for his fiction piece ”Comrade Lemma and the Black Jerusalem Boys Band.” (Source)

ImageNations Rating: 5.0/6.0

Other Caine Prize Shortlist: Icebergs by Alistair Morgan

94. The River Between by Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo

Title: The River Between

Author: Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo

Genre: Fiction/Social Realism

Publishers: Heinemann (African Writers Series)

Pages: 152

Year of First Publication: 1965

Country: Kenya

For the Africa Reading Challenge

The River Between is a story about leadership, changes and identity. It concentrates on social and political change at the onset of European invasion. As a colonial literature the story is set in the period where the Kikuyu highlands of Kameno and Makuyu was at its nascent stage of Christian European invasion. Though similar to Weep Not Child, the struggle in The River Between against Christian European revolves around the issue of tradition and identity.

The story opens with an omniscient narrator who tells of Kikuyu creation; of how Murungu created Gikuyu and Mumbi, the first man and woman. The narrator also debates which ridge is the eldest: Makuyu - where it is claimed that Gikuyu and Mumbi sojourned with Murungu on their way to Mukuruwe wa Gathanga - or Kameno, where they had stopped, as each ridge claims leadership based on its own story. However, a common river, Honia, runs through the valley between the two ridges. And it is by this river that the ritual of circumcision is practised. The river also gives life to the people of both ridges.

Chege, a descendant of a line of prophets and seers most notably of whom was Mugo wa Kibiro, led his son Waiyaki into a sacred grove to show him the secrets of the land and to tell him about the prophecy that would become Waiyaki's sole objective in life and his ruin for Chege believed that Waiyaki is the son in that prophecy. 

"Salvation shall come from the hills. From the blood that flows in me, I say from the same tree, a son shall rise. And his duty shall be to lead and save the people!"

However, these two ridges are now divided along religious lines:

Makuyu and Kameno still antagonized each other. Makuyu was now home of the Christians while Kameno remained the home of all that was beautiful in the tribe.

with leadership under different personalities. Mayuku's leadership is under Joshua and his fiery brand of Christianity whereas Kameno's leadership is under Waiyaki. Things came to a head when Joshua's daughter, Muthoni, died after she ran away from home to participate in the circumcision that would usher girls and boys into adulthood. Charged to bring these two groups together, Waiyaki vowed to use education as the tool to keep the village's identity and to keep the white man at bay whereas his detractor - Kabonyi, himself an ex-follower of Joshua - vowed to use political force. When Joshua's second daughter, Nyambura, falls in love with Waiyaki, things spiralled out of control for both sides of the divide for Nyambura has not been circumcised and a Christian and Waiyaki has sworn an oath to protect the traditions and secrets of the people. This internal struggle and autophagy blurred Waiyaki's vision for he was a man who paid no particular attention to such traditions as circumcision.

Could Ngugi be speaking to us metaphorically? So that the ridges today are nothing more than the diametrically opposing ideologues and ideologies running and ruining our countries and tribes. For instance, on the political front there is Socialism against Capitalism with the the latter abhorring everything about the former even if it presents itself as the best policy to solving a problem. And vice versa. However, if Kameno and Makuyu are metaphors for ideologies or ideologues, then they would aptly represent the socio-religious divide more than the political. For from the Muslim-Christian clashes in Nigeria to the Protestant-Catholic conflict in Northern Ireland, we are confronted by a group of people with equal eagerness to tear themselves apart to preserve their faith and not their humanity. And this is what gives this localised novel, an international appeal. 

This novel, though not Ngugi's best, emphasises his interest in social realism; in documenting the changes that are or have taken place. In this story, Ngugi shows a different method of fighting the oppressor: using the oppressor's own tools. He shows that education is not mutually exclusive to the preservation of tradition and not all rituals are important to preserving tradition and culture.

As an Ngugi, need I say it is recommended?
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Brief Bio: Click Here

ImageNations' Rating: 4.5/6.0

87. Weep Not, Child by Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Title: Weep Not, Child

Author: Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Genre: Fiction/Colonial

Publishers: Heinemann

Pages: 143

Year of First Publication: 1964

Country: Kenya

For the Africa Reading Challenge

To begin with, this is a book I last read almost seven years ago. It is also one of the very few books I have re-read. Though I only review books I have just (within the year) read I feel the need to share this with you.

The story revolves around Ngotho and his children and their relationship with Jacobo and the Howlands. Ngotho was a man filled with emotions and loneliness. The type of emotion one cannot do anything to assuage its excruciating pains. As a patriarch Ngotho hurts from the knowledge that even though his children show great potential he cannot help them to fulfill. Worst of all is his inability to stand against Jacobo, the anglicised local man for whom he works. And when he remembers that his son, Boro, fought in the second Big War, his impotence becomes hurting sore; it stares starkly at him. When Boro ran into the bush to fight with the fighters, Ngotho finally gathered some Okonkwo-like bravery and attacked Jacobo. This attack led to a series of disasters. As Ngotho became spiritually alienated and emotionally disturbed; as he became weaker, his enemies, Jacobo and Howland became stronger.

Ngugi wa Thiong'o's Weep Not Child is a story that examines the relationship that existed between blacks and whites and within blacks themselves prior to independence. It explores several socio-economic issues such as access to education, jobs and the universal right to life. It also explores the Mau Mau bush-fighters and their struggle for an independence in Kenya. When access to social amenities is unequal and others have rights that are lost to others, there is a class struggle and a type of caste system is created. For instance, and here note the play on words, whereas the Ngothos were dead-poor and representative of the Kenyan proletarians, the Jacobos were rich farmers who worked for the white farmers, the Howlands. And names become important. From a very typical and native name of Ngotho, the poor and the masses, we move to those who have sold the land to the whites and serve them. Those who bow before them and in doing so shame the black race. These are called the Jacobos - a localised name for the English name, Jacob. Then the Lord of Lords, the colonialist is represented by Howland... How Land?

This classification were strongly implemented by all the individuals involved. So that even though Kamau wanted to learn carpentry and his 'black' master would not show him all he needs to know he complained bitterly, insinuating that this was the reason why - Ngotho - his father prefers to work for the whiteman;

Blackness is not all that makes a man ... There are some people, be they black or white, who don't want others to rise above them. They want to be the source of all knowledge and share it piecemeal to other less endowed. That is what's wrong with all these carpenters and men who have a certain knowledge. It is the same with rich people. A rich man does not want others to get rich because he wants to be the only man with wealth ... Some Europeans are better than Africans ... That's why you at times hear father say that he would rather work for a white man. A white man is a white man. But a black man trying to be a white man is bad and harsh. (Page 22)

And this is where the crux of the issue lies. The Africans in the novel who adopted the lifestyle of the colonialists were harsher and brutal in their treatment of fellow blacks than the colonialists themselves. Thus, Ngugi here is not piling up the blame at the doorsteps of the colonialists or Europeans but also showing that the ability to do good is inherent and that it is not necessarily true that the oppressed race is always vulnerable and pitiable. But most times that they inflict the pain by themselves on themselves. That on several occasions, in order to please their masters, those who pretend to have the masters' 'colour and manners' go to the extreme in their maltreatment of their very own tribesmen. This observation by Ngugi is not different from many other views, like Mia Couto's The Russian Bride in his short-story collection  Every Man is a Race, where the slave boss treated the others harshly to impress his Russian boss.

Again, this novel could be a precedence to Matigari, even as it precedes it in publication. For in Matigari, which was set in the period following Kenya's independence, we see that it was the rule of the Jacobos and not the Ngothos, even though it was the latter who had fought with their lives for independence. The Ngothos (or Matigari ma Njiruungi) remained an oppressed group and even though there was a change in government (in Matigari) the land was still being misappropriated by the same Jacobos (or John Boys) for their friends, the Howlands (or Williams).

Are these symbiotic relationship different from what prevails in most countries on the continent? Are they different from the today, where governments sell national assets for nothing, if only the capitalist entrepreneurs would promise their children good university education abroad? Or where governments refuse to see the harm being wreaked upon its country because that's where his personal sustenance comes from? Is it different from the present era, where the paunch is put before development or where the "I" supersedes the "We" even when the resource is a Common Resource?

To really understand the development quagmire, within which most African countries seem to be stuck or better still wallow, a reading of these two novels would suffice. For it is only when our present actions bestow positive externalities on posterity that we can hit our chest and say 'yes we've done well'. However, as it is now, we are light-years away from attaining such feat. Ngugi by this book alone has provided us with the solution to our problem by diagnosing what the problem is.

If you have not read this novella, whose title was taken from Walt Whitman's On the Beach at Night, perhaps well-chosen for the subject it addresses, then kindly do so. It is one great novel.

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Brief Bio: Ngugi wa Thiong'o, currently Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of California, Irvine, was born in Kenya, in 1938 into a large peasant family. He was educated at Kamandura, Manguu and Kinyogori primary schools; Alliance High School, all in Kenya; Makerere University College (then a campus of London University), Kampala, Uganda; and the University of Leeds, Britain. He is recipient of seven Honorary Doctorates viz D Litt (Albright); PhD (Roskilde); D Litt (Leeds); D Litt &Ph D (Walter Sisulu University); PhD (Carlstate); D Litt (Dillard) and D Litt (Auckland University). He is also Honorary Member of American Academy of Letters. A many-sided intellectual, he is novelist, essayist, playwright, journalist, editor, academic and social activist.

The Kenya of his birth and youth was a British settler colony (1895-1963). As an adolescent, he lived through the Mau Mau War of Independence (1952-1962), the central historical episode in the making of modern Kenya and a major theme in his early works. (Source)

ImageNations Rating: 6.0/6.0

43. Matigari by Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Title: Matigari

Author: Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Translator: Wangui wa Goro

Genre: Fiction (Satire)

Pages: 175

Publishers: Heinemann (African Writers Series)

Year of Publication: in Gikuyu, 1986, (in English 1987)

It was my first attempt at writing this review that led to my article on Precolonial and Post-Colonial African Literature. Ngugi's novel, Matigari, is one that is funny along all lines and at several levels. Just after independence, Africa's faithful literati realised the path along which the new governments were taken the country. They foresaw that such a path portends nothing but doom and so decided to speak against it. One of such prolific writers against the system in Kenya and because of the ubiquitousness of the atrocities on the continent for that matter Africa, was Ngugi wa Thiong'o.

In Matigari, Ngugi wa Thiong'o created a fictional hero Matigari ma Njiruungi (this in Gikuyu means 'the patriots who survived the bullets'). Matigari, having fought the colonialist into the bush and having kept the flame of independence going came from the forest to possess the land for which he had fought only to realise that the new Lords of the land, those who fought not but took the opportunity to jump onto the seats once it was vacated, had, in collusion with the colonialists, taken over his land and house and all his property, leaving him with nothing. The period where the sower does not reap what he had sown was still going on with utmost impunity. Matigari did not understand what has happened in his absence. He went about asking the people, the masses, who themselves have been beaten into cowardice by the government with the help of the security forces, where he can find justice and truth.  

...My only thirst and hunger are to do with my troubled spirit. I have travelled far and wide looking for truth and justice...(page 94)

Having sworn not to use violence this time, he roamed the land, entering all corners and asking whomever he met where he could find truth and justice. And the people considered him mad in the beginning, yet he never gave up, he had hope:

... there was no night so long that it did not end with dawn (page 3)

With this Matigari went on ... asking, keeping his belt of peace on. He was arrested two times: once he was sent into a police cell the other into a mental home, and on all two he absconded. His name spread through the land and his fame led to different stories and theories. Some considered him Jesus Christ; some said he was female; others male; others tall; others short; yet they all agreed that Matigari, whom they had earlier considered mad was their saviour. 

Matigari later realised that

one cannot defeat the enemy with arms alone, but one could also not defeat the enemy with words alone (page 131)

And with that, he plunged into the forest to retrieve his weapons to fight John Boy (a native Kenyan) and Williams, the former's father was a servant to the latter's father and after Matigari chased them into the forest their children had shared all the properties that was supposed to be for the people.

Ngui wa Thiong'o

The novels fame was multiplied when in 1987 the government's security forces literally acted it out by going around in search for the person who was calling himself Matigari. Realising that there was no such a person and that it was a fictional hero in a book, the

... police raided all the bookshops and seized every copy of the novel. (page viii, Introduction)

Later the author was to join his book in exile.

The beauty of Matigari is not only about the prose or the precise use of language and the simplicity of the diction. The beauty lies in the veracity of the issues written about. Though a satire, the book represents the African society right after independence and today. One thing that came out clearly in this novel is the changeover from communalism (caring for all) to individualism, where each fighting for himself sold all. John Boy, whose education was funded by the community, refuted the ideology of communalism and advanced the individualism agenda 

I would ask you to learn the meaning of the word "individual". Our country has remained in darkness because of the ignorance of our people. They don't know the importance of the word "individual", as opposed to the word "masses"... (page 23)

And through this oppression, the academia sold itself for they sought positions by toeing the line of the government and nodding and singing praises when they are called upon. They acted like puppets, responding to the strings of the puppet master. Matigari explained that

There are two types of people in this country. There are those who sell out, and those who are patriots (page 126)

This is an interesting book, a revolutionary book. Ngugi used a medium in which he could decry the rot that has taken society by its throat, cogently. Has anything change? No! It is only increasing! The numbers at the 'grabbing-stealing-cheating-killing' end is increasing and that the Matigaris are dying off, losing faith and hope in the system they helped established.

As you can see, this book has jumped onto my all-time favourites list. It is that good. I recommend it to all who love change, who want to see the right thing done.

Likely Laureate for 2010, Ngugi amongst them

This is just a quick one. This wouldn't be the main blog of the day. The Nobel Laureate for 2010 would soon be announced and I am happy to inform you that amongst the Atwoods, Byatts, Roths Oates, Cormacs, Pynchon, is Ngugi wa Thiong'o. No one knows yet, but at least by the mention of his name amongst the likely candidates we can only hope.

Ngugi wa Thiong'o is the author of several books including Weep Not Child, Wizard and Crow, A Grain of Wheat, Decolonising the Mind. Meet the author here. Check out the list of likely candidates here.

An Evening with the Greats

Yesterday evening was an evening to remember. It is the dream of every budding writer to meet other writers who have published their works and whose name is common to all. Yet, greater joy comes from not knowing who the person only to be told that he is an award-winning writer. 

Yesterday evening, at the American Corner of the Legon Centre for International Affairs (LECIA), I had the privilege of meeting two great writers of our time: Kojo Laing, whose latest novel, Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters, I reviewed on this blog and the Kenyan author Binyavanga Wainaina.

Binyavanga Wainaina

Binyavanga Wainaina is a Kenyan author, journalist and a 2002 Caine-Prize winning author of Discovering Home. He is also the founding editor of Kwani?, a literary magazine in Kenya. He is also the Director of the Chinua Achebe Centre in New York.

Binyavanga read from his yet to be published memoir. His reading captivated us all and left us laughing with its humour and character descriptions. Before Binyavanga entered the room we were discussing the issue of identity in writing. Should the author projects his identity in writing or should he allow his creative imagination to wonder wild even if it would lead to some Enid-Blyton-like stuff being produced. Binyavanga summed it all up by saying that it is difficult to appreciate what you have and mostly others see more in your surroundings than you would see yourself. Also, it is good to allow your creative imagination to rule you. Kojo Laing commented by quoting Wole Soyinka: "The tiger does not advertise his tigritude".

Presently, whilst writing this blog, I just realised that I have shared with my friends on facebook Binyavanga's essay 'How to Write About Africa'. This piece is one of the most interesting piece I have ever read and it portrays the stereotypic mentality of people concerning Africa.

Kojo Laing

At the end of the reading questions were asked by the audience and it was through this Q&A that I got to know the reasoning behind Kojo Laing's Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters. I know if I had met him earlier and heard his responses my reactions to the review would definitely have ben different.

All in all it was a great evening. However, a copy of Kojo Laing's book could be obtained at Amazon.