270. Dreams in a Time of War by Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Stories of the atrocities and ills committed during colonialism most often seem fictional to people's ears, especially those who never lived within the period and never directly experienced them. To those twice removed from the action, it sounds like a fantastic tale told to children around the firelight, beneath the full moon. This might have occurred because for the larger part of the twentieth century, this has been the motif for several African writers - poets, novelists, dramatists. However, nothing is as real as the wanton devastation of the people by the colonists and colonialists in their bid to own the land and subjugate, or in their own way civilise, the people. It is through the biographies and memoirs of those who lived the times that the true effects of what was meted out to our fathers and grandfathers come alive. It is easy for one to disregard fiction, but not too easy to ignore a memoir. 

And in the childhood memoir of Ngugi wa Thiong'o, one of Africa's eminent chronicler of socioeconomic changes, the atrocities come alive at a rate that discombobulate the reader. Dreams in a Time of War (Vintage, 2011 (FP: 2010), 257) tracks Ngugi's life from his father's compound to his mother's-cum-grandfather's compound to the point where he miraculously left for school. It deals with loss and rejection, and a mother's foresight to educate a son, at all cost.

Ngugi's true tale of his life in a Kenyan village clearly showed the role of the church in the colonisation of the indigenes - or the natives, as they were derogatorily referred to by the settlers. It emphasises that what we have read all too often in works of fiction, including the author's own oeuvre, are not mere writers' fantasies. If anything at all, they are watered-down versions, for most often facts are stranger than what fiction could conjure. The role of the church in subjugating the people, through their religious tales, through their preaching, which dehumanises blacks, through the portrayal of their seafarers who landed on the shores Africa, in the classrooms they monopolised and in their churches, cannot in no way be underestimated. In having the sole control of education, they were armed with the single most effective tool of subjugation. It is for this reason why some believe that the Christian God is a white god, and cannot represent blacks.

Even when the natives showed leadership and foresight by creating their own schooling system teaching their students their own syllabuses, the colonialists closed it down when they realised that the nationalists elements are overreaching their bounds; allowing those that agreed to teach the colonialist's approved subjects and syllabuses to open. The priests who manned the religious-schools progressively proselytised all their students and staff, demanding of them to shed all traditional and cultural entrapment, regarding those that imbibed European culture and sensibilities as the avant-gardes. They became the 'path clearers' for the colonial administration. In most African countries, baptismal certificates became the only official document the colonial government accepted when one was dealing with the state. The role of these priests is treated in Mongo Beti's The Poor Christ of Bomba, though unlike Father Superior Drumont, most of these priests never gave.

Reflecting on Ngugi's memoir, it becomes clear that every country has done to another that which it has at one point in time itself fought against. It became clearer that people do not fight oppression because they are entirely anti-oppression or that they abhor, strongly detest, oppression. People do fight oppression because they think they are superior and above oppression. Not others. Most often, when such anti-oppression fighters gain their freedom, succeed in their fight, the very first thing they do is to implement what they had fought against on others they feel superior to, sometimes on the very people they have just defeated. Whilst the British fought Hitler and this occupation of European countries and spread of Nazism, they were at the same time implementing equally draconian and Nazi-like segregation, apartheid, eviction, and occupation in their colonies. If Nazism is racism, what is segregation, apartheid, black land-confiscation?

After the African soldiers - Kenyan soldiers in this specific case - helped the British in a war they had nothing to do with - the Second World War, they - the British colonial government - took lands away from the natives to settle their white soldiers as payment for their war efforts. Thus, while the white soldiers came home to large tracts of land, the black soldiers came home to displaced families. This is a universal phenomenon and it is one that confound exceedingly. After that abominable holocaust and the Jews' return to 'their homeland', they displaced the Palestinians in a blitzkrieg that shocked and still shocks the world. The world is not about fairness or equality. It has never been and might never be. Regardless of what one thinks, the Orwellian principle of Animal Farm reigns. Fairness and Equality are concepts the strong proposes to subject the weak, whose weakness prevents them from retaliating the fairness and equality. A prejudiced mind, a mind of racial and tribal superiority, of religious fundamentalism, of birthers and truthers, a mind which defines brotherhood not in humanity but in other concepts that eliminates others can never ever beget fairness and equality. Asking such a mind to do so is like asking darkness to produce light.

How different therefore was the colonialist's behaviour in Africa during the struggle for independence, especially in Kenya, different from the atrocities carried out the world over? They killed en masse, people disappeared during the night, people were arrested and killed without trial, they wiped out villages, they engaged numerous spies, they hauled resources, they psychologically destroyed people, they dehumanised the natives. Was this not another genocide? What is it called, when a country sets out to destroy another by surgically destroying its history, identity - through controlled manipulations in classrooms, by confiscating its land (to the African land is more than just a piece of the earth), and by killing them en masse at the least resistance? Were these not exactly what the communist countries were accused of?

To stray off, and jump Ngugi - for I know this would definitely appear in his other memoirs, some of the African leaders who led the fight for independence, or who forcefully took power right after independence, behaved similarly. These folks only wanted to be like the white rulers - to enjoy the perks of power, the position and rewards it affords, not necessarily to remove the yoke from their people's necks. In Dreams in a Time of War, a classic example would be Rev Stanley Kahahu, who after becoming a priest, thought he had scaled a wall higher than his people, and armed with the colonial knowledge he had gained and with the backing of the colonial administration he supported, took lands away from their rightful owners. His wife was worst, for she treated everybody, especially the non-Christians, as dirt - cheating them as and when she deemed fit. And one shivers when one realises that one is not reading Weep Not Child, or A Grain of Wheat or any fiction for that matter, but a memoir - a true account of events. Thus, a person does not lose his character when he acquires power. His traits become pronounced. A wicked person may be humble only because he is poor, his real character comes to the fore when he is in a position of power.

Just as not all whites behaved like the colonialists, not all blacks supported the nationalists in their fight for an independent Kenya. In fact, the most brutal colonial force - those who descended heavily physically and emotionally - on the Mau Mau fighters and their families was the Home Guards, which consisted of natives sympathetic to the colonial cause. These folks, living among the people, sometimes from the same womb, developed tortured their kin in droves. And do we not have such elements in our midst today as we pretend to fight neo-colonialism? Are there not Africans out there who say we cannot and should not think of going beyond our means? Are there not Africans who have sold Africa and continue to sell it for their sole benefits?

This war, which Ngugi lived under, which destroyed homes, families, friendships, would turn brother against brother, neighbour against neighbour. It will cause a rift within families and villages. The victims were thus divided, as each takes a stand in the colonialists versus the nationalists struggle. No one would leave the turf unscathed.

Ngugi also talked about the nascent transportation infrastructure that was taking place in the country, with a child's fascination. At a point in time, he had to choose between fulfilling his desire to ride in a train and his pact with her mother to stay at school. All through Africa, in colonial period, the construction of roads and rails meant further oppression from the colonialists. Usually these transport systems were directed at areas with huge resource reserve. It also paved the way, literally, for the evangelical works of the church, which precedes and prepare the people for colonial administration. 

Dreams in a Time of War treats politics, as a pre-teen-early-teen child saw it, and socioeconomic changes that followed rapid colonisation and the war that ensued. It captures the nuances of life - the sad times (a father's rejection; a brother's flight into the bush; an education that was nearly lost), the happy times (gaining admission into one of the best schools; participating in the rite of passage), the emotional moments (beaten by a British soldier for not adding the respectful 'effendi' to statements; having to go without food in the quest for education), and youthful carelessness (the near-asphyxiation; the life-goes-on regardless of the 'bush war').

The writing and narrative style - past and present - put the reader right in the midst of the actions as Ngugi describes them. This makes the reader's emotions synchronous with the emotions exuding from the pages of this magnificent book. The reader goes through all the topsy-turvy moments, living with the figures (not characters), the near misses, the deaths, and pain of realising you have been sold out by a brother, a friend. Reading this book, one has to remind himself that he is reading a memoir and not a work of fiction. It is the reservoir from which Ngugi draws out his work of fiction and anyone who has read any of Ngugi's works will understand it better after reading this work. This work - and may be the others that follow like In the House of Interpreters - encapsulates the essence of Ngugi's oeuvre. 

Individuals who lived within this period of Africa's history - the period when the struggles against the colonialists were at their peak - have a lot to tell. For in their lives is the real history of Africa and Africans. Their lives provide the human side of the struggles narrated in History text books, which is sometimes skewed - told to make some others look macho and important, to exaggerate the roles of sellouts and people who did nothing, or even to water-down the atrocities of the colonialists. These stories expose the evil of colonial rule and the native stooges of the time. And it is these that we must fight; that we do not do to ourselves that which we have fought ferociously against. That we shall no more become colonised, but fight neo-colonism, and whilst doing so prevent the return of the Bokassas, the Mobutu Sese Sekos, the Idi Amins, and such barbaric rulers that shattered the continent. And finally, be wise not to be caught up in any East-West struggle, the like of the Cold War era.

More importantly, these memoirs show that the journey of life is not smooth. It has its bumps and anyone who wants to take a ride must know and appreciate this. They also show us the volume of work that is left or needed to be done. The struggles that Ngugi went through to get education should not be seen in Kenya today. These are the markers against which progress will be measured. Our failures and achievements would be determined by the rate at which we can distinguish between life under colonial rule and life under independence.

This is a quintessential Ngugi book, one that I will recommend to all.

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Read about the author here

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.

Quotes for Friday from Ngugi wa Thiong'o's Weep Not, Child

My third reading of this book was for a Book Club discussion. The review here was written thirteen years after my last reading in 1998. Thus, I don't know whether I should review it again, now that the story is fresh in my mind or I should leave it just as it is. However, enjoy the quotes that came to me:

...[T]ime and bad conditions do not favour beauty. [3]

'Don't worry about me. Everything will be all right. Get education, I'll get carpentry. Then we shall, in the future, be able to have a new and better home for the whole family.' [4]

A fool, in the town's vocabulary, meant a man who had a wife who would not let him leave her lap even for a second. [9]

'Blackness is not all that makes a man,' Kamau said bitterly. '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 others less endowed. ... A rich man does not want others to get rich because he wants to be the only man with wealth.' [21]

'... A white man is a white man. But a black man trying to be white man is bad and rash.' [21]

[A] mother's silence is the worst form of punishment for it is left to one's imagination to conjure up what is in her mind. [35]

Education was good only because it would lead to the recovery of the lost lands. [39]

'... All white people stick together. But we black people are very divided. ...' [75]

'... Besides do you really think you'll be safer at home? I tell you there's no safety anywhere. There's no hiding in this naked land.' [83]

Yes. Sunshine always follows a dark night. We sleep knowing and trusting that the sun will rise tomorrow. [95]

'... Unless you kill, you'll be killed. So you go on killing and destroying. It's a law of nature. ...' [102]

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Read my review here

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

Quotes for Friday from A Grain of Wheat by Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo

What Karanja feared more than the rumours was their possible confirmation. As long as he did not know the truth, he could interpret the story in the only way that gave him hope: the coming of black rule would not mean, could never mean the end of white power. (P. 42)

God helps those who help themselves, it is said, with fingers pointing at a self-made man who has attained wealth and position, forgetting that thousands of others labour and starve, day in, day out, without ever improving their material lot. (P. 63)

Party leaders from the district were the first to speak. They said Jomo Kenyatta had to be released to lead Kenya to Uhuru. People would not accept any other person for the Chief Minister. They asked everyone to vote for party candidates in the coming elections: a vote for the candidate was a vote for Kenyatta. A vote for Kenyatta was a vote for the Party. A vote for the Party was a vote for the Movement. A vote for the Movement was a vote for the People. Kenyatta was the People! (P. 71)

'What thing is greater than love for one's country?...' (P. 72)

'But there is no home with a boy-child where the head of a he-goat shall not be cooked,' (P. 80)

Mbugua had earned his standing in the village through his own achievements as a warrior and a farmer. His name alone, so it is said, sent fear quivering among the enemy tribes. Those were the days before the whiteman ended tribal wars to bring in world wars. (P. 82)

A home full of children is never lonely, she always said. (P. 83)

'It is not politics, Wambuku,' he said, 'it is life. Is he a man who lets another take away his land and freedom? Has a slave life?' (P. 107)

Our people say that building a house is a life-long process. (P. 121)

Then wealth and power were not important unless they enriched that silent communion from which living things heaved and opened to the sun. The silence to which he had now returned dead. (P. 128)

One lived alone, and like Gatu, went into the grave alone. ... To live and die alone was the ultimate truth (P. 129)

A man does not go to a stranger and tear his heart open (P. 135)

'Strange, isn't it, how we give many motives to our actions to fit an occasion. ...' (P. 162)

'... The coward lived to see his mother while the brave was left dead on the battlefield. And to ward off a blow is not cowardice.' (P. 162)

A river runs along the line of least resistance. (P. 183)

'.. Those buried in the earth should remain in the earth. Things of yesterday should remain with yesterday.' (P. 190)

'She has gone back to her parents. See how you have broken your home. You have driven a good woman to misery for nothing. Let us now see what profit it will bring you, to go on poisoning your mind with these things when you should have accepted and sought how best to build your life. But you, like a foolish child, have never wanted to know what happened. Or what woman Mumbi really is.' (P. 192)

Mugo was deeply afflicted and confused, because all his life he had avoided conflicts: at home, or at school, he rarely joined the company of other boys for fear of being involved in brawls that might ruin his chances of a better future. His argument went like this: if you don't traffic with evil, then evil ought not to touch you; if you leave people alone, then they ought to leave you alone. (P. 211)

'... He who was not on our side, was against us. ..' (P. 240)

Quotes for Friday from Ngugi wa Thiong'o's The River Between

[T]he oilskin of the house is not for rubbing into the skin of strangers. [P.3]

She had learnt the value of Christian submission, and she thought every other believer had the same attitude to life. Not that she questioned life. It had given her a man and in her own way she loved and cared for him. Her faith and belief in God were coupled with her fear for Joshua. But that was religion and it was the way things were ordered. However, one could still tell by her eyes that this was a religion learnt and accepted; inside the true Gikuyu woman was sleeping. [P. 34]

A young man who rises to leadership is always a target of jealousy for his equals, for those older than himself and for those who think they could have been better leaders. [P.63]

Nyambura knew then that she could never be saved by Christ; that the Christ who died could only be meaningful if Waiyaki was there for her to touch, for her to feel and talk to. She could only be saved through Waiyaki. Waiyaki was her saviour, her black Messiah, the promised one who would come and lead her into the light. [P.103]

Circumcision of women was not important as a physical operation. It was what it did inside a person. It could not be stopped overnight. Patience and, above all, education, were needed. [P.142]

If the white man's religion made you abandon a custom and then did not give you something else of equal value, you became lost. [P.142]

The land was now silent. The two ridges lay side by side, hidden in darkness. And Honia river went on flowing between them, down through the valley of life, its beat rising above the dark stillness, reaching into the heart of the people of Makuyu and Kameno. [P.152]

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Read the review here

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.