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GYNOCENTRIC CONTOURS OF THE

MALE IMAGINATION: A STUDY OF

THE NOVELS OF CHINUA ACHEBE

AND NGŨGĨ WA THIONG’O

Dr. Amna Shamim

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About The Author

X Dr. Amna Shamim is an Assistant Professor in the Department of

English, Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences at Integral

University, Lucknow, India. She has been teaching Professional

Communication to Undergraduate and Postgraduate students; and

English Literature to Postgraduates. She has authored a book

entitled Colonial/Postcolonial Paradigms in the Novels of Chinua

Achebe (TFA & AOG), and co-authored a poetry book entitled

Lucknow Poetica. She has edited three anthologies: Two poetry

anthologies entitled Feminist Voices Across Cultures: A Poetry

Anthology, and The Global Muse; and a critical anthology entitled

Towards Islamic Feminism. She has got a number of research

papers published in various Journals and Anthologies. She is an

active participant in conferences and seminars and is constantly

working on enhancing her academic credibility. Her areas of

interest are Technical Writing, Professional Communication,

Feminism, and African Literature. She can be reached at:

amna_2036@yahoo.co.in

X

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About The Book

X The focus of this book is upon the changing perception of

women in African society and their portrayal over different periods

in the novels of Chinua Achebe and Ngugi wa Thiong’o; the

writers who intriguingly wrote on the constant changing role of

African women in Igbo and Gikuyu clans. The book dicusses the

image of African women entrapped in double jeopardy in both

traditional and modern Africa. There has been a remarkable

transformation in the representation of women from the early

novels to the later novels of both the writers that has been studied

in this book from close quarters. The approach and technique of

the novelists in projecting their female characters has also been

analyzed. The novels of both the writers marked a sea change in

the thinking and perception of Westerners with reference to Africa

and its people. This work is devoted to the exploration of the

image of women in the East and West African societies through

the selected novels of Chinua Achebe and Ngugi wa Thiong’o.

X

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Contents

X

Chapter 1 Introduction. 1-32

Chapter 2 Women in the Novels of Chinua

Achebe.

33-77

Chapter 3 Women in the Novels of Ngũgĩ wa

Thiong’o.

79-125

Chapter 4 Women in the Novels of Achebe and

Ngũgĩ: A Comparison.

127-173

Chapter 5 Conclusion. 177-189

Works Cited and Consulted. 191-210

X

Dr. Amna Shamim

1

Chapter 1

Introduction

The African continent which has been described as „The Dark

Continent‟ as also „A Long Night of Savagery‟ is, however, a

country of long and rich cultural legacy endowed with a varied

corpus of literary traditions that was passed on from one generation

to the next through the medium of orality. The orature of Africa

that was preserved by its native people in the form of folktales,

poems and songs, helped in developing and retaining the aesthetic

sensibilities of its population that later paved way for the written

literature. These stories, fables and folk songs were encapsulated in

culturalism and traditionalism that instilled in their children the

ritual practices and traditions of the various clans. Storytelling was

indeed one of the numerous pastimes in the homestead of African

people. Amongst the elders, there were men, besides women, who

abundantly contributed in keeping their culture alive and kicking.

The orature of Africa consisted of both prose and poetry. The

different forms of prose and poetry employed by the natives

consisted of folk songs, praise poems, epic poems, folklore and

work songs. To emphatically elevate the effect these stories and

songs produced on the young and not-so-young minds, the tales

narrated by the professional singers, like the gĩcaandĩ players, were

accompanied by the beatings of the drums and the use of the

instrument called Gĩcaandĩ. The instruments Adungu and Nyatiti

were also used to produce the same effect. The performers made

ample use of proverbs and riddles in their poems that were meant

for the listeners to decode and generally there was an another poet

in competition who decoded the message.

Gynocentric Contours of The Male Imagination: A Study of The Novel of Chinua Achebe and

wa Thion ’o

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Oral literature is, and was, by far, an integral part of the

African literary tradition. It is impossible to imagine African

literature as a composite whole without mentioning the relevance

of stories through oral narratives that was employed by the natives

during the pre-colonial era. This included the imbibing of the

traditions of the clan in children through the medium of

storytelling. Orality, then, was the only form of passing on the

traditions as African languages were devoid of any script. The

African languages developed a script of their own only after the

incursion of the colonizers who brought with them their script and

education; something that the African people were unaware of. The

fear of the colonizers and the need to compete with them, led the

natives to gain on the educational front. Ultimately, this acquired

knowledge helped them in producing a script for the languages that

they were using to communicate. It was commendable on the part

of the indigenous race to alacritously make use of the newly

produced script in order to preserve their oral literature. The

orature of Africa that consisted of different forms of oral narratives

such as mythical tales, folk tales, poems and songs was then

transformed into literature. This transformation of oral literature

into written form was the result of the education that the native

Africans were compelled to receive from the initial stages of

colonization till the end of the colonial regime. The natives did not

take long to realize the worth of education and became learned one

after the other. Not much later, they started taking help of this

education to narrate their stigmatic journey from colonial to the

post colonial era. According to the facts provided by F. Abiola

Irele, ge‟ez script is one of the oldest scripts of Africa that was

developed in the fourth century. According to John Parker and

Richard Rathbone, ge‟ez script “originated in ancient South

Arabia” and was used by “Ethiopian Coptic Church, one of the

earliest Christian Churches to translate the Bible and to record its

landholdings, its prayers and healing formulae, and the lives of its

saints” (51). Other than ge‟ez, writers wrote in Mali, Swahili and

Dr. Amna Shamim

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Yoruba, too. One of the earliest examples of African literature,

other than the orature, includes “Epic of Sundiata” or “Epic of

Son- Jara” written in Mali.

It has been observed that nearly all the scripts of African

languages were developed during and after the invasion of Romans

and Arabs on the African land. Romans conquered Egypt and

North Africa in 30 BC. Then came the Arabs, the French and the

British, one after the other, who also aimed at civilizing the

barbaric race. These colonizers brought with them their own scripts

that they taught to the Africans. The earliest invaders of the

African land were the Arabs who taught and preached Qur‟an and

its language. It is true that in the sixteenth century Arabic

chronicles appeared in the south of the Sahara. The first chronicle

was published in 1520 and it was titled “Kilwa chronicle”. This

chronicle was followed by “Ta‟rikh al-fattash” (1655), and

“Ta‟rikh al-sudan” (1655) respectively. The Arabic script was also

used for “the transliteration of three major African languages,

Hausa, Fulfulde and Swahili” (Parker 53). The contribution of the

Arabs with regard to the development of Africa is revealed from

the following passage:

By the 8th century, precious fragments of information on

sub-Saharan Africa begin to emerge from the accounts of

Muslim travellers and geographers- sources that have

proved crucial for recovering the early history of the

sudanic kingdoms and the Swahili city-states of the east

coast. (Parker 51)

The native Africans were uncivilized and heathenish due to

which they were thought of as inferior by the European colonizers.

Although these people were barbaric, they neither had the

resources nor the kind of hatred required to keep other races under

their control. They were concerned with their own traditions and

rituals and they could go to any extent to safeguard it. The history

and the literature of Africa reveal that the African race did not

Gynocentric Contours of The Male Imagination: A Study of The Novel of Chinua Achebe and

wa Thion ’o

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harm the colonizers until they found no way out of the torture that

was being inflicted upon them. This innocence of the African race

gave others the opportunity to trouble them and use them for their

personal gains. For approximately fifty long years, African men,

women and children were traded like commodities. They were

bought and sold and were made to work as bonded labourers. The

years of torture for Africans began in 1440s when the Portuguese

mariners started kidnapping them and transporting them to distant

lands. The slave trade is said to have ended in 1867. This was the

year that recorded the last voyage in which the native Africans, as

slaves, were sent to America. The Atlantic Slave Trade and the

Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade are the two slave trades that brought

slavery to Africans and compelled them to bear the brunt of

belonging to an uncivilized race. Their years of suffering have

been recorded by researches through the ages and the detailed

account of their agony is provided in a number of books and other

materials composed by the researchers. One such research revealed

the following information on the Slave Trade:

Sub-Saharan Africa lost over twelve and a half-million

people to the trans-Atlantic slave trade alone between 1525

and 1867. Perhaps as many again were carried off to slave

markets across the Sahara and the Indian Ocean. Over forty

percent of captives left from West-central Africa alone with

most of the remainder leaving from the Bight of Benin, the

Bight of Biafra, and the Gold Coast. About one in eight

died on board the slave vessel and many others died prior

to departure and after arrival. Departures were channeled

through a dozen or so major embarkation points such as

Whydah, Bonny, Loango, Luanda, and Benguela, though

many smaller ports also supplied slaves. (“Trans-Atlantic

Slave Trade”)

It has also come to light that the researchers, other than

discussing the sufferings of Africans during the Atlantic slave

Dr. Amna Shamim

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trade, have been able to figure out the other side of the coin. Some

scholars have written in black and blue about the Africans who

took advantage of their own brothers and sisters by acting as

middle men in the selling and buying of the native people. John

Thornton in his book, Africa and Africans in the making of the

Atlantic World, 1400-1800, argues that the Africans, too, were

involved in the slave trade and they were playing an active part in

controlling the terms of the trade. They gained through their

dealings with Europeans and others whereas the victims were kept

under adverse circumstances and were later handed over from one

master to the other. The details of the slave trade and their personal

experiences as slaves were captured and narrated by Olaudah

Equiano in 1789, in his book The Interesting Narrative of the life

of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African. In the

recent past, researchers scrutinized Olaudah‟s work and observed

that probably he was not an African. Other than Equiano, one of

the famous African slaves who wrote his biography, detailing his

experiences, was Mahommah Gardo Baquaqua. He wrote a

pamphlet titled An Interesting Narrative. Biography of Mahommah

G. Baquaqua, A Native of Zoogoo, in the Interiors of Africa that

was published in 1854 in Michigan. Much later in 1911, Joseph

Casely Hayford published his novel, Ethiopia Unbound: Studies in

Race Emancipation which is considered the first African novel

written in English. After this, many novels and plays were written

in different parts of Africa. During the colonial period, natives

gained much on the educational front, resulting in the increased

rate of literacy in the African regions. The natives put into use their

learning by producing umpteen literatures. They not only took help

of the colonizer‟s language to produce their literature but also used

their indigenous languages to do so, doing justice to both the

languages.

African culture was composed of orature that was

employed by the storytellers. The nation had a long tradition of

Gynocentric Contours of The Male Imagination: A Study of The Novel of Chinua Achebe and

wa Thion ’o

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oral narratives that were later transformed into the written form to

save them from getting lost in times. In written form, poetry and

drama were the first to be read and written. They remained in

vogue until the most popular genre of literature, novel, took its toll

in Africa. Novels gained momentum in the nation as, first of all,

they were the dominant genre in Europe; the hub of literary works

and home to people having the knack of literature. Secondly, they

successfully accomplished the tasks that the narrators did in oral

narratives. The similarity of the novel with oral narrative carved

for it a separate place in African cultural tradition. With the

increased interest of Africans in novels, it did not take them long to

pen down their own experiences and narrate it to the world through

the genre of novels. When Africans themselves wrote of their lives,

there were no chances of misrepresentation of their events and

traumas. With the passage of time, texts written in Africa were

transported to Western nations and were read by the people there.

The texts then gained popularity among the readers of Europe,

leading to the increased interest of the people in the lives and times

of Africans.

Literature as a tool began to be employed by the literary

icons of Africa to put forth their perception of their society. In the

adept hands of the Anglophone African writers, African literature

reached its paramount distinctive shape. Since ages, the writers

from across the globe have employed the lens of literature to peek

at the traumatic life events of people, both common and

uncommon, in the dystopian myopic society. To quote S.Z.H.

Abidi for similar thoughts,

Literature is the most sensitive barometer of the mercurial

society and its subtle day-to-day changes, as also its half-

tones and whispers. It truly reflects them all in its thematic

gestures, technical innovations, emphatic slants, attitudinal

changes and new genres. (Editorial)

Dr. Amna Shamim

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The techniques and styles of writing used in the ancient

Greek and Roman novels became the source of inspiration for the

modern African writers. African novels were influenced by two

canonical texts of literature: Aethiopica by Heliodorus and The

Golden Ass by Apuleius. The Golden Ass is considered as the “first

modern novel” for the kind of techniques employed in it. The text

is an inter play between fantasy and realism. Whereas the elements

of realism are predominant, the elements of fantasy pose to be the

precursor of “magic realism”; an element that was constantly used

in African prose and poetry, especially in prose. Examples of

African novels that have employed this device are numerous. First

and foremost is The Palm-Wine Drinkard by Amos Tutuola, a

novel based on mythological tales. The novel talks about a man

who follows the Palm-Wine drunkard and reaches a new land

where he encounters ghosts, magic and demons. Another example

that can be cited is that of The Famished Road by Ben Okri which

is about “abiku”, a spirit child, hailing from an unknown city of

Africa. The novel uses the device of magic realism to narrate the

story that has intertwined real world with the spirit world.

Pepetela‟s novel, The Return of the Water Spirit (1995), translated

into English in 2002, is another example of magic realism. The

novel is set in Angola in 1980s, depicting an event in which the

buildings of the city, Luanda, are crumbling one after the other,

and yet nobody is able to find out the reason of this calamity. It is

named “Luanda Syndrome” (Pepetela 66) which is the punishment

from God for a crime that‟s committed in the city. The crime is

committed by a slave and the people of the city. The slave

develops objectionable relationship with the daughter of his master

and is beheaded for the same. Later it is revealed that the one

responsible for the crumbling of the buildings is Kianda, the

goddess of water in Angolan mythology. African novelists,

through magic realism in their works, tried to capture the minds of

the culturally grounded Africans. As African writers knew the

tradition of their nation and were aware of the beliefs of their

Gynocentric Contours of The Male Imagination: A Study of The Novel of Chinua Achebe and

wa Thion ’o

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people in the supernatural, it became easier for them to portray the

essence of the nation in the novels and other genres of literature.

With the help of their missionary education, and by using the

colonizers‟ tongue, Africans found it easier to reach out to the

wider audience for giving out the true picture of their nation‟s

culture and traditions. Most of the African works could be seen

dealing with the conflict between the Modern and the Traditional

value-system, the major cause being the rift between the African

people with regard to the acceptance of Christianity by a few and

rejection of the same by others.

The writings in Africa took a toll with the incursion of the

colonizers. The works of African origin were influenced by

Europeans and Arabs alike. The holy texts of both the invaders

played a formative role in the formation of African novels.

According to F. Abiola Irele, “The association of Christian

sentiment with expressive form in the Bible also explains the

influence of Bunyan‟s Pil rim’s Pro ress,…for the construction of

the written novel in Africa” (CCAN 5). On a similar footing was

the Arabic language in Africa as the African novels were also

inspired by the works written in Arabic. Some of its inspirations

were Tayeb Salih‟s (1929-2009) novel, Season of Migration to the

North, his short story collection The Wedding of Zein, and also the

novels of Naguib Mahfouz (1911-2006), an Egyptian novelist, who

won the 1988 Nobel Prize in Literature. The novel, Season of

Migration to the North, originally titled Mausam al-Hijra ili ash-

Shamail published in the year 1966 was a Sudanese novel in

Arabic. It was later translated into many other languages. The story

in this novel is about the narrator who returns to Sudan after

getting educated in England. In Sudan, he comes across a person

named Mustafa Sa‟eed who is not the resident of Sudan. Unlike the

villagers, Mustafa does not praise the narrator for his foreign

education, but later it is revealed that Mustafa, too, is as learned a

man as the narrator himself.

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