Modern Africa: Perspectives to be Understood Through Literature - Essay Example

Modern Africa: Perspectives to be Understood Through Literature Prajakta Kanegaonkar Whenever we think and talk about Africa, we think about beautiful wild landscapes, numerous tribes and their cultures and colourful people. We are also partially aware of the problems of Africa such as apartheid etc. African countries however have come a long way from these stereotypes. Post their independence many countries are struggling to come to terms with the atrocities of life. Like many under developed nations African countries are torn between the welfare of the society and people and progress of the nation as a whole. This is a phase where a common man can get extremely disillusioned about the idea of freedom and that is because the dream of independence is always having a utopian aura to it. The actual life is completely different. The society is suddenly thrown on its own and development kick starts in various directions. This becomes all too technical for a commoner and his questions are reduced to his survival and existence. When we read the works of Petina Gappah, Alain Mabanckou and Binyavanga Wainaina, we see through the smoke screen. Each of these writers writes on ‘take it or leave it’ philosophy. The effect is we cannot leave it. The picture created stays in our minds and we keep going back to it. Each of these writers is noted and recipient of numerous awards. The styles they have adopted range from stark darkness to humour but they convey the point across. We are going to understand various aspects and perspectives of modern African society through the works of these writers, namely Petina Gappah, Alain Mabanckou and Binyavanga Wainaina. Petina Gappah’s short story collection An Elegy of Easterly is a collection of soulful, and yet heart wrenching stories about people who are fighting to make both ends meet, to fight the inevitable. All the stories except ‘Something Nice from London’ have a tinge of humour which do not cut deep but can be easily identified with and enjoyable. Her skilful observation of people is apparent in the stories. What actually entrances the reader is the simplicity with which these stories are told. The language is fluid, which keeps the stories going at their own pace. Irrespective of the excellent linguistic skills the message is unmistakable. The garb of humour can’t hide the dark reality about the person whose story she is sharing with the reader. In the story ‘The Mupandawana dancing competition’ M’dhara Vitalis has spent all his years working in a factory for earning livelihood. When his factory shuts down the organization gives him three pairs of shoes as a reward for his skill and work he has done in the factory for many years. He is an excellent dancer and wins the local dancing competition only to get a few drinks free in the place which organised the dancing competition event. His death is described in the simplest yet powerful language by Gappah. We crowded around him, relishing this new dance that we had not seen before. He twitched to the right, and to the left. The music was loud as we egged him on. He convulsed in response to our cheering. His face shone, and he looked to us as if to say, ‘Clap harder.’ And we did. It was only when the song ended and we gave him a rousing ovation and still he did not get up that we realised that he would never get up, and that he had not been dancing, but dying. (The Mupandawana dancing competition, An Elegy of Easterly) After M’dhara Vitalis has been told to quit the job, he turns to coffin making to earn his bread and butter. His death is not a significant loss to the people around as he is already too old for the world. The last line of the paragraph says it all that he died in the euphoria. Euphoria of performing what he was known best for, his identity and his image. With liquor and music inside him, he swayed and danced his way to glory. He died in the glory which he created, while people were clapping and appreciating him. The entire story actually written in a humorous tone manages to suddenly bring tears in the eyes of the reader. It reflects on extreme poverty, the thankless systems of the business houses, and, the terrible condition of economy; where a person has nowhere to go. Yet he manages to find happiness for himself. He manages to die in the small stint of glory. This speaks in itself of the sacrifices of the common people. What hurts the most is all the stories focus on the deplorable conditions of the common masses who somehow find hope and happiness to go on with life. The political system is satirically presented in the ‘At the sound of the last post’, wherein the widow of a politician watches lowering of an empty coffin of her husband. The social structure is presented excellently in the story. She watches as people around her mourn for her late husband. The most amusing point of the story is the people around her are certainly not saints and angels. The cultural chaos is absolutely apparent. She notices wives obediently and dutifully following their husbands but are afraid to go to bed with them for the fear of catching AIDS. All the husbands around are having mistresses, secrets which are open and yet unsaid, stories which everyone knows but nobody wants to talk about them. The societal structure is filled with hypocrisy and yet maintains a level of superficial dignity. For all the great things that are being said for her husband the widow is acutely aware that her husband did not die of heroism as it is being portrayed of. In fact the real cause of his death is maintained as a secret. The clinging to false values is seen clearly. While reading this particular story, the reader can see tethers of social fabric of the Zimbabwean society. The most touching story however is ‘Something nice from London’. Unlike other stories this story is not humorous. It is dark but more than that it is heart wrenching. It talks about the people in the society who are not keen on staying in Zimbabwe. They want to escape to Europe or the western countries for want of better conditions of living, better acceptance and dignity from the society and off course all the material comfort the money can buy for them. Every family looks forward to leaving the country and settling down abroad or at least have one member in the family go abroad and send the foreign currency home. This story throws light on every aspect of Zimbabwean society. The family in question is not waiting at the airport for a nice package to be delivered or money coming from abroad but for the dead body of the son who had been to England for studies. He however in England got caught in wrong things, never understood the seriousness of the conditions at home and kept demanding money constantly from his widowed mother. The sister who narrates this story sees her mother pinching herself to send the money to the son and keep him going. The mother sells the furniture of the house, sends almost all the money her dead husband’s insurance has fetched and is now facing the problem of feeding the relatives who have gathered in her house for the funeral of the dead son. The dead body seems to take ages to arrive. The sister observes the senseless custom of gathering of the relatives in her house invading every space. The demands of the customs that don’t seem relevant, the ungratefulness of the family members whom her father has generously helped in the past and all her unsaid defence against the accusations made towards her mother are the key points of the story. The story also speaks of the deplorable conditions of the economy, where fuel prices are so steep and the quantity available is so less that there are miles of queue outside petrol stations. The numerous trips to the airport are costing the most precious commodity, petrol to the family. The most striking factor is when the sister states that in the culture she has been brought up in, doesn’t allow anyone to speak ill of the dead. She however doesn’t seem to remember anything good about her brother who has caused so much trouble and problems to her and her family. This story can happen in any culture and any society. The beauty of the story is the matter of fact narration and yet the anger, the frustration reaches the reader perfectly. The story speaks about red tape and bureaucracy. The sister and her elder brother try to get visa to go to England to get the dead body back, an act which is going to cost them fortune. Officers demand for an invitation letter to grant the visa. Asking for senseless documents in the moment of grief is rubbing it in. The bureaucracy however is dead to emotions and doesn’t try to understand the gravity of the situation. We are to forget the increasingly hysterical phone calls as Peter threatened to take his own life if Mother did not send more money, the phone calls that led her to sell all the shares that Father had left to provide her security, to take out a loan at eight hundred per cent interest, a loan she struggled to repay from her modest teacher’s salary that became a trifle as inflation rose first from thirty to seventy per cent, then from one hundred and seventeen to nine hundred and sixty seven point five three per cent until it broke the one thousand per cent barrier. We are to forget that my mother’s blood pressure rose with inflation as she sold item after item to feed the demands from England, her visits to the doctor becoming more frequent as she sought to control Peter’s excesses from seven thousand kilometres, until he said again he would kill himself if she did not send money, and my mother, broken by approaching penury, fatigue and illness said “Then do, Peter. Do, for maybe then we will all get some rest.” (Something Nice From London, An Elegy of Easterly) This paragraph says it all. It talks about the endless struggle of a family to survive. It talks about the effects of the crumbling of an economy on a common household, fights to survive and finally resigning and surrendering to the inevitable. The mother being a mother feels responsible for the words she said, but in reality it is the life that has killed her makes her speak of the death of the son which perhaps is the only way out for her. In the novel Broken Glass, Alain Mabanckou, talks about a sixty four year old school teacher who has been turned out of his job because of his erratic behaviour in the class and alcoholism. He is hired by club owner to write an account of customers who have been visiting his club and maintain a document or a notebook. Mabanckou attacks the clichés that are used for describing African culture. For example when broken glass asks the club owner why he wants to maintain a written account on the club, … he said he didn’t want Credit Gone West just to vanish one day, and added that people in this country have no sense of the importance of memory, that the days when grandmothers reminisced from their deathbeds was gone now, this is the age of the written word, that’s all that’s left, the spoken word’s just black smoke, wild cat’s piss, the boss of Credit Gone West doesn’t like ready-made phrases like ‘in Africa, when an old person dies, a library burns’, every time he hears that worn-out cliché he gets mad, he’ll say ‘depends which old person, don’t talk crap, I only trust what’s written down’, (Broken Glass, Alain Mabanckou) Mabanckou gives pseudo names to all his characters but all his characters in the novel depict life and their experiences. He makes mockery of everything through his narrator broken glass. He talks about people who have their own stories to tell. Broken glass reveals his story as well. He has been deserted by his wife for his drinking habit. He has been asked to leave his job and he is too old to start life afresh. Mabanckou comes from Republic of Congo. The societal struggle reflects in this book as well. The club has withstood many blows but the patrons of the club have not. Mabanckou weaves societal and political references humorously in the account of patrons of the club. He talks about wives backstabbing their husbands, the endless customs and economic condition of the society through broken glass. Broken glass himself is an aspiring writer who has seen the world through his reading and books. The owner of the club stubborn snail wants him to take up writing about the club and earn free liquor in return. The entire story told in ironic humour leaves the reader wanting for more. The failures of the characters who visit the club, the stories they share, if enlarged would apply to the entire society of the country. Although they have streak of humour they still manage to convey the message of the struggle of the people across. Wainaina’s book talks about his own story and life in Kenya. He came back from South Africa after the apartheid ended. He always wanted to go back to his homeland. His book again delves into humour and refutes the typical writing about Africa. This book gives a clear differentiation of what Kenya is today and how it is portrayed as a happy go lucky place in the outside world and its literature. His own lineage is heavily into politics of his country and believes in bringing about change in the system. The references to politics in his book are sharp, pointed and unmistakable. Mandela is President… there are now black people in suits and ties, on television, on the streets… A good chunk of my finance class is in Johannesburg, working for Arthur Anderson. (One day I will write about this place, Binyavanga Wainaina) He mentions the changes the sudden westernization that took place in the society through statements like these. He talks about tribalism which is continually referred by the western world as an essential characteristic of African culture. He talks about rigged elections in his own country and how people refuse to acknowledge a Ugandan name of a fellow countryman. He subtly and openly talks about the changes happening on socio-political front in Kenya. Although the book claims that it is his story, in reality it could be a story of anyone who has been aware and is observant about the changes happening around him. He claimed that he got the idea of writing this book through a family reunion where he saw members of his family coming together and spending time with each other. He saw the attachments they had for each other and was moved by it. Today’s Africa is different from what we have been reading about for years together. Ironically in our minds and perceptions we do not allow regions, countries and people to grow and to be different. In this scenario all the three books provide a fresh perspective to Africa. Wainaina’s book which starts as a personal memoir gives new insight to the state of Kenya. Alain Mabanckou’s book talks about the society of Congo and Petina Gappah gives a refreshing but critical view of Zimbabwe. The commonality of the three books is that they give an idea about what is happening in today’s Africa. They don’t intend to be dark, they comment about the life around them in a satirical and humorous way and humour is another common thread connecting all the three books together. Societies all around the world function on certain traditional principles which are uniquely contributing to the development of the society. However there is always a transition phase when an individual starts questioning the purpose of these principles perhaps asking for them to be renewed. This transition is not easy for an ordinary individual at the same time it is unavoidable. We are only concerned with it when the wave of transition reaches our doorstep. Rest all other places we expect to be static and unchanging and that is because we do not want to change our perceptions. These books force us to change our perceptions and make us accept the changes that are taking place in African societies. Beneath the humour and the easy going simple language lies the dark reality of modern Africa, countries of which are struggling with inflation, economic and political instability and poverty on a tremendously large scale. The least we can do is to not to presume that everything is static and will remain so in future. References: 1. Elegy of an Easterly – Petina Gappah 2. Broken Glass – Alain Mabanckou 3. One Day I will write about this place – Binyavanga Wainaina Read More