The Bride Price by Buchi Emecheta - Book Report/Review Example

Research Paper on The Bride Price by Buchi Emecheta The book The Bride Price is written by Buchi Emecheta. The Nigerian author mostly writes of black women. Her stories show them struggling as they try to retain their individuality as well as create proper lives for their families and themselves. It is something which she went through herself in her life till she gained her independence, but it is true that she, of ourse, had to face several hardships as well. Her experiences seem to influence the plot in her books. In this novel, Emecheta’s main purpose is to show how the value of a woman is equal to the level of status she can bring to a man. This story is of a Nigerian girl called Akun-na and her family. After her father dies, she is left without anyone who can protect her and is forced to marry someone. She goes against the society to be with her lover, a young school teacher called Chike. She escapes from one terrible situation to another and suffers through quite a lot to get the ending she wishes for, which is still not exactly a happy one. After marrying Chike and conceiving a child, she goes into premature labor and dies after giving birth to her daughter. Emecheta’s book was published in the year 1976 and is based on the post-colonial times in Nigeria. The women in those days, particularly in Nigeria, were fully dependent on the men. They were not treated like normal human beings but like objects. They could be bought and sold if a man wanted to have a woman and their opinion was not even asked. Their wishes were disregarded, they were to act like automatons and just follow whatever the men ordered them to do. Generally, the girls did not get any education; it was only in a few villages where there were schools for girls. Even then the girls were barely educated as they had to stop their studies once they got married which was when they were around fourteen years of age. There were certain rules and regulations which had to be followed by them no matter what the circumstances. Barely anyone had the courage to rebel and those who did had to suffer a lot at the hands of the society. Akun-na did not approve of the society’s laws and wanted to follow her own wishes which led to her having to face quite a number of problems and eventually her death. “Emecheta uses Akunna's story to expose and combat those socio-cultural traditions, taboos, myths, emotional and class deprivations employed by a patriarchal system that is inherently structured to perpetually produce “women in chains”” [Mez]. In those times, it was a sexist society and the men were the ruling lot. It was automatically assumed that if the family could afford to send their son to school, then the boy would get a good education. Every command of the men was to be carried out without arguments. Most of them were an insensitive lot with no care of the women around them be it their wives or their daughters. They were greedy creatures only caring for money and the respect they had in society. They used the females for their benefits, no matter how they got them; it was the same to them as long as they got the results they wanted. Since the beginning of times, the men were thought to be powerful and important, more so than the women, and the Nigerians had the same traditional concepts regarding male superiority. They were not down trodden upon and could do whatever they wished to. This was not for all though. Chike, the man Akun-na is shown to be in love with in the book, was a descendant of the slaves. Despite his wealthy father’s offering to pay Akun-na’s uncle the bride price several times, Okonkwo refuses him. This was because of his background which Okonkwo considered to be far too inferior. Despite the freedom of the slaves done by the Colonists, the natives refused to accept them as their equals. In the olden times, if the husband died, then the widow was left to be ‘inherited’ by the next male relative of the deceased. Similarly, in this book, when Akun-na’s father dies due to a World War II injury, her mother Ma Blackie has to marry his brother Okonkwo because that was what tradition told her to do. “Since a family “does not exist” after the death of the paterfamilias, the widow and her children are inherited, as material goods, usually by the uncle of the deceased. This nearly disappeared custom, preserved in the past by some African communities, inarguably degrades African women and their children but enhances male privilege” [Jer03]. This shows how the women were properties of the men. If the ‘owner’ died, they could be given in the hands of another. They were always dependent on the men. They were not considered capable enough to take care of themselves or their children on their own. Even though only the husband had died, still the offspring were considered to be orphans as if both their parents were dead. “It is not that we have no father any more, we have no parents any more. . . . So, not only have we lost a father, we have lost our life, our shelter” [Buc80]. Akun-na becomes Okonkwo’s daughter and he has high hopes for her bride price. As per tradition, this is the money which is paid to the father of the girl by the man who is to become the husband of the girl. He allows her to study in the local school as an educated girl would get him a higher bride price. He has no affection for the only daughter of his late brother. Rather, he is more interested in the amount of money he would end up scoring off her by selling her to the highest bidder. He wants to become the chief in the village, wants to raise his position in the society and for that he needs money which he can easily get in the form of Akun-na’s bride price. “…Okonkwo was almost a father to her now… He wanted to be an Obi, so he needed more money. Aku-nna had to allowed to stay in school so that she could be married to rich man, from one of those newly prosperous families springing up like mushrooms all over Ibluza” [Buc80]. According to tradition, the men kept a look out at all the girls around them to see what they grew up into as. As soon as the female reached puberty and started menstruating, it would mean that the girl was now ready to get married and bear children. Their mental and emotional maturity did not count, they could be vessels for the children and that was all that was required. The men who were interested in the particular girl would offer a bride price for her to the father or the guardian of the girl. The man the father thought to be the most suitable – this was usually judged by the prospect’s position in society and the amount of money he was offering to marry the girl – would be the lucky one. He would be allowed to marry the girl. Anyone who would not pay the bride price could not marry until they did so. It was the girl’s responsibility to create no fuss at the guardian’s choice of husband for her. She was to just accept the decision made on behalf without asking for her input. Her husband had paid a huge sum to have her and so she was to marry him and listen to his demands. "… must accept the husband chosen for her by her people, and the bride price must be paid" [Buc80]. The man assumed that the bride he had paid for must be a virgin – it was an attribute in great demand in those days. If a girl was not chaste, then the men refused to marry her. Something of a similar nature happens in the novel with Akun-na. "To her society, vaunting fornication with an osu is the last straw, and the stain on her family and friends is indelible." [Mez]. Since Akun-na is a new arrival in the village, so naturally all the males’ attention is on her. When it is discovered that she has had her first period, she starts receiving several marriage proposals. She only wants to marry Chike but she cannot do so due to his social standing. One of her suitors Okoboshi kidnaps her but nobody interferes. Okoboshi is not blamed for abducting a girl as it was quite an accepted custom in the village to do so. This clearly shows how much of a sexist and unfair society Akun-na was living in. Deciding to go against the culture, against the traditions she had grown up with, she lies to Okoboshi. "… to fight for her honor. This was going to be the deciding moment of her existence" [Buc80]. She says that she has already lain with a man – Chike to be specific – and is no longer a virgin. “… the son of dog-chief, if the best he can manage to steal for his son is a girl who had been taught what men taste like by the son of a slave. . . . Yes, he has slept with me many, many times" [Buc80]. This gives her quite a freeway to be left on her own and she manages to escape. It is not surprising that Akun-na is willing to go to such lengths to be with Chike. He is the one man who actually shows that he loves her, the real her, her personality, her mind. He is the one who really values her. He is unlike the others like Okoboshi who is only interested in her body. He is also not like her uncle who does not care a whit for her; it is the bride price he would receive for her which is not important. She is either of material worth or someone wants to bed her. That is her value in their eyes and she, of course, does not like it all. She is also more forward in her views due to the education she is blessed and lucky enough to have unlike the other girls of her age and living in the same village. Punishing the women for not following orders or doing something which is disapproved of by the guardians is a way of proving one’s manhood. It is to show that the men have the greater power comparatively. So Akun-na was punished for running away with Chike. Her uncle refused to take the bride price and so in the eyes of the people, the union of the two was not considered as marriage. Under the tradition, Akun-na belonged to her uncle and the husband he had chosen for her. Because of this, she could not return back to the village and live there. “She could never return to Ibuza because she had committed an abomination. Some elders, however pointed out that as long as Okonkwo did not accept any bride price from the slave, the girl still belonged to Okoboshi” [Buc80]. The same people who were shown to be supporting her during her father’s death were now all against her and had driven her out of the village. They would rather she die than break their tradition. The women never stuck together to show unity in front of the males, but instead they tried to distract each other so that they would get the attentions of the most powerful man. Even though women were very important to the men in those times – their bride price helped in improving their conditions – still they were not treated well. The value of the women was quite equal to the level of status that she could bring to the men. If the women acted the way the tradition bid them to do, the men would have a hefty bride price and raise their position in the society. On the other hand, if the girls like Akun-na ran away, they brought embarrassment to the family. Their worth would be much less to the man. She eloped and died in child birth, that was what, they said, she deserved. “Chike and Aku-nna substantiated the traditional superstition they had unknowingly set out to eradicate. Every girl born in Ibuza after Aku-nna’s death was told her story, to reinforce the old taboos of the land” [Buc80]. Works Cited Mez: , (Mezu 133), Jer03: , (Fisher and Silber 63), Buc80: , (Emecheta 21-28), Buc80: , (Emecheta 75), Buc80: , (Emecheta 168), Mez: , (Mezu 136), Buc80: , (Emecheta 136), Buc80: , (Emecheta 138), Buc80: , (Emecheta 104), Read More