A Praise Song for Bawa Jangwarzo

 

Another pleasant surprise was seeing an ajami text praise song for the Gobir ruler Bawa Jangwarzo in Heskitt's work. Since courtly praise singing was looked down upon by some Islamic scholars (think of al-Tahir's reference to praise singing in a poem on Borno), we are assuming this text was written in the Arabic script by someone affiliated with the court of Gobir's dynasty. The use of kirari for short verses describing Bawa Jangwarzo. Unfortunately, Mervyn Hiskett, whose A History of Hausa Islamic Verse is quite detailed otherwise, does not elucidate the origin of this song.

Since it appears to be one of the few surviving examples of an ajami courtly praise song for a pre-jihad ruler, it must have been written by someone familiar with the praise literature for the Gobirawa royal line. While short kirari appear in the Kano Chronicle, this seems to be one of the few extended songs to be adapted with the Arabic script. Moreover, this praise song was written in what Hiskett refers to as the khafif meter. This suggests its author was someone well-versed in the tradition of Islamic poetry, even if using it for a secular theme in praise of Gobir's king. 

The thematic and symbolic language of the praise song is similar in some ways with what one can read in Kanuri praise songs. The ruler, Bawa, is praised as the "forked pole that supports the roof" and his military victories or conquests are celebrated. The references to rebellions put down in Shiki and Dole or the narrator asking for a horse further support the idea of the Gobir king as a great warrior. Indeed, traditions refer to his campaigns against Zamfara which sought to free itself from Gobir's dominance. It is perhaps worth nothing that Dan Tafa referred to Bawa as the first Hausa ruler to refuse to send tribute to Borno, too. 

The Song of Muhammad al-Amin b. Muhammad al-Kanemi

The first page of Denham's English translation of Muhammad al-Amin al-Kanemi's Q. daliyya Nasim al-saba arajta rab'an bi-Kukawa wa-shahadta man bi ' l-babi min mutaraddidi

Although we read it a few years ago in the work of Denham and Clapperton, it somehow escaped our attention until recently. We are speaking of, naturally, an Arabic poem penned by Muhammad al-Amin al-Kanemi, the founder of the Shehus who have ruled Borno after the fall of the Sayfawa. In this case, we found the poem by al-Kanemi intriguing for its resemblance to Kanuri praise songs from the period of the Sayfawa dynasty. In this case, one sees a song or verse poem about the martial prowess and victory of al-Kanemi against Bagirmi (and other unnamed foes). This, naturally, brings to mind Kanuri praise songs for the mai, yerima or galadima for similar military victories or skills. Some of the metaphorical language used by al-Kanemi is also quite rich and draws on what must have been some of the standards of Borno Arabic poetry and oral literature. For instance, references to "forests of spears" when referring to his large army is quite evocative or to the hyena bring to mind Kanuri praise songs referring to lions, bush cows, and the rogondimi snake. Moreover, metaphors and similes comparing al-Kanemi's favorite mistress, rescued during this lengthy campaign (over 6 months away from Kuka, or Kukawa) to Indian silks are rather well-done. Indeed, this personal element in which al-Kanemi celebrated this reunion with a lover is a personal dimension to Borno's written literature that is not easily found. This makes it very much a personal statement even as it celebrates the contributions of other military chiefs or officials like Tirab. Last, but certainly not least, the song from 1821 refers to the palace of the Bagirmi sultan facing an attack from al-Kanemi's troops. This is another piece of evidence for Borno's role in the sacking and pillaging of Massenya, the Bagirmi capital.

A Novel by a North African

Apuleius's The Golden Ass is a hilarious tale of a man transformed into a donkey. Written in the 100s, perhaps during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, the North African author combines comedy and moral education in a tale of magic. Lucius, the protagonist, and central character in novel loaded with inset stories, suffers from an unnatural interest in magic and sex, ultimately leading to his accidental transformation into an ass by Photis, his lover (and slave of Milo and Pamphile, the witch). P.G. Walsh's translation ably renders into the English language much of Apuleius's wicked humor and satire of social relations, the Roman Senate, "catamite" priests, and unfaithful servants. Walsh's translation does not "modernize" the text to make it too informal or contemporary, so it still almost reads like something a Latin-speaker wrote over 1800 years ago. 

Like other ancient "novels" of the Roman Empire, the narrative structure brings to mind Arabian Nights through its several stories of infidelity, disloyal slaves, sorcery, supernatural events, bandits, greedy estate-owners, and, in the tale of Cupid and Psyche, a fable with Platonist or philosophical implications. Cupid and Psyche's tale occupies a significant chunk of the text, suggesting its central importance to the religious and philosophical themes pertinent to the soul and love, humanity and the divine. Psyche's desire for connection, her curiosity, and her eventual reunion with Cupid (and the other gods) suggest a possible route for human connection to the higher powers. Like Lucius, Psyche's curiosity and need for companionship drive her toward peril, but humble service to the gods (even a human-like Venus, overwhelmed with envy for the unsurpassed beauty of Psyche) with acceptance of one's mistakes lead to her salvation. 

Like Heliodorus's Ethiopian Romance, the novel shifts its settings and deals with a variety of trials that Lucius must survive or escape, although there is no Charicleia or female figure he truly loves (Photis was only useful for her sexual services). The intervention of the gods and belief in divine providence abounds in both texts, although the two lovers in Heliodorus's romance are directly linked to two main deities of the Greek pantheon and lack any of the moral flaws of Lucius. Since Lucius is a flawed person with moral shortcomings, his character is more believable and compelling than the star-crossed lovers in the Greek romances. Of course, since Heliodorus and Apuleius were both familiar with the literary heritage of the Greek language, The Golden Ass shares much of the same mythological and literary allusions with the ancient Greek "novels."

 The final book, which tells of Lucius's initiation into the mysteries of Isis and Osiris, presents a shift in tone in the novel as it drops it satirical tone and seems to openly embrace worship of Isis and proper religious behavior. In its embrace of the mysteries and its description of various rituals, this must surely be the world's first occult novel. Like a fable, it calls upon the reader to pursue knowledge in the proper way and practice moderation in sex and curiosity. Lucius, educated though he was, had to endure harrowing experiences as a donkey before he could learn this essential lesson, and find a way out of he morally corrupt world he experienced first-hand as a beast of burden. Much of the details of Lucius's initiation is left unrevealed to the reader, but the novel purports to offer right living and service to the mystery cults as the path to knowledge and success. Instead of the avaricious estate-owners, unchaste wives, effeminate pseudo-priests, violent bandits, abusive centurions, or miserly wealthy who hoard their riches to no purpose, the cult of Isis offers a path away from these ethical dilemmas. 

As an influential text in the history of the Western canon, I could not help but wonder if this novel may have influenced Antoine Innocent's Mimola. The Haitian novel directly links the Vodou loas to the dieux lares of the ancient Mediterranean. Like Lucius, Mimola is afflicted by supernatural means, although in her case it has more to do with the family's rejection of the ancestral spirits. Like Lucius, Mimola and her mother must persevere over the course of a number of trials, culminating in their pilgrimage to Saut d'Eau. Again, like Lucius, Mimola is initiated as a priestess in Vodou and is freed from her affliction. Perhaps any and all similarities between the two novels end here, yet they share a critique of Christianity (the baker's adulterous wife is likely a Christian, while in the Haitian context nationalists of Innocent's era were critical of the Catholic Church's influence). Like Apuleius, Innocent sees the syncretism of "pagan" beliefs and their positive social impact as the basis for community, the city-state. I would like to further explore any possible links between Apuleius and Haitian authors in the future, particularly as it relates to the occult, initiation, and connaissance. Milo Rigaud's Jésus ou Legba? may be the best place to look, especially since Rigaud linked Vodou to ancient Egypt and Nubian religions, of which Isis was a major figure. 

King Solomon's Mines

Although Haggard was far from a great novelist, his King Solomon's Mines was published at the perfect time. The recent Western re-discovery of the ancient zimbabwe stone structures in southern Africa with concurrent racialized imperialist fantasies during an era of burgeoning British imperial expansion in southern Africa created a climate favorable for a popular romance eager to read stories of adventure in an unknown African interior. Adding an imperialist layer with the background of Solomon's legendary mines and legends of an ancient "white" race that erected fabulous ruins in the dark heart of Africa must have appealed to some British readers, who could see in themselves the rightful successors to the light-skinned invaders who once conquered the native population. There's even a thin layer of historical references to the Portuguese past presence in the region (the old Dom) and the return of a "white" race represented by the Anglo-Saxon. 

Haggard, however, awkwardly combines his racist fantasy with an admiration of the Zulu people, the model for the Kukuanas who ruled the area of King Solomon's Mines. Due to his own penchant for racialist theories of gallant Viking or Dane warriors and the type of masculinist culture of honor and military valor they supposedly represented, Haggard, or his narrator, Quartermain, seem to view the Zulu as a great native "race" of noble savages. However, as a savage "black" population, they are destined to fall under benevolent British rule. And if you think Haggard would actually go as far as including a consummated relationship between a black woman, Foulata (whose name might be a reference to the Fulani people of West Africa), and a white man, Good, you will be disappointed. Instead, black and white are never to cross. The races are presumably immutable and black and white too different, despite the expressed admiration of Haggard's three white protagonists for the Kukuanas. 

In his own way, Haggard seems to want the Kukuanas to be left alone, but surely the Anglo-Saxon "race" will extend their control over the noble Kukuana peoples. Quartermain, Henry and Good convince Umbopa to end some of the barbaric superstitions and violent traditions of the Kukuanas, and despite the Kukuana king's promise to resist any white encroachment, we all know what transpired in Rhodesia and the rest of the African continent. Quartermain and friends represent an earlier stage in the colonial relationship, one that sought to restrict execution without trial and eradicate the witch-hunting rituals. But like their Zulu model, the Kukuana will surely fall under direct British rule. 

Despite it's flaws in structure and prose, the novel must have been one of the influences on Pauline Hopkins. Hopkins, drawing from the Ethiopianist Christian tradition and focused on ancient Meroe, obviously held a differing view on race. In her novel, Reuel, the light-skinned African-American, returns and becomes king of an ancient, lost state modeled on Meroe and Biblical allusions. Unlike Umbopa, Haggard's noble savage, Hopkins endeavored to craft fully-fleshed out character, not just stereotypes. Moreover, the Ethiopianist and racial vindicationist tradition Hopkins drew from made Telassar an advanced civilization, not like the Kukuanas who merely inherited the chainmail and infrastructure left behind by an ancient white race. For Hopkins, Meroe and the idea of a Nubian origin of civilization was meant to inspire African Americans. So, Hopkins borrowed from the lost world type of literature Haggard excelled in to write a novel that would uplift black Americans and encourage them to see something positive in their African origin. The two authors perhaps share an uncomfortable emphasis on racial identity as a driving force to which all must ultimately embrace or suffer the consequences, although Reuel is of mixed-race ancestry. 

The Sayfawa and The Adventures of Sayf Ben Dhi Yazan

The fictionalized Sayf ben Dhi Yazan of The Adventures of Sayf Ben Dhi Yazan: An Arab Folk Epic contains kernels of historical facts while reflecting some of the geopolitical tensions in Mamluk Egypt. The historical Sayf did fight against the Axumite Ethiopians, but Sayfa Ar'ad lived in the 14th century. Moreover, the Axumites were Christians, not worshippers of Saturn, as this folk epic portrays Ethiopia. The Solomonic dynasty's thwarted threat to divert the Nile is also ahistorically recycled as part of Sayf's greatness as he ensures the domination of Ethiopia and the Sudan (Black Africa). By ensuring the Nile flows into Egypt and living up to his lineage as a descendant of Shem, the "cursed" black Africans are subjugated. There are also references to much of the known world, including China, Waq al-Waq, the Zaghawa, the Maghreb, Egypt, Persia, India, and Greece. The Nile River itself almost becomes a character, that mythical river which medieval Islamic geographers believed to traverse most of the African continent. The source of the Nile itself is a land of wonders and perhaps Nubia, or early Islamic writings on Nubia, also influenced the depiction of the African interior in this work of literature. After all, early Islamic sources claimed the pre-Christian Nubians worshipped the stars and, later on, that they claimed descent from Yemen. 

Despite some occasionally uncomfortable lines referring to "unclean black Ethiopians" or derogatory allusions to black Africans, valor and conversion of Islam can make them noble. None of the characters are developed or fully-fleshed persons, but Sayf spends much of his youth among the "Sudan" and marries or befriends several of them. Indeed, black Africans could be beautiful, comely, valorous, intelligent, or skilled in this work. Shama, the first wife of Sayf, also seems to have been "black" herself. Moreover, some of the "white" characters, especially Sayf's concubine mother, are the most treacherous, anti-Islamic characters in the story. There is undoubtedly an Islamic bias and emphasis on Arab ancestry, as references to patrilineal descent or Arab virtue make abundantly clear. Ethnocentric and Islamic biases aside, it is difficult to read this medieval work as racist (though there are elements of it). Thus, the epic may reflect an acceptance in the Curse of Ham ideology, yet Islam, which did not exist when Sayf actually lived, and a culture of chivalry could ennoble black characters. Arab lineage and Islam, ultimately, are the most important factors at play here. 

Clearly, stories of Sayf and the Tubba'i kings were exaggerated and widely circulated across the Arabic-speaking and Muslim world for centuries before this epic of magic, romance, and war was written down in Mamluk Egypt. Stories and legends of Sayf of Himyar's defeat of the Axumites, or claims his lineage included the greatest kings who had once conquered all lands, probably reached Kanem soon after its Islamization in the late 11th century. Exactly when the Sayfawa dynasty began to claim descent from Sayf is not certain, but it was repeated in North African and Middle Eastern sources throughout the Middle Ages after the state's Islamization. Sayf's appeal to a recently Islamized dynasty must have been part of this circulation of fictionalized tales of the great king. Both influenced by and influencing the circulation of tales of Sayf, Kanem-Borno's ruling dynasty could have shaped the folk epic. It would fruitful to analyze the oral traditions in Kanem and Borno for possible influences on the epic or vice versa. 

If stories of his conquests of Ethiopia and the Sudan were already disseminated by the 11th century, then the mais of Kanem might have chosen him as an ancestor to legitimize their own lineage as recent Muslims. Moreover, they might have seen their own conquests and raids of non-Muslim "Sudan" as repeating the feats of the legendary Sayf. For instance, Islamic sources reporting on 13th century Kanem's expansion and raids on the peoples south of Lake Chad or the region of Borno could have been interpreted as another instance in which Sayf b. Dhi Yazan's progeny established their hegemony over pagan "Sudan" who resisted Islam. Indeed, Kanem's expansion in the 1200s might have influenced the folk epic when it was finally written down in Egypt. Kanem pilgrims, students, and traders had already been known in Cairo, so stories of the Sayfawa's conquests in the African interior probably influenced the Sayf epic. Confused geographic notions that the Nile was connected to Lake Chad and much of sub-Saharan Africa could have made it easier to envision Kanem as accessible to (Christian) Ethiopia and pagan "Black Africa" as well. Kanem was additionally known through diplomacy, trade contacts, and as supplier of slaves via trans-Saharan networks to Egypt. All of these aforementioned factors would have meant some people in Mamluk Egypt might have interpreted the Sayfawa dynasty's dominant position in the Central Sudan as evidence of Sayf's conquests of Ethiopia and Black Africa. Like the fictionalized Sayf of the epic, his so-called descendants in Kanem and Borno were pious Muslims, militarily superior, and effective at subjugating infidels.

Like their putative ancestor, the Sayfawa mais were promoting Islam while asserting, through Islamic genealogical and historical modes of thought, an identity as sons of Shem and not "Sudan." Although they were, for the most part, obviously considered "black" in the Maghreb or Egypt, their lineage mattered more than their color or phenotype. This lineage established political and religious legitimacy as well as serving as a challenge to attempts to enslave Kanem subjects. If they were Muslims and descendants of Sayf, then enslavement of them was unlawful. Of course, the chronicles of Ahmad b. Furtu, the Diwan and oral sources commemorate the names of several pre-Islamic rulers of Kanem. These pre-Islamic rulers could have been, like the Zaghawa princess mentioned early on in the epic, easily fused with Sayf through creative genealogical reworking and fictitious marriage alliances. After all, the various foreign wives and lovers of Sayf come to symbolize his conquest of the world, so someone in Kanem could have simply incorporated Sayf into the ruling dynasty through a marriage between him and a "Zaghawa" princess. In the epic, or at least the abridged English translation, the Zaghawa princess is only mentioned once. If, however, the epic was passed down orally and subject to occasional changes by various audiences and storytellers, the earlier "Zaghawa" could have been combined with Sayf through a marriage.

Through such creative retellings of the Sayf story cycles and the political facts enshrined in royal genealogies, the Sayfawa court could easily claim descent from Sayf who defeated the Axumites and gradually moved to Kanem, where the pre-Islamic mais became descendants of Sayf, too. After all, the legends circulating of Sayf make him implausibly Muslim before the life of the Prophet Muhammad, so Kanem's rulers could have retconned their pre-Islamic past. This is part of the reason we find it hard to agree with Lange's assertion that the Sayfawa dynasty replaced an older, Duguwa house. There is simply not enough evidence to prove a dynastic change, nor would it have been necessary. Based on our current evidence, it seems unlikely since all the local written and oral sources claim dynastic continuity. Nonetheless, the fictionalized tales of Sayf b. Dhi Yazan's exploits must have reached Kanem by the late 11th century or early 12th century, if not earlier. Then, after adopting Sayf as their ancestor, reports of Kanem's conquests in the central Sahara and Chad Basin must have shaped the "authors" of the Sayf epic in Egypt. Reading The Adventures of Sayf Ben Dhi Yazan actually strengthens the theory of Abdullahi Smith just as it adds another layer to understanding the historical context of the epic. Such a theory suggests the centrality of Kanem-Borno to constructions of race, difference, and the image of Africa in Egypt and the Middle East.

Batouala

Rene Maran, the first black writer to win the Prix Goncourt back in 1921, was born to parents from French Guiana. He spent years in French Equatorial Africa during the zenith of European imperialism. His father served in the French colonial administration, which he also did. However, Maran sought to ameliorate some of the worst abuses of the colonial regime in French Equatorial Africa.

Reading Batouala from a 21st century lens, the novel hardly seems anti-colonial or radical at all. Indeed, the novel's main characters, a community of Bantu-speaking peoples of what is now the Central African Republic, carry on their old traditions, rituals, and beliefs in spite of their colonial overlords, who are depicted as cruel alcoholics who use excessive force. The Africans, such as their chief Batouala, however, are arguably portrayed as happy 'savages' who resist the change that comes with modernity, preferring long days of idleness and not too interested in attaining literacy or the technological advances made by the Europeans. Batouala retains his power and influence as chief of their small community, but his authority and the authority of all African leaders prior to the arrival of the whites is under siege.

Surprisingly, Maran does succeed in establishing the worldview of the community he describes. The short novel is full of songs, folktales, rituals, and perspectives on the natural world from the African' point of view. Moreover, this portrayal is neither wholly negative or positive, so all the flawed aspects of Batouala and his community are shown as well as their strengths, including their rules for murder, polygamy, slavery, and their circumcision and fertility rites. Animals, such as Baoutala's pet dog, the panther, and others, also appear as strong characters due to their symbolic role in folklore and hunting, or for providing another lens through which one discovers the world of Batouala and the extreme suffering that results from their way of life.

Perhaps because he so vividly depicted the world of Africa from an African perspective, Maran was scorned and rebuked in France for decades after the publication of Batouala. The simple act of giving Africans humanity at a time when they were conceived of as untutored children and savages in need of Europe's saving grace was inevitably going to spark anger and opposition from some French. Hemingway, however, immediately understood the novel's power and agreed with the message, hence his accolades for Batouala.

Half of a Yellow Sun

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun is a powerful narrative of the Biafran War that surpasses the factual details of the case, as all great fiction does. Part history, part love story, Adichie proves her skills as a writer in crafting a book over 500 pages long but so addicting one cannot put it down. Her style is simple, sweet, and effective. In many ways she is the 21st century Chinua Achebe, the famous Igbo writer of the 20th century, best known for Things Fall Apart. Her narrative, rooted in the 'facts' of the Biafran War, such as the corruption, ethnic conflict, colonial manipulation and starvation of the Biafran masses, tells me more about this war's impact on human lives than any history I could find. And believe me, I've read and seen the pictures of starving children, since the Biafran War of 1967-1970 was everywhere in the international press due to the blockades ordered by Gowon in Nigeria.

Unfortunately, I believe that many unfamiliar with Nigerian history and culture will be unfamiliar with some of the background to the conflict. Adichie wisely chose to begin the story in the early 1960s and avoided giving too much historical background, since the novel would have likely become boring and academic for those unfamiliar with the historical context. Likewise, Adichie's novel focuses on the Igbo perspective, and through the Englishman Richard Churchill, a white man's perspective on Nigeria. It would be nice to read about the Biafran conflict from the perspective of the Muslim North and the non-Igbo minorities within Biafra who worked with the Nigerian state to defeat Biafra, whose flag included half of a yellow sun, hence the title of the novel. The only northern, Muslim Hausa character to play a role in the novel is the wealthy prince, Mohammed, a former lover of Olanna, the Igbo daughter of a Chief who abused his position as a tax collector to amass wealth and purchased property in Lagos, where he and his wife live lavishly. Olanna's former beau still loves her, and helps her escape Kano when the Hausa begin to massacre Igbos after the Igbo led a coup against the Northern-controlled central Nigerian government. In response, the Igbos of southeastern Nigeria, under Colonel Ojukwu, secede from Nigeria, which had only been 'independent' of Britain since 1960. Although the Muslim North and South of Nigeria were never close prior to the unification of the two regions under British colonial rule in 1914, and even then the two regions remained distinct and separate as Southern elites received colonial education and prepared to take over civil administration in the central state, the Igbos had traveled to the North and Lagos to start businesses, purchase property, etc. Indeed, at one point in the novel, the Igbos are referred to as the Jews of Nigeria. 

After the Igbos declared independence, it was inevitable their little republic would face war with Nigeria because of Biafra's oil and the need to maintain colonial borders established by European powers. Indeed, Biafra was never recognized by the imperial powers, and Nigeria received aid and arms from Britain, the Soviet Union and some African countries to force Biafra into submission. It also helped that Biafra's military was corrupt and exploiting its own people in the name of Igbo nationalism and autonomy, commandeering cars, conscripting 'idle' men such as Ugwu, and lying to the people when they knew Nigerian forces were about to defeat their forces and take another Biafran town. The Biafran propaganda and misinformation to their people worked well, since so many people, including Olanna and her Igbo professor husband, Odenigbo, felt cheated when a ceasefire was declared. Ojukwu fled, lying to Biafra on the radio. Ugwu, who was conscripted later in the novel, initially desired, at least partially, to serve in the military to fight for Igbo independence. However, after serving, he experiences the military's corruption, dehumanization of its own soldiers, who are like sheep, and even participates in the rape of a Biafran woman working at a bar with his fellow soldiers. While serving as a soldier, Ugwu comes across Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. The symbolism is so obvious, that the Biafran soldiers are akin to slaves, exploited and abused to carry out injustice while supposedly 'doing the right thing' by being patriotic. Ugwu decides to name his own story about the Biafran War after Douglass's Narrative.

Adichie's white character, Richard, is fully developed as one of the main characters (Ugwu, Olanna, and Richard are the main characters whose point of view is explained by the omniscient third person narrator). Richard Churchhill, though on the side of Biafra and in love with Kainene, Olanna's twin sister, remains a white man and part of the former colonial elite regardless of his ability to speak Igbo and serve Biafra with journalistic accounts of heroism, suffering and resilience of the Igbo peoples. His fellow white residents of Nigeria display astounding racism and pro-imperialist beliefs, including Susan, Richard's lover before Kainene. Susan sees Nigerians as violent, savages who are ungrateful despite all the 'civilization' the British brought to Nigeria. Two American journalists Richard shows around Biafra during the War are likewise racist, paternalistic fools who see Nigerians (and all Africans) as savage, starving peoples with the mind of children. Indeed, the Americans care more about dead whites than any of the thousands of dead and dying blacks. This unspoken rule of Western journalism taints all Western accounts of war and deaths in Africa, since any and all whites remaining in those African regions where people are dying are either rescued instantaneously or memorialized in Western newspapers and television news forever. The dying, malnourished Biafran children, suffering from kwashiokor and other deficiencies, become objects for Western journalists to achieve name recognition and become famous. The Red Cross and other relief agencies and churches, despite coming with the right intentions, also reinforce white supremacy and abuse their power. Father Marcel, a priest at the relief center in Orlu, run by Kainene, raped starving young girls until  Kainene discovers the truth and chases him out. 

Richard likes to see himself as Biafran, as African, not European. But his whiteness and the inherent privileges that confers upon him makes it impossible to escape his whiteness in Nigeria/Biafra. He can speak Igbo, study the Igbo-Ukwu civilization (and still express shock that these people had any civilization!), marry an Igbo woman, and endeavor to write about the story of Biafra, but it will never be his story. Ugwu ultimately must tell the tale, since Richard's whiteness makes him forever privileged. He came to Nigeria to find a home, and to write the one brilliant novel that will make him famous, but finds neither. Even when he 'helps' the Biafran cause by writing articles that will get international press, the only reason his stories get so much attention in the West is because he's a white man. Colonel Madu, who asks him to write in the first place, never saw him as anything but a white man who will never understand Igbos of Africans. Although life does not end well for him with the disappearance and presumed death of Kainene, Richard's whiteness will ensure him a life of privilege and comfort in Nigeria. As previously mentioned, his fascination with the Igbo-Ukwu art that dates back to the "time of the Vikings" is rooted in a disbelief, or shock that black Africans could produce magnificent pieces of art, practice long distance trade. Thus, despite his attempts to avoid paternalistic racism, Richard nevertheless succumbs to it. 

Adichie also criticizes those Nigerians/Biafrans, who in the name of nationalism, black power, and progress abuse their power to copy whites and mimic British styles in dress, 'culture' and taste. Olanna and Kainene's parents, for example, have to buy everything European, essentially buying into the material excess of European cultures. Other Nigerian/Biafran elites act similarly, endeavoring to be like the former and current British colonizers, who persist in their racist beliefs and treatment of blacks. The Western ways of Nigerian elites is also sharply contrasted with the lower-class population, who are domestics, peasants, and villagers whose traditions, ways of life, and even dietary patterns are vastly different. The new black elite, despite professing to support and come from the masses, turn their backs to the religious beliefs of Igbo peasants, for example, as Odenigbo does with Igbo beliefs he calls superstitions. The new elites are no more than black skins with white masks, blacks masquerading as whites because they ape European colonial domination, divide and rule tactics, and condescension if not outright hatred for the lower classes.

Adichie's novel here is a masterpiece. She explores issues of gender, love, colonialism, race, and national identity in Nigeria in deep, meaningful ways with a simple prose that is easy for anyone unfamiliar with Nigeria or West Africa to follow. Igbo phrases and words are used throughout the novel, reminding the reader that most of the dialogue is in fact in Igbo between different characters in southeastern Nigeria. Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham and multiple iconic events of the 1960s to put the Biafran war in a much larger context of decolonization, apartheid in South Africa and white-rule in Rhodesia, the civil rights movement in the United States, and a world in the process of taking the flood in the tide in the affairs of men. Nothing happens in isolation, thus, the Biafran War is part of human history, not solely Nigerian history. The universality of Adichie's novel is why it's so important to read literature from around the world, since all human 'nations' interact with others. Furthermore, one would hope this novel increases foreign knowledge and interest in Nigeria, one of African's most important economies, and the most populous nation in Africa. The effects of the Biafran war linger, and its causes are still replayed in the ethnic/regional conflict for control over the central government. People in the Niger Delta are still oppressed by a central, national government that colludes with foreign oil companies instead of providing for infrastructure and funding for government programs to battle poverty. Moreover, the conflict between the Muslim North and mostly Christian South continues to divide the regions. Nigeria currently has an agreement where the North and South switch off leaders of the central government, so the new leader is Christian, but the previous was a Muslim. 

Tayeb Salih's Season of Migration to the North

Sudanese author Tayeb Salih's Season of Migration to the North, translated from Arabic to English by Denys Johnson-Davies, with some help from the author, is considered one of the greatest novels in the Arabic language for the 20th century. As someone trying to expand my fervor for world literature beyond Africa, Caribbean and African-American literature, Salih's novel seems like a great start, especially since it's also African literature in addition to Arab. Indeed, the novel is laden with references to folklore, poetry, and Islamic faith of the Arabic-speaking northern Sudan and the wider Arab world. Nevertheless, the novel also remains fundamentally African based on the dark skin of the Sudanese themselves and the plethora of stereotypes and experiences under colonialism that the novel's characters experience. Indeed, it blurs the distinction between "Arab" and "African" because of the intersecting identities possessed by characters such as Mustafa Sa'eed, the Sudanese intellectual who studies abroad in England, becomes a darling of the left because of his black skin, and uses his time there to "liberate Africa with his penis" by exacting vengeance for Kitchener's conquest of the Sudan, often related to sexual conquest because of the inherent gendered power dynamic and violent nature of European colonialism in Africa. Indeed, the novel's strong sexual overtones and openness, as well as criticism of female circumcision and patriarchy, made it controversial in Sudan.

The novel, though short and quite poetic in language and tone, especially regarding the beautiful metaphors and similes connecting the characters to nature and the Nile, uses an episodic structure that is initially confusing. The unnamed narrator, returning from England after studying poetry, meets a newcomer in his village along the Nile, Mustafa Sa'eed. The son of an Ababda man and a woman from the south, Mustafa Sa'eed lived his life independently and with an intellectual fervor quite remarkable, winning scholarships to study in Cairo and in England. His presence strikes a curiosity in the narrator, who, after hearing the man recite an English poem, insists on learning his life story. This leads to Mustafa telling an incomplete narrative of his life while leaving clues and pressure after death to ensure that the narrator uncovers the truth of his life for Mustafa's sons and posterity, since Mustafa's ego demands immortality. After Mustafa's death, the narrator receives his letter, a key to a secret room in the house, and guardianship of his sons and wife, a young woman, Hosna, who never uncovered Mustafa's secrets and was not interested in marriage afterwards. The rest of the novel consists of a sort of reversal of Heart of Darkness with the narrator traveling back to Khartoum from his village further north along on the Nile, encountering Bedouin, other drivers and soldiers, and eventually, an entire rural community where everyone breaks into communal feasting, dancing, and merriment. He also uncovers more of Mustafa's history while engaging with the people of the Sudan and discovering that “we shall pull down and we shall build, and we shall humble the sun itself to our will; and somehow we shall defeat poverty” (114).

Salih, a Sudanese person who studied in England himself, could likely be the narrator. The narrator, after criticizing the extreme, patriarchal and ignorant views of his fellow villages regarding an arranged marriage between Mustafa's widow and Wad Rayyes, an elderly man with a penchant for marrying different young women for sexual purposes, realizes he is in love with Hosna, this young woman, but fails to make a decisive stand and marry her to prevent her from being forced into a marriage with a lustful old man with horrendous views on gender. Indeed, during a scene of surprising but semi-hilarious discussion, the narrator's grandfather, Wad Rayyes, Bakri, and an elderly woman, all seniors, engage in a raunchy talk about sex where Wad Rayyes proudly lists off his sexual accomplishments, including the time he raped a slave (and yes, this novel is set in the late 1950s and early 1960s, but Wad Rayyes is over 70 by this point). His views are best summarized in the following quotation, “I swear to you, Hajj Ahmed,” said Wad Rayyes, “that if you’d had a taste of the women of Abyssinia and Nigeria you’d throw away your string of prayer-beads and give up praying--the thing between their thighs is like an upturned dish, all there for good or bad. We here lop it off and leave it like a piece of land that’s been stripped bare." Wad Rayyes correctly attacks the practice of genital mutilation, but still sees women as essentially property for reproduction and pleasure, even misquoting the Koran to justify it by mistaking "women" for "wealth" in "wealth and children." 

Despite the misogynistic views held by the men and reinforced or accepted by many women in the narrator's small village, the older woman participating in the discussion openly and unashamedly reveals her love life and which of her past husbands satisfied her the most, indicating the ways in which the environment, though inherently sexist, still allowed room for female autonomy and sexuality, just so much as it was done under the sanction of marriage. This, when added to the spirit and determination of the villagers as well as other poor, rural Sudanese exploited or neglected by the central government in Khartoum, contributes to the narrator feeling that "by the standards of the European industrial world we are poor peasants, but when I embrace my grandfather I experience a sense of richness as though I am a note in the heartbeats of the very universe” (73). Their ability to persevere, or at least hope as much in the liberation of nightfall from the sun's indefatigable heat, displays an ability to make a decision and stand up for themselves, something the narrator finally does near the novel's conclusion:

“Then my mind cleared and my relationship to the river was determined. Though floating on the water, I was not part of it. I thought that if I died at that moment, I would have died as I was born--without any volition of mine. All my life I had no chosen, had not decided. Now I am making a decision. I choose life. I shall live because there are few people I want to stay with for the longest possible time and because I have duties to discharge. It is not my concern whether or not life has meaning" (168).

Season depicts all the strengths and flaws of human nature and Sudanese society while correctly criticizing European colonialism and racism. Furthermore, instead of the racism solidified by Europeans in Conrad's Heart of Darkness, this novel shows the reader the other side, where the narrator and Mustafa's travels along the Nile and to England reject racism and assumptions of European supremacy and uncover the natural compulsion toward life and humanity among the people of the Sudan. The novel is also interesting to read because of the masterful use of metaphors and poetic phrasing and makes constant references to poets, such as Abu Nuwas, and Arab folklore, such as the afreet or ifrit spirits. The novel is also quite comedic, despite the horrendous murder and suffering of the  characters. Mustafa, "the black Englishman," concocted lies of all sorts to play up to stereotypes of Africa and Arabs to bed as many white women as possible, going to such lengths as organizing his apartment in a harem-like bedroom and deliberately exaggerating and lying about African cultures. His misdirected desire to avenge Africa for European hegemony, manifested in the form of sleeping with various white women and having a disastrous impact on their lives, also causes Mustafa's own downfall after his marriage to Jean Morris. Simple sexual conquests from an invader from the South will not liberate Africa, but only further the conquest and control of female bodies, reinforcing patriarchy and colonialism.

Nevertheless, it's also interesting to see a story set on the Nile's other vast nations beyond Egypt, since the Sudan and Ethiopia have just as much of a claim and dependence on its affluence for sustaining life. Salih's accurate, poetic language conjures images of the desert, the Nile's bountiful waters, it's excesses as it inundates the land, and the mud and mud-brick homes of the villagers. He also depicts the conflicts between north and south, west and central in the novel by the marginalization and enslavement of darker-skinned, non-Arabic speakers from what is now South Sudan. Unfortunately, these dynamics are not fully explored, but Salih remains a constant critic of postcolonial Sudan's government corruption. Moreover, the novel's ambiguous ending for the narrator, in my mind, symbolizes the ambiguities of life and the problem of attaining balance between the north and south banks of the Nile, the West and the East. This duality, always ambiguous in Salih's novel, avoids making a pronounced denunciation of colonialism without likewise criticized local traditions, thereby echoing the crisis of the dichotomy in the lives of the narrator and Mustafa, two educated individuals caught between Sudan and England. 

The best part is the structure of the novel fits a frame story, like Arabian Nights. The intertextuality obviously extends to Heart of Darkness as well because of the symbolic importance of the river, Africans going to Europe and during the narrator's own traveling in the Sudan, he encounters the spontaneous celebration with rural peoples, depicted as savage in Europe's projection of barbarity on Africa, but seen as life-affirming by the African narrator. Moreover, Mustafa, while in Europe, finds the worst of himself, the darkness of his heart which Kurtz finds in the Congo. Salih wrote an excellent reverse Heart of Darkness.

Of One Blood and Meroe

We finally read Of One Blood because of our interest in Sun Ra. Past instances of African American science fiction or speculative fiction seems relevant to any research into Sun Ra's inventive and, perhaps, wacky notions. Pauline Hopkins also appears to have beat Ishmael Reed in establishing a fictive link between "voodoo" and ancient Nile Valley civilizations, although Of One Blood is a weaker novel that perhaps attempts to juggle too many competing "out there" or supernatural phenomena (mesmerism, occultism, second sight, magic mirror in Telassar, spiritualism). It also confronts issues of racism, the unity of the human species, incest, and the horrors of slavery's impact on the black family, including a surprising revelation near the end of the novel about Aubrey Livingston's relationship with Reuel and Dianthe. 

But the most interesting aspect of this early Afrofuturist" novel is its use of Meroe, and a hidden city of its descendants, as a symbol of an ascendant Ethiopia who will restore the prestige of the black race in modern times. Drawing heavily on the discourse of Ethiopianism, which had influenced black nationalism in the US throughout the 19th century, "Ethiopia" (really, Meroe or "Nubia) returns to its greatness as one of its lost descendants, an Afro-American passing as white, returns to the throne. Telassar, the hidden city of Meroe's descendants, has maintained the ancient civilization in secret. With the return of a descendant of Ergamenes, they are poised to return to greatness. Since Ethiopianism drew from Christianity as practiced by African-Americans, Hopkins employs the Bible and classical sources to offer an Afrocentric view of the ancient world. Basically, all civilization and the arts derived from Ethiopians or their kin in Egypt, Canaan, and Babylon. 

For these aforementioned discursive uses of Ethiopianism in a speculative fiction guise, Hopkins has written perhaps the most interesting of early "Afrofuturist" literature. In terms of its prose and structure, there is room for improvement, but Reuel's use of mesmerism and occultism in the Boston chapters is directly relevant to the advanced hidden science of Telassar and the Afro-American's deep past. There is enough material here to appeal to academics, hoteps, black feminists (particularly through the character of Mira and Aunt Hannah), and those merely curious about unexpected speculative fiction. 

By the novel's call to a return to Africa, it also fits into the larger history of vindicationist black history, stressing the great past of the African as a way of countering white supremacy and instilling a pride in African Americans. However, it also demonstrates the limitations of Ethiopianist discourse as its centered on Christian, Western notions of civilization. It is also unclear what Telassar, with its Afro-American king to inaugurate a new dynasty, will accomplish for an Africa under European conquest. It possesses some advanced technology, but the reader is left in the dark about the future relations between Telassar and imperial Europe. Nonetheless, it is a far more entertaining and interesting world than that of Black Panther.

Heart of the Ngoni

Although this blogger is no fan of Harold Courlander's work on Haiti, his recounting of the Segu epics (with Ousmane Sako) is rather entertaining. The Segu epics, which bring to mind an epic historical fiction novel by a renowned Caribbean writer, should be read together for a fuller appreciation and understanding of Bambara civilization from the 1600s-1900s. Indeed, the story of the origin of Segu goes back far further, to Wagadu and Soninke origins, tying the Bambara with other ethnic groups in the Western Sudan (Mandingue, Soninke, Fula, etc.). And, as non-Muslims whose kingdom led an uneasy coexistence with Muslim groups (in addition to incorporating Muslim mystics) the embellished narratives of past Segu kings or heroes give an idea of social values and ideals along the Niger River at a time when 3 forces were irrevocably transforming West Africa: Islam, the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, and colonialism. While the coming of the white man is only important in the last tale of a Soninke town, and most of the tales focus on important figures and kings at the zenith of Segu's power, before the Muslim jihadists defeated Segu, the aforementioned 3 tides are unforgettably in the background. Anyone who has read the historical epic of Conde will see it immediately in these stories, focused as they are on the great kings and warriors in a time of chivalry and honor.