| Author | Message | ||
     Steve_s "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Steve_s Post Number: 187 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: N/A |
This is a seriously good novel. Published in 1988, it's a coming-of-age story which deals with social change, the clash of cultures and women's liberation on the level of a Chekhov or Flaubert. It's an African novel. The main character Tambu (short for Tambudzai) is a 14-year old farm girl whose educational prospects are limited until her brother dies and she's sent to take his place at the mission school, where her uncle Babamukuru (her father's English-educated, successful brother) is the headmaster. Babamukuru is not a bad man, in fact, he's very generous toward his extended family, it's just that he represents, in different ways for each of the women, the oppressive nature of the patriarchal family structure. Alice Walker's comments on the back cover might apply to the main character, Tambu, as well as the author: "Sardonic, coolly observant, splendidly detatched from every form of chauvinistic nonsense, Nervous Conditions introduces a new voice that, in its self-assurance, sounds, at times, very old." | ||
| Steve_s "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Steve_s Post Number: 188 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: |
I'd just like to add that she wrote this novel at age 27 or 28 after having studied medicine at Oxford (Chekhov himself was a medical doctor) and psychology at the University of Zimbabwe (Nervous Conditions is a psychological novel). So this is an IQ which is off the charts. She subsequently wrote plays and studied film at the German Film and Television Academy in Berlin and was the first Zimbabwean woman to direct a feature film. Let me just add that neither Flaubert nor Chekhov had to deal with the effects of colonialism, interracial dating, bulemia, or polygamy! In other words, it's hard to be judgmental about someone like Babamukuru and I think that his daughter Nyasha's criticism of him is just indicative of teenagers' ability to see through their parents. Anyway, in the modern world, so-called Western education, Christianity, and the English language all belong to a global culture, not just to those nations like Zimbabwe which were subjugated by colonial imperialism. And now we have a more insidious form of global corporate culture represented by Britney Spears, 50 Cent, and Vin Diesel! It's interesting that in reading about the so-called Lost Boys of Sudan who wandered for years from place to place, that they would occasionally find a respite from their cruel experience in the person of a distant relative, a cousin, nephew, or an uncle who they did not even know, who would take them in and treat them like family. And that person was invariably related to their father's fourth wife, for instance, who lived in a faraway village. But Babamukuru, the patriarch in Nervous Conditions and headmaster of the Mission School, like many other Africans, is a Christian man for whom polygamy just amounts to bigamy, or a sin in the eyes of the church. So in that respect, he's no different than any other Christian, white or black. So in that sense, I don't see him as a "colonized" or assimilated African man. | ||
| Cynique "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Cynique Post Number: 3068 Registered: 01-2004 Rating: N/A |
I find your foray into the world of book reviewing very accomplished, Steve. And I continue to be amazed at your prodigious reading habits! | ||
| Steve_s "Cyniquian" Level Poster Username: Steve_s Post Number: 193 Registered: 04-2004 Rating: N/A |
Dear Cynique, Everything is habit-forming, so make sure what you do is what you want to be doing. -- Wilt Chamberlain LOL!! | ||
| Sudan Newbie Poster Username: Sudan Post Number: 8 Registered: 12-2005 Rating: N/A |
If you really want to read the true story about the Lost Boys of Sudan, I recommend that you read "The Journey of the Lost Boys" by Joan Hecht. It is a very well researched book with numerous personal stories from the boys about their journey across Africa. |
