Book Review: When the Sun goes Down, introducing international short stories

Title: When the Sun Goes Down

Author: Emilia Ilieva and Waveney Olembo (Editors)

Publisher: Sasa Sema, 2011

Genre: Fiction (Anthology)

Pages: 199

Reviewer: Manuel Odeny

This title When the Sun Goes Down and other stories from Africa and Beyond is an anthology of sixteen short stories by Emilia Ilieva and Waveney Olembo, both dons in Egerton and Kenyatta university respectively.

Since literature is taught as a mirror which reflects the society this collection as a high school set book in English subject reflects not only to the Kenyan society but also at the international scene with increased titles from foreign writers.

Firstly with 16 stories with international writers, the book has surpass last year’s set book Half a Day and other stories which had 12 from Eastern and North Africa, this new set book has writers from Colombia, India, USA and Japan for the first time in Kenyan set books.

With the high rate of globalization brought by the speed of internet connectivity and media problem in far corner of the world like economic recession, terrorism attack and global warming affects us making this new set up a welcome.

Even though descriptions of the settings and characters may be alien to Kenyan students and readers, their themes are highly linked to us. The international story Tuesday Siesta by Colombian Gabriel Marquez and Sandra Street by Trinidadian Michael Anthony tackle issue of global warming and environmental degradation in an easy writing prose.

Equally, the issue of poverty is brought fore by USA writer Tillie Olsen’s I stand Here Ironing which contrasts the image of the rich western image.

On the other hand, the collection by the two writers Ilieva and Olrmbo has also managed to pass across readers the themes of HIV/AIDS, gender relations, corruption, war and human relations and peculiarities.

The main story When the Sun Goes Down written by Kenyan Goro wa Kamau and gave the book its title, talks succinctly on how society treats and stigmatise HICV/AIDS victims by following the lives of positive couples struggling for acceptance from their neighbors.

The story too like Kenyan Grace Ogot’s Bamboo Hut and Moroccan Leila Abouzeid Two Stories of a House also tackle the issue of gender relation not only in the family but also among members of the society.

Ugandan Moses Isegawa’s The War of the Ears which tackles the use of child soldiers in an African setting resonates well with the readers with the sentencing of DRC warlord Thomas Lubanga by ICC last week. Isegawa who was a refugee in Gulu Town of Northern Uganda writes from experience to invoke the image of a society living in terror of warped children militias. Interestingly, Isegawa is the author of Snakepit which had favorite reviews in Kenyan media few years back.

Other stories like Arrested Development by Zimbabwean Sindisile Tshuma talks of corruption and poort road infrastructure akin the chaotic matatus in Kenya while Sefi Atta from Nigeria talks about the issue of emigrants from West Africa going to Spain through North Africa by following the hazardous journey of a would be emigrant in Twilight Trek.

As an anthology the editors of When the Sun Goes Down have managed to open up high school students to literature of the world by increasing their appreciation with foreign writers. Equally, by mixing seasoned writers like Kenyan Grace Ogot and Nigerian Cyprian Ekwensi with new hands in literature like Sindisile Tshuma, Sefi Atta and Moses Isegawa, readers will appreciate the value of a story regardless of the timeline used.

With the government approval of the short story title with foreign writers for the first time shows that the high school students who are highly connected with Facebook, twitter and contemporary media will have the urge to not only read and appreciate African literature but open up to the world.

Poem: Pygmalion and Galatea by Marieta Maglas, Romania

Your sight was poignantly penetrating

me within. Your blue eyes were even more

bittersweet in that opaque singleness, our

touch was like a sadness piano song. I did

not know when you really wanted to exist

for yourself while pretending to be existent. I

kissed you and you thought that it was only a

kiss, but I wanted to swallow your silence and

to blow into the air your defense. You were

dying inside of you. You loved me in this

secret room of ours. We could understand our

existence. That room kept us hidden from

the whole world for a second. In our

dream, we became free. We tried to free

our mind and our souls, but our dream couldn't

generate any idea. We made love for no

other reason but to love each other. I

became a milky white ivory Galatea of

yours .You made me your woman for

that sense of belonging. I needed that , I

wanted my own metamorphosis. I became

that Galatea not being able to leave the

love cell. In your absence, I became that

Galatea wallowing in hopelessness,

understanding that the sadness was the

only thing really existent inside. I became

that Galatea wanting to see again your green-blue

loving eyes. You became that Pygmalion of mine,

for without me .....you ....

© Marieta Maglas, Romania

(I got this poem re-living the greek play of sculptor Pygmalion and his life like statue Galatea on my FB timeline this morning from my poet pal and wished to share it with the world. To get more of Marieta Maglas poems click here)

Book Review; Down African Second Avenue by Ezekiel 'Eskia' Mphahlele

Ezekiel 'Eskia' Mphahlele

Title: Down Second Avenue

Author:  Ezekiel (Es’kia) Mphahlele

Publisher: Faber and Faber first published in 1959

Pages: 222

Genre: Non-fiction (Auto-biography)

Reviewer: Manuel Odeny

 

The author’s life as captured in this title has relevance to Africans and more so Kenyans where, while in exile from his country South Africa, directed Chemchemi Cultural Center and published a short story In Corner B in 1967.

Like most South African biographies Ezekiel Mphahlele’s Down Second Avenue offers a personal account of the effects of degrading apartheid system. Born on 17^th December 1919, the first two chapters are dedicated to his childhood in Pietersburg where he lived with his unkind paternal grandmother who was ‘as big as fate, as forbidding as mimosa, stern like a mimosa tree”. His drunken father takes after the grandmother which sees his parents separate after domestic violence at a tender age.

The family moves on with the author’s maternal grandmother and Aunt Dora, who do laundry for a living, on Second Avenue of Marabastad slum in Pretoria which form the main setting of the book. He shares the tin shack with his little brother and sister, three uncles and three cousins as his mother works away in white suburbs as servant.

Mphahlele’s description of the slums of the 1920’s still resonates to poor housing and demolitions to date. He writes “Marabastad, like most locations, was an organized rubble of tin cans. The streets were straight; but the houses stood cheek and jowl, rusty as ever on the outside, as if they thought they might as well crumble in straight rows if that was to be their fate…the standards were always swaying in drunken fashion”. As kids they are forced to rummage through bins in Indian and white locations to supplement the meager family income.

The author escapes this appalling condition heightened by apartheid’s segregation through education offered by missionaries which gave rise to the country’s first black elites which spurred anti-apartheid resistance.  He went to school with Oliver Thambo and author Peter Abrahams among others.

As the noose of apartheid tightens education is controlled completely making the author lose his job as a teacher and ends up being an office messenger even after getting a Masters Degree with distinction.

Equally, locations considered to be in white areas are brought down without any negotiations with tenants like in Syokimau saga. House 2A of Second Avenue where the author grew is brought down.

“Marabastad is gone but there will always be Marabastads that will be going until the screw of the vice breaks. And the Black man keeps moving on…they yell into his ears all the time: move nigger or be fenced in but move anyhow” he summarizes the ordeal.

Without a job the author moves to Botswana to teach before coming back to his country to become a journalist and a literary editor with Drum Magazin in 1956. He try’s and get dissolution with politics by joining Africa National Congress, ANC before leaving the country for exile in Nigeria to teach in Lagos.

Ironically it is while in exile that his writing career takes off, this book was written while the author was in Nigeria. He says his short story Man must live again, whose story of the same title was in Kenyan set book Encounters from Africa, was an escapist writing since he “ can never summon enough courage to read a line from any of the stories”

“Writing in exile somehow feels like having just climbed down from a vehicle that has been rocking violently for countless times” he notes.

The book is divided in twenty three chapters with the author using simple English in a strong narrative to tell the story of his life within the struggles of apartheid. by giving full chapters to other characters in their daily struggles against the system the reader is offered a mirror to see the society in a wider angle. Equally by using interlude written in first person between major chapters, the reader get a chance to glimpse at the author’s personal struggles.

But by finishing the book with his move to Nigeria away from his country, Mphahlele falls for the pitfall of autobiographers’ ‘escapism’. Consider the following finishing: Barack Obama (Dreams from my father) where he leaves for Harvard from the Chicago slum, VS Naipaul (Miguel Street) moving from Trinidad to abroad trhe same with Camara Laye (The African Son) he leaves Mali for African in a scholarship.

Apart from Kenya and Nigeria, Mphahlele lived in Zambia and USA in exile before returning to his country in 1977 and changed his name to Es’kia as a means of recanting Christianity. He died on 27^th October 2008 which his two autobiographies, thirty short story collections and several poetry books leaving a major mark in African literature.

Folklore Poem: When dad was shaving me (Translated from dholuo)

When dad was shaving me,

I bowed my head down-down,

I saw something dangling,

Something like a cut worm,

It’s sweet at dawn when it grinds,

The thing plaits matuta,

The thing is red like ombulo’s seed.

Original version:

Kane baba liela,

Akulo wiya piny-piny,

Aneno gi maliero,

Machalo mana ofunyu,

Mit ko gwen ko rego

Gino suko matuta

Gino kwar ko ombulu

*matuta- cornrow hair style

Ombulu- a red hot African seed from wild legume  

© 2011 Manuel Odeny

Folklore Poem: My Husband, My Cunt (Translated from dholuo)

let me buy myself meat,

the meat I will eat with my husband,

my husband who fucks my cunt,

my cunt which gives birth to my kid,

my kid who suckles my breast,

my breasts which are ‘bra-ed’ by bra!

Original dholuo version:

anyiewna ring’o,

mondo acham gi chuora,

chuora machuona ng’onya,

ng’onya manyuolo go nyathi,

nyathi madhodhona thunda

thunda majuko go ojuku!

(We sung the song repeatedly as children and not even once did we think kids come from supermarket J)

©2011 Manuel Odeny

Poem: Me and My Beggar by Otiato Guguyu

The Poet: Otiato Guguyu

it was in my ears -
the tingling coin
in his empty bowl
every empty dawn.

It was in his routine -
the timely nod
in grotesque gratitude
every begging morning

Today,
it was that same clanking coin
but there was no nod
my heart pride cherished gratitude
"but why"
"sir in the budget read yesterday
prices have inflated
but you still give me the same coin
I would be pleased if you raised your charity.

I walked away
tomorrow there would be no clanking

It would be a note!

©2008 Otiato Guguyu

The poet, Otiato Guguyu is a Communication and Media Technolgy with IT student at Maseno University Kenya, The Managing Editor of Equator Weekly and a Blogger at http://otiatoguguyu.blogspot.com

A Dholuo Poem: Akwanyo Sindan by Manuel Odeny

Akwanyo sindan,

tang’ane?

Atang’ meru,

merane?

Amero kong’o,

kong’ane?

Akong’ lau,

lawane?

Alaw gweno,

gwenane?

Aguen chogo,

chogane?

Achog rabolo,

bolane?

Abol suka,

sukane?

Asuk wiya,

waiyane?

Awi tuoro,

tuorane?

Atuor nindo,

nindane?

Anindo kama,

to anindo kama,

tachieo!

(There is a calming madness when writing in your mother tongue, Dholuo)

A poem called A sheng poem by Manuel Odeny

Yeah man (mic is on)

mimi ni da best
riding the wave kwa crest
ku-land mtaani ni East wala sio West (lands)
shika biaf na da-best to join the rest
ni-siense da best to waive the rest
themes kwa heart ku-nest
kuangusha ki-biro ki-viagra na ease bila test
mistari mikali bila rest
nikichill ki-ndom bila vest
chupa na glass ndani ni Krest,

Yeah

(Written at 02:46 am yesterday in insomniac night to lull back to sleep)

Poem: Sometimes I Write by Manuel Odeny

Sometimes I write

because mine is a face

that dreamt a thousand dreams

captured in a thousand-and-one words

In silence and solitude

i write the wailing quietness

delicately picking the sound of a pin drop

capturing floating, settling dust

In ghastly realism.

Sometimes I write

in cacophony of city bustle

my words roaming the human jungle

capturing city’s hustle

out of impatient honks,

hurrying thumping feet

to filter meaning from the gibber.

On the Mara boulders I cat call

words free reining plains, hills

before me pen, me notebook picks:

on rustling grass

whistling foliage

on lull of lapping cool rivers

to the roar of dark, foamy Victoria

the echoes of the cat call.

Sometimes I write

in heady African prayers

throbbing with the bul*

shrilling with the asili’

with clap of hands, gyrate of bodies

dropping with sweat libations

raising slowly amid chants

before letting my words hung loose

accompanying invoked spirits of ancestors.

Sometimes I write

(like now)

in a warm insomniac night

amid soggy sheets, sleep disserted

when the world listens

to some things I don’t say.

·                     bul From Dholuo, a Luo drum.

·                     Asili, from Dholuo, a Luo flute

Achebe's Anthills of the Savannah, 23 years and still potent in Africa

The author Chinua Achebe

Title: Anthills of the Savannah

Author: Chinua Achebe
Publisher: Heinemann, London 1987
Genre: Literature (Fiction)
Reviewer: Manuel Odeny


The book is an extension of Chinua Achebe’s A man of the People entailing the fall of civilian governance to a military one through the eyes of minster Nanga and main character Odili Samalu.

Published merely a week after the 15th January 1966 Nigerian coup ousting Abubakar Balewa and his stooge Ladoke Ankitola, Achebe prophetically wrote:

“Overnight everyone began to shake their head at the excess of the last regime, at its graft, oppression and corrupt government.” As it is common in most coups A man of the People went further. “Newspapers, the radio, hitherto silent intellectuals and civil servants- everybody said what a terrible lot and it became public opinion the next morning.”

Barely a month after Nigerian coup the streets of Accra were abuzz with jubilation as Kwame Nkurumah was toppled by the army on 24th February.

It’s from here that Anthills of the Savannah shows the degeneration of Kangan, a fictious West African state, after a popular military coup, into a failed state.

The Kangan story revolves on state house maneuvers away from ordinary wanainchi in a budding dictatorship as seen through the eyes of three main characters from an elite college. Sam from Sandhurst becomes the president and appoints Chris as his commissioner of Information.

The third is a maverick editor of the government run daily National Gazette, Ikem Osodi.
Other characters aiding in plot are Beatrice a graduate working as a senior civil servant, Chris’ girlfriend and Elewa (Ikem’s fiancée) a semi-illiterate saleslady from a ghetto in Bassa the capital.

Still relevant 


More than two decades after its publication, do the Anthills of the Savannah have any relevance in African scene? After rereading the title I found it still fresh in African politics today.

In the novel, as in Nigeria and Ghana’s case, the army brought up in Sandhurst tradition stood aside in the failure of the civilian rule till their interest were at stake.

Like most coups in Africa, the Kangan army entered governance amid celebration and hope of grand promises of liberating the citizens from corruption, unemployment, nepotism and other ills.

Once installed Sam’s promise of following the constitution and later phasing way to civilian rule is edged away as he become a budding dictator emulating an octogenarian dictator Ngongo from East Africa.

Relevant and recently publicized is the Madagascar case when a disc jockey and former mayor of Antananarivo Andry Rajoelina backed by the army outset the sitting president Marc Ravalomanana. World pressure for power sharing amid the warring factions as hit an impasse.

Let’s consider the book's relevance during publication and in just two decades after independence in Africa there were forty successful coups with countless others abortive.

Consider in 1965 from June, in a period of six months: Algerian Ben Bella was disposed by colonel Houri Bourmedienne, Zaire’s General Mobutu Sese Seko outset presdent Kasa-Vubu while chief of staff Jean Bedel-Bokassa removed his cousin David Dacko as president of Central Africa Republic. Colonel Christopher Soglo and Sangoule Lamizana seized power in Benin and Bukina Faso respectively.

Back to the novel, when Sam’s attempt to change the constitution on a referendum for a president for life is thwarted by Abazon region, he resorts to divide and rule to control dissidents and power absolutely.
Erstwhile comrades are turned against.

Editor Osodi is picked from his house Gestapo style before being murdered while Chris dies at the hand of a randy and drunk policeman while fleeing a national hunt to Abazon.

This is relevant closer home when Ethiopia’s major Mengistu massacred with machine guns his army colleagues in committee running his Marxist-Lenin revolution while Idi Amin after his 1971 coup felt insecure enough to mass kill Obote’s Langi and Acholi tribe that “it was impossible to dispose off the bodies in graves” as written by his former minister Henry Kyemba in State of Blood (Corgi,1977)

A peep through the tight wall of Sam’s court jesters Ikem Osodi offers an insight to dictatorship:

“Worshiping a dictator is such a pain in the ass. It wouldn’t be so bad if it was merely a matter dancing upside down on your head. With practice anyone could learn to do that. The real problem is having no way of knowing from one day to another, from on minute to the next what is up and what is down”

Sam’s quest for power boomerangs back when his security personnel kidnap him in a palace coup.

Sadly power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely making the problem of Africa to lie on leaders obsessed with power.

The defect is profoundly felt in Nigeria where ethic loyalties are exploited by leaders making political debates to be acrimonious. Within a year after the first coup there were three counter coup with culminated to the North and Eastern Igbo nationals in the Biafra war that lasted for 2and a half years.

“The trouble with Nigeria (read Africa) is simply and squarely failure of leadership.” I quote Achebe in The Trouble with Nigeria (Heinemann, 1983) “The Nigerian (African) problem is the unwillingness or the inability of its leaders to raise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership.”

Does the book offer any hope for Africa.

Within the title the Savannah was ones lush with the vegetation. This is the hope and the euphoria for social economic progress that engulfed Africa during independence.

The fire of poor leadership, neo-colonization, economic down turn, schism of cold war –isms amongst others ravaged the savannah. The jugged anthills jutting out of the barren savannah are a reminder of the dreams lost and hopes yearned.

As the book ends Amaechina, Ikem’s infant daughter is a beckon of hope and a jutting anthill in hopelessness surrounding Africa. During her naming ceremony the whole society is represented. In government there is a bureaucrat and an army officer. Scholarly there is a university student and semi-illiterate mother. Religiously, a Christian and a Muslim share a jig while the old have a relenting and a hardliner conservative.

Amaechina is the new generation of younger Africans growing in the global village with more opportunities to progress away from the dark past.