Now on to the real post. I found the most interesting part of the story on a literary level how narration was set up. Each of the women had their own narrator voice, something I have not seen much in novels, especially with so many of them (I'm still having trouble remembering who is who).
Being that the book was written from the point of view of so many people, I find myself wondering how reliable they are as narrators and witnesses to events. I think this started when Asana fed us a line about her brothers death. It made me question other facts, like if Hawa's mother actually was the favorite, we are only getting that story from her point of view. Of course the daughter would want to think her mother was the favorite out of eleven wives, it is something to make you feel better, especially if you are lonely and have no one to play with.
There were times that I wondered if events actually occurred as they were being told, or if they were slightly different. The narrator was going on their own experience and we all have different views of events even if we are all there at the same time, same place. think what I am trying to say is, I read the lady's with a grain of salt and relied on my own background knowledge of the region.
I could not find any portions where the narrator seemed to know more than the person narrating the text might know. all the information provided seemed to be gained through years of experience and if whoever narrating at the time talked about events happening across the country it seems to be from what they heard of after the fact. Feel free to find any portions that dispute this, I would love to find them.
My final question about the book is the term "aunty". I know this was used int he South during and after slavery, Black women did not have proper names, it would be "aunty", some people had a problem with this. It makes me wonder if this was a European constuct and why Mariama thought it was a good term, and endearing term. Offhand I feel this has something to do with her postivie experience working for Mr. Blue.
2 comments:
The FGM is in Asana's "Bitter Kola" section, only a few pages in. It's definitely easy to miss, I had to do kind of a double-take while reading it.
"Auntie" is used throughout Africa as a term of respect for elders who are of your mother's generation. Likewise males of your father's generation can be called "baba" (father). Basically the belief is that communal societies all seniors of your parent's generation are surrogate parents. Africans took those traditions with them when they were enslaved in the so-called New World. The term "Auntie" was then transformed and distorted to denigrate black women.
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