Xala

You don't need to read further than the first page to get the first jab at post-colonial African countries. Just as our previous readings of Walter Rodney and Frantz Fanon tell us, when colonial powers leave they also leave a structure. Though clearly the structure is broken and harms the people it is too easy for those revolutionaries to use it as their own. Perhaps that is due to the lack of education and foresight, who knows. The beginning of Xala, we see the main character and his friends taking over the Chamber of Commerce, since they were all business men. It is important to note that the main character El Hadji has some nefarious activities going on. He acts as a front for overseas investors. I read this to mean that, El Hadji is the African face of European businesses in the country. It is as if the European's never left, the only difference is they must now give money to one more African, a small price to pay to continue to run the industry. The beggar whoever likes El Hadji, when El Hadji gets back after getting rid of the xala. A very nice gesture by someone who has been arrested after phone calls from El Hadji.

Did anyone notice El Hadji's interaction with the beggar? He hates the beggar, to say the least and has him arrested on several occasions. Then look at how he acts with everyone else, throwing thousand franc notes around left and right. Why wouldn't he spare some money to the beggar but be willing to give money to facc-katt's and seet-katt's? I think the beggar is suppose to represent the common man, the poor man or the unemployed class in the country. As a business man El Hadji has no use for him so he finds him an annoyance. Everyone else serves a purpose or a task for El Hadji, but the singing/begging simply annoys him. El Hadji is a former revolutionary, a champion of the people, not put in power; his job is to help out people like the beggar, but alas, he ignores the beggar just as the French colonial power would have.

I began to wonder if the whole impotance is Yay Bineta fault? She had two husbands die on her and the old wives tale was that she was destined to kill a third. Yay claims that her "daughter's" marriage was like her own, and we see this with how she makes it happen and is always riding El Hadji (much like a wife). El Hadji being impotent is a little less than death, since he did not technically marry Yay Benita. And one could make the argument that being impotent was worse than death, he lost face and couldn't function as a human being.

It seems pretty obvious that the xala was an effect of acting European. But the business men are fake Europeans or a satire of it. My favorite line includes the phrase "made to measure" suits, the African's are trying to look refined and Europeans but their suits are bought off of the rack. Their European persona's don't fit them. Anyway, El Hadji fixes his xala problem by going off the road, so to speak, and getting back to his African roots. The third marriage was based around money and not love to begin with. At first it was on the brides side, she needed to marry to get out of her fathers house since he couldn't afford all his children. Then it became monetary for El Hadji, he, clearly, had to pay for the huge reception that would show him as a man of means, buy another villa and thent here was the car and gasoline. Money, which is rooted in European culture more than African, was the downfall of a mighty revolutionary.

For the fun of it read Xala and look for all the allusions toward male genital or erections, the novel is full of them.