The Dark Child is a vivid and graceful memoir of Camara Laye's youth in the village of Kouroussa, French Guinea, a place steeped in mystery. Laye marvels over his mother's supernatural powers, his father's distinction as the village goldsmith, and his own passage into manhood, which is marked by animistic beliefs and bloody rituals. Eventually, he must choose between this unique place and the academic success that lures him to distant cities. More than autobiography of one boy, this is the universal story of sacred traditions struggling against the encroachment of a modern world. A passionate and deeply affecting record, The Dark Child is a classic of African literature.
". . . this gem of a book deserves a wide audience. Appropriate for African and women's studies courses and a must for college and university libraries." —Choice ". . . Mpho relates the story of her life with an integrity that makes for utterly compelling reading. . . . The fortitude of this woman, now in her late 60s, is a lesson to us all." —The Bookseller, United Kingdom "This is a fascinating autobiography . . ." —KLIATT ". . . a powerful autobiography of a Lesotho elder who tells her life as an African woman in South Africa. The focus on black culture and concerns as much as racism allows for an unusual depth of understanding of black concerns and lifestyles in Africa." —Reviewer's Bookwatch "An African woman's poignant and beautifully crafted memoir lyrically portrays the brutal poverty and reliance on ritual that shape the lives of her people, the Basotho. . . . A commanding and important work that will captivate readers with its unique voice, narrative power, and unforgettable scenes of life in Southern Africa." —Kirkus Reviews " . . . a stunning autobiography of a remarkable woman . . . Nthunya's telling is eloquent. Although her voice is generally one of dignified emotional distance, it is punctuated by her very human humor and pain." —Publishers Weekly ". . . recommended for collections in African folklore." —Library Journal "I am telling my stories in English for many months now, and it is a time for me to see my whole life. I see that things are always changing. I was born in 1930, so I remember many things which were happening in the old days in Lesotho and which happen no more. I lived in Benoni Location for more than ten years, and I saw the Boer policemen taking black people and beating them like dogs. They even took me once, and kept me in one of their jails for a while." —Mpho 'M'atsepo Nthunya A compelling and unique autobiography by an African woman with little formal education, less privilege, and almost no experience of books or writing. Mpho's is a voice almost never heard in literature or history, a voice from within the struggle of "ordinary" African women to negotiate a world which incorporates ancient pastoral ways and the congestion, brutality, and racist violence of city life. It is also the voice of a born storyteller who has a subject worthy of her gifts—a story for all the world to hear.
Celebrated for the authenticity of its vernacular style and the incandescence of its lyricism, One Day of Life depicts a typical day in the life of a peasant family caught up in the terror and corruption of civil war in El Salvador. 5:30 A.M. in Chalate, a small rural town: Lupe, the grandmother of the Guardado family and the central figure of the novel, is up and about doing her chores. By 5:00 P.M. the plot of the novel has been resolved, with the Civil Guard's search for and interrogation of Lupe's young granddaughter, Adolfina. Told entirely from the perspective of the resilient women of the Guardado family, One Day of Life is not only a disturbing and inspiring evocation of the harsh realities of peasant life in El Salvador after fifty years of military exploitation; it is also a mercilessly accurate dramatization of the relationship of the peasants to both the state and the church. Translated from the Spanish by Bill Brow
Africa's strong tradition of storytelling has long been an expression of an oral narrative culture. African writers such as Amos Tutuola, Naguib Mahfouz, Wole Soyinka and J. M. Coetzee have adapted these older forms to develop and enhance the genre of the novel, in a shift from the oral mode to print. Comprehensive in scope, these new essays cover the fiction in the European languages from North Africa and Africa south of the Sahara, as well as in Arabic. They highlight the themes and styles of the African novel through an examination of the works that have either attained canonical status - an entire chapter is devoted to the work of Chinua Achebe - or can be expected to do so. Including a guide to further reading and a chronology, this is the ideal starting-point for students of African and world literatures.
