When Rain Clouds Gather
When Rain Clouds Gather

Author: Bessie Head

Publisher: Waveland Press

Published: 2013-09-23

Total Pages: 201

ISBN-13: 1478611677

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Rural Botswana is the backdrop for When Rain Clouds Gather, the first novel published by one of Africa’s leading woman writers in English, Bessie Head (1937–1986). Inspired by her own traumatic life experiences as an outcast in Apartheid South African society and as a refugee living at the Bamangwato Development Association Farm in Botswana, Head’s tough and telling classic work is set in the poverty-stricken village of Golema Mmidi, a haven to exiles. A South African political refugee and an Englishman join forces to revolutionize the villagers’ traditional farming methods, but their task is fraught with hazards as the pressures of tradition, opposition from the local chief, and the unrelenting climate threaten to divide and devastate the fragile community. Head’s layered, compelling story confronts the complexities of such topics as social and political change, conflict between science and traditional ways, tribalism, the role of traditional African chiefs, religion, race relations, and male–female relations.

Maru
Maru

Author: Bessie Head

Publisher: Waveland Press

Published: 2013-09-16

Total Pages: 113

ISBN-13: 1478611618

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Read worldwide for her wisdom, authenticity, and skillful prose, South African–born Bessie Head (1937–1986) offers a moving and magical tale of an orphaned girl, Margaret Cadmore, who goes to teach in a remote village in Botswana where her own people are kept as slaves. Her presence polarizes a community that does not see her people as human, and condemns her to the lonely life of an outcast. In the love story and intrigue that follows, Head brilliantly combines a portrait of loneliness with a rich affirmation of the mystery and spirituality of life. The core of this otherworldly, rhapsodic work is a plot about racial injustice and prejudice with a lesson in how traditional intolerance may render whole sections of a society untouchable.

A Question of Power
A Question of Power

Author: Bessie Head

Publisher: Waveland Press

Published: 2017-03-06

Total Pages: 233

ISBN-13: 1478635142

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

In this fast-paced, semi-autobiographical novel, Head exposes the complicated life of Elizabeth, whose reality is intermingled with nightmarish dreams and hallucinations. Like the author, Elizabeth was conceived out-of-wedlock; her mother was white and her father black—a union outlawed in apartheid South Africa. Elizabeth eventually leaves with her young son to live in Botswana, a country less oppressed by colonial domination, where she finds stability for herself and her son by working on an experimental farm. As readers grow to know Elizabeth, they experience the inner chaos that threatens her stability, and her constant struggle to emerge from the torment of her dreams. There she is plagued by two men, Sello and Dan, who represent complex notions of politics, sex, religion, individuality, and the blurred line between good and evil. Elizabeth’s troubling but amazing roller-coaster ride ends in an unfettered discovery.

The Half-God of Rainfall
The Half-God of Rainfall

Author: Inua Ellams

Publisher: HarperCollins UK

Published: 2019-04-04

Total Pages: 62

ISBN-13: 0008324786

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

From the award-winning poet and playwright behind Barber Shop Chronicles, The Half-God of Rainfall is an epic story and a lyrical exploration of pride, power and female revenge.

Rain School
Rain School

Author: James Rumford

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Published: 2010-10-25

Total Pages: 37

ISBN-13: 0547505000

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Shows how important learning is in a country where only a few children are able to go to school.

Adamant
Adamant

Author: Lisa Bevere

Publisher: Baker Books

Published: 2018-04-17

Total Pages: 223

ISBN-13: 1493407244

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

By ancient definition, the adamant was known as both a diamond and a mythical stone of indestructible wonder. In more modern terminology, it describes a posture of unshakeable resolve and determination. If there was ever a time for us to be adamant about love and truth it is now. God is Love. God is Truth. Both love and truth are timeless, transcending our current trends and opinions. Sometimes the most loving thing we will ever do is to speak the truth, but speaking truth begins with living it. Using the mediums of Scripture and story, New York Times bestselling author Lisa Bevere takes readers on a journey into the Mountain of God, to the one place they can learn not only to abide in God's unshakeable truth and love, but become adamant--people who are unmovable, determined, and steadfast. With conviction and passion, Lisa unpacks the concept of the adamant for readers, linking together the grand story of Scripture and God's purpose in their lives. Readers will see that God's plan is revealed as we dwell in him, it is there that we are forged and shaped. As we abide in Christ our Cornerstone we are shaped into the image of the adamant.

Collected Plays
Collected Plays

Author: Wole Soyinka

Publisher: London ; New York : Oxford University Press

Published: 1973

Total Pages: 292

ISBN-13: 9780192811646

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

`The Lion and the Jewel alone is enough to establish Nigeria as the most fertile new source of English-speaking drama since Synge's discovery of the Western Isles.' The Times The ironic development and consequences of `progress' may be traced through both the themes and the tone of the works included in this second volume of Wole Soyinka's plays. The Lion and the Jewel shows an ineffectual assault on past tradition soundly defeated. In Kongi's Harvest, however, the pretensions of Kongi's regime are also fatal. The denouement points the way forward. The two Brother Jero plays pursue that way, the comic `propheteering' of the earlier play giving way to the sardonic reality of Jero's Metamorphosis. Madmen and Specialists, Soyinka's most pessimistic play, concerns the physical, mental, and moral destruction of modern civil war.

The Collector of Treasures
The Collector of Treasures

Author: Bessie Head

Publisher: Heinemann

Published: 1992

Total Pages: 132

ISBN-13: 9780435909819

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Botswana village tales about subjects such as the breakdown of family life and the position of women in this society.

A Woman Alone
A Woman Alone

Author: Bessie Head

Publisher: Heinemann International Incorporated

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780435906030

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

A collection of autobiographical writings, sketches, and essays that covers the entire span of Bessie Head's creative life.

Bessie Head and the Trauma of Exile
Bessie Head and the Trauma of Exile

Author: Joshua Agbo

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-06-17

Total Pages: 232

ISBN-13: 1000398633

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book investigates themes of exile and oppression in Southern Africa across Bessie Head’s novels and short fiction. An exile herself, arriving in Botswana as a South African refugee, Bessie Head’s fiction serves as an important example of African exile literature. This book argues that Head’s characters are driven to exile as a result of their socio- political ambivalence while still in South Africa, and that this sense of discomfort follows them to their new lives. Investigating themes of trauma and identity politics across colonial and post- colonial contexts, this book also addresses the important theme of black- on- black prejudice and hostility which is often overlooked in studies of Head’s work. Covering Head’s shorter fiction as well as her major novels When Rain Clouds Gather (1969), Maru (1971), A Question of Power (1973), Serowe: Village of the Rain Wind (1981), and A Bewitched Crossroads: An African Saga (1984), this book will be of interest to researchers of African literature and postcolonial history.