Racy, menacing, and enthusiastic, through the eyes of the child-narrator, the story is told of adventurous life and escapades of Eme children. Told on many levels of tragedies, the substance of Obioma’s Man-Booker-Prize-shortlist narrative is premised upon internal dislocation, demise of dreams and the quietly unremitting pursuit of destiny.
The Emes are not so happy family though, controlled and ordered by the authority-wielding, Guerdon-threatening father. If the unraveling begins with dark prophecy at Omi Ala river by Abulu, the transfer of Agwu Eme from Akure to the Yola branch of the Central Bank of Nigeria is the floodgate; his absence, offering the children a free reign of their life, to venture beyond their confined domain.
Abulu’s prophecy of Ikenna’s murder is to be fulfilled by Boja, despite his attempt to thwart it, being aggressively jovial and assuring to his determinedly belligerent brother who seems conspiratorially bent on being killed.
There are referential overtures to storytelling tradition of Things Fall Apart and the Yoruba folktales that Tutuol incorporated in his “drunkard” book. But the difference is that while Achebe allowed language and culture to stand on their own, Obioma gives them prop and crutch to support on.
Behind the child-narrator keeps watch an adult imposer. The author-narrator on many instances appears to be almost neatly out of his society, peering over it from above. A familiar place is treated in this manner: “Tell me, where did you go?” the mother asked. Obembe replied: “We have been playing football at a pitch near the public high school” (259).
It gives the impression as though they are speaking, looking over their shoulders, very aware of and sensitive to the stalking outsider.
While this may be helpful to an outsider, it creates contradiction within the child-voice innocence narration. The voice becomes a stern prescriptive, allowing no room for the reader’s engagement.
But that is just a righteous indignation. What if the Africans are not the intended readers, and are a margin of, and not the core, global audience?
This should not be assumed as pigeonholing, nor shackling restriction; but it is quite hard to decontextualize and deauthorize narratives. Narratives are more interesting and engaging if they allow for cultural and linguistic distinctiveness, away with much of explaining proverbs and other cultural acts.
Who else tries to explain a proverb in Achebe’s work? Who else explains proverb in the real world conversation?
While aiming for global outreach, narratives have an intrinsic footprint and inevitable claim to their origin, which should not be dispensed with at the expense of global readers. Rushdie, Garcia Marques, Nagib Mahfouz, Narayan, Gao Xingjian, Orhan Pamuk, Jorge Borges all have their unique linguistic flavor untempered.
Piggybacking breathlessly on flashback, almost leaving you gasping, by now we can realize that the story begins at the end. After killing Abulu to avenge their brothers, Obembe went into exile; Ben was put on trial, recounting at court session the incidents of his family. As readers, we feel called upon to sympathize with them for being innocently punished by the cruel hand of fate.
