The River Between by Uzodinma Iweala (English) Paperback Book

Description: The River Between by Uzodinma Iweala, Chinua Achebe, Ngugi wa Thiong'o The latest addition to the Penguin African Writers Series- the great Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiongos powerful fictional critique of the influence of Western missionaries on postcolonial KenyaA Penguin ClassicA 50th-anniversary edition of one of the most powerful novels by the great Kenyan author and Nobel Prize nomineeA legendary work of African literature, this moving and eye-opening novel lucidly captures the drama of a people and culture whose world has been overturned. The River Between explores life in the mountains of Kenya during the early days of white settlement. Faced with a choice between an alluring new religion and their own ancestral customs, the Gikuyu people are torn between those who fear the unknown and those who see beyond it.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust theseries to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-datetranslations by award-winning translators. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Author Biography NGUGI WA THIONGO is an award-winning novelist, playwright, and essayist from Kenya whose novels have been translated into more than thirty languages. He is Distinguished Professor of English at the University of California, Irvine. He lives in Irvine, California.UZODINMA IWEALA is the author of the award-winning novel Beasts of No Nation and is one of Grantas Best Young American Novelists. He lives in Lagos, Nigeria, and New York City. Review "One of the greatest writers of our time." —Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, The Guardian"His novels . . . have been deservedly canonized by the iconic [Penguin Classics] series." —The Wall Street Journal"Beautifully compact . . . It takes its reader on a journey out of the colonial matrix and into the world of the real, showing us life reclaimed in all its complexity from the simplifying template of colonialism. . . . It has an undeniable power." —Uzodinma Iweala, from the Introduction"It has the rare qualities of restraint, intelligence and sensitivity." —The Times Literary Supplement "A sensitive novel about the Gikuyu in the melting pot that sometimes touches the grandeur of tap-root simplicity." —The Guardian Promotional On two neighboring mountain ridges in Kenya during the early days of white settlement, the Gikuyu people are torn between those who are drawn to the newcomers fiery Christianity and those holding fast to their peoples magical customs. Review Quote "Unparalleled as a chronicler of elemental change." - The Guardian "It has the rare qualities of restraint, intelligence and sensitivity." - The Times Literary Supplement "A sensitive novel about the Gikuyu in the melting pot that sometimes touches the grandeur of tap-root simplicity." -The Guardian Promotional "Headline" On two neighboring mountain ridges in Kenya during the early days of white settlement, the Gikuyu people are torn between those who are drawn to the newcomers fiery Christianity and those holding fast to their peoples magical customs. Excerpt from Book Introduction My first encounter with Ngugi wa Thiongos writing came relatively late for a person who considers himself a student of African literature. A friend of mine, a painter from South Africa, left a copy of Ngugis essay collection Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature in my apartment with the instruction to read it if I wanted to "free my mind." These days it is hard to read such words without thinking first of the 1999 blockbuster science fiction movie The Matrix , in which humans have become slaves to technology, which has imprisoned them in a picture-perfect virtual world. While most people in the film move around oblivious to the fact that they are literally sleeping through life, a select few experience discontent with the perceived order and long for something more. They are offered a choice between the blue pill, a chance to erase all indications of their discontent, and the red pill, an opportunity to explore the twists and turns of an enlightened life. Their problem is that freeing the mind requires that they embrace a contradiction: their world is built on a fallacy and this fallacy provides a foundation for what can be an expansive-if difficult-new life. Ngugis body of work, from his 1965 novel The River Between to his 2012 memoir In the House of the Interpreter , is the red pill, delivering readers from a simplistic understanding of the forces of colonialism in Africa to a complicated imagining of Africa before, during, and after colonialism. Decolonising the Mind , first published in 1986, some ten years after he wrote Petals of Blood , the last novel he wrote in English, is Ngugis self-described "farewell to English as a vehicle for any of my writings,"1 and it provides great insight into the motivation for all of Ngugis writing, but especially for The River Between and his other early novels. In Decolonising the Mind , one of the most marvelous analyses of the colonized (or formerly colonized) persons existential predicament since Frantz Fanons The Wretched of the Earth or Black Skin, White Masks , Ngugi explores the role that language plays in the process of colonization and in the long and incomplete struggle to emerge from colonialisms shadow. It is not an easy text, primarily because it advocates abandoning many assumptions that the postcolonial African (which is to say every living African) has about the struggle for freedom and the institutions that structure everyday life. Ngugis unpacking of the damage done to independence movements by Africans being forced to use the colonizers languages to express discontent calls into question the authenticity of the work he chose to write in English, but such is the attitude of Ngugi, a writer profoundly allergic to the simple. Ngugi describes African existence as a struggle between two competing forces, an imperialist tradition and a resistance tradition: The biggest weapon wielded and actually daily unleashed by imperialism against that collective defiance is the cultural bomb. The effect of a cultural bomb is to annihilate a peoples belief in their names, in their languages, in their environment, in their heritage of struggle, in their unity, in their capacities and ultimately in themselves.2 For Ngugi, imperialism extends well beyond the period of European expansion into Africa following the infamous Berlin Conference of 188485, which divided the continents peoples among European fiefdoms. Ngugis imperialism is not a time-bound event. It is an infectious mind-set that radically corrupts self-perceptions and sociohistorical narratives, a constant and dynamic process initiated to cause despair, despondency and a collective death wish. Amidst this wasteland which it has created, imperialism presents itself as the cure and demands that the dependant sing hymns of praise with the constant refrain: "Theft is holy." Indeed, this refrain sums up the new creed of the neocolonial bourgeoisie in many independent African states.3 A disease that offers itself as its own cure? A problem that presents itself as its own solution? This is the circular reasoning against which Ngugi argues in his critical nonfiction and his fiction. His oeuvre is unapologetically ideological while at the same time concerned with the aesthetics that distinguish art from propaganda. Ngugi describes his approach to writing like this: First of all let me say [that] writing out of ideological convictions, of course, is very important. One has important ideas that arouse ones anger, passion [and] commitment. Details ISBN0143107496 Short Title RIVER BETWEEN Pages 176 Language English ISBN-10 0143107496 ISBN-13 9780143107491 Media Book Format Paperback Year 2015 Imprint Penguin USA Place of Publication New York, NY Country of Publication United States Audience Age 18 Edited by Chinua Achebe Death 2013 Series Number 4 UK Release Date 2015-04-28 Series Penguin African Writers Series Publication Date 2015-04-28 US Release Date 2015-04-28 Narrator Susan McInearny Illustrator Jim Lee Affiliation Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Bipolar Clinic and Reseach Program, Massachusetts General Hospital Position Associate Professor of Psychiatry Qualifications PsyD Author Ngugi wa Thiongo Publisher Penguin Putnam Inc DEWEY FIC Audience General NZ Release Date 2015-10-20 AU Release Date 2015-10-20 We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! 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