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Part of
Landscapes of Realism: Rethinking literary realism in comparative perspectives
Edited by Dirk Göttsche, Rosa Mucignat and Robert Weninger
[Comparative History of Literatures in European Languages XXXII] 2021
► pp. 357–372

Reclaiming space, mastering time in African postcolonial fiction

The theme of this chapter is contextualized by an introduction which analyzes what is meant by postcolonial African literature, focusing on the map of time and space where it appeared and flourished as a revolutionary re-positioning of the mind against the universalism of European canons. Postcolonialism is not just a mode of writing but an epistemological approach and a vision of the world that ceases to rotate around the imperial metropolis and becomes unprecedently multicentric. The relevance of time and space in African postcolonial discourse derives from the fact that since its inception, postcolonial theory and practice have been political and rooted in political analysis and history – so that the whole of postcolonial literature talks politics. The chapter then moves into an analysis of the works of five important African writers – Olive Schreiner’s The Story of an African Farm (1883), Sol Plaatjeʼs Mhudi (1930), Chinua Achebeʼs Things Fall Apart (1958), Ken Saro-Wiwaʼs Sozaboy (1985), and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichieʼs Americanah (2013). If realism might be considered as an ongoing experiment in the art of representation, for the African writer it is more philosophical and political than ethical and aesthetic, and the goal is never mimetic but rather representational of a new and different landscape.

Keywords: realism, African literature, colonialism, postcolonialism, imperialism, Ken Saro-Wiwa, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Chinua Achebe, Olive Schreiner, Sol Plaatje
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction: Thinking postcolonial realism in Africa
  • 2.Schreiner’s chronotope as anti-colonial critique
  • 3.Past and present in African history: Sol Plaatje’s Mhudi
  • 4.Living at the crossroads: Achebe’s Things Fall Apart
  • 5.“Water don pass gari”: Matters have come to an end
  • 6.A serious Americanah
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Works cited
Published online: 21 April 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/chlel.xxxii.12viv
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