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Testing the Censors
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10481 |
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Section : |
BOOK WORLD
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| Issue
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1 / 1993 |
2,229 Words |
| Author
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Charles R. Larson
Charles R. Larson is an internationally known authority on
Third World literature. He is the author of The Emergence of
African Fiction, The Novel in the Third World, and American
Indian Fiction. His novel The Insect Colony is set in West
Africa during the Nigerian civil war. He has edited several
anthologies of international writing and served as general
editor of Collier Books' African/American Library. He teaches
literature at American University in Washington, D.C. |
THREE DAYS ON THE CROSS
Wahome Mutahi
Nairobi, Kenya: Heinemann, 1991
182pp.
The graphic cover illustration of Kenyan journalist Wahome Mutahi's first novel, Three Days on the Cross, leaves little to the imagination. In the foreground is a battered prisoner lying on the floor while a police officer wielding a large iron wrench stands over him. Off in the background another officer (of a much higher rank) coolly observes the brutal scene. The horror on the prisoner's bloody face reveals the totality of his fear and humiliation. The shocking artistry of the illustration (reminiscent of pulp fiction or cheap detective magazines of the past) immediately seems out of character with what one might expect from the publisher of serious, educational books.
The disclaimer on the back of the title page begins typically enough ("This is purely a work of fiction. All the characters are fictitious and are not supposed to bear any resemblance to any persons, living or dead.") but then veers off into darker territory: "The country which is the setting of the story is not supposed to bear any resemblance to any existing African country." Wahome Mutahi is identified on the cover as "a well-known newspaper columnist in Kenya and an editor with Nation Newspapers."
Little surprise that Three Days on the Cross has been a runaway best seller in Kenya since its publication in October. What is initially surprising is the fact that the novel has not been banned and that Mutahi is walking the streets of Nairobi, still functioning as his country's most popular journalist.
Writing in contemporary Africa is often a dangerous occupation. Though the number of writers incarcerated may have declined somewhat in recent years, there still are many others who have fled into exile, instead of accepting a more predictable fate. East Africa's most celebrated writer, Ngugi wa Thiong'o, also a Kenyan, has lived in exile in England and the United States for more than ten years, following his forced resignation as chairman of the English Department at the University of Nairobi and his subsequent two year imprisonment, all without even the perfunctory benefit of charges or trial. The Kenyan government continues to ban Ngugi's recent work, as it does that of several of his contemporaries including an adaptation of George Orwell's Animal Farm, given a Kenyan setting.
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