Buchi Emecheta : The bride price

Aku-nna (« my father’s wealth » in igbo language) is a young teenager living a peaceful life in Lagos, the Nigerian metropolis with her carefree brother Nna-Ndo, her mother Ma Blackie and her father. The latter who served as a soldier in the British colonial army and came back from faraway fronts with a recurrent handicap on his leg, is now working as the head of casting department in the Nigerian railways society. Aku-nna is a brilliant student whose hope is to make a good marriage to make her father proud. But soon that loving and caring father died from the deterioration of his old war wound.

“With our father gone, there will be no more school for me [school is over for me]” thought Aku-nna and she couldn’t be more right.

Buchi Emecheta introduces us step by step (progressively) to the remains of tradition in the igbo burial ceremony in Lagos, the solidarity that naturally takes place as well that the hypocrisy behind some behaviors. Then the author takes us to the countryside where the Odia family is forced to move, they settle in Ibuza at Okonkwo’s, the eldest brother of the late Ezechiel Odia.

In that context, with the man very attached to tradition that is her uncle, the frail and sickly Aku-nna discovers a very rigid and male chauvinist society. The reference to Okonkwo, the eccentric and also extremely attached to tradition character from Chinua Achebe’s novel may be intended. In this novel, Uncle Okonkwo is interested in his own social ascent within the clan and counts on Aku-nna’s dowry as soon as she’ll start growing up into a woman. Meanwhile the girl becomes attracted to a young teacher whose status as a slave descendant makes him a social outcast.

This novel brings back the questions Chinua Achebe already rose in “Things Fall apart”, i.e the possibility of questioning some flaws of the traditional igbo culture. The subject of caste, for instance. The main difference here lies in the fact that the outside look is not one of an occidental missionary but coming from a young African girl herself raised in an African city. Unlike Léonora Miano’s character, Aku-nna does not reject her entire culture. But she disapproves of forced marriage and the ostracism that leads to Chike’s family being banished from the society. Buchi Emecheta also analyzes the impact of both magical and religious beliefs on the subconscious and how they somehow freeze things up so much, even when there seems to be a tiny bit of freedom for the people

Buchi Emecheta takes us to a journey through this story of which tone and rhythm are perfectly under control.

A very beautiful novel indeed.

Article original traduit du français par  Titilayo Agbahey

Buchi Emecheta, The bride price 

Ed. George Braziller