Ngugi writes back to Empire

Lovemore Ranga Mataire The Reader
As Zimbabwe prepares to commemorate 35 years of independence from colonial subjugation, it is pertinent that we examine the work of Ngugi wa Thiongo. The Kenyan author is one of Africa’s foremost writers, political activists and an ardent critic of what has become of the continent in the post-colonial era.While Ngugi is most well known for his novels whose common thread is the denunciation of imperialism and neo-colonialism, less attention has been given to his plays, especially “The Trial of Dedan Kimathi”, which he co-authored with Micere Githae Mugo and “I Will Marry When I Want” which he co-authored with Ngugi wa Miri.

The two plays are pertinent in four ways. First, “The Trial of Dedan Kimathi” deals with the period leading to the independence of Kenya during the Mau Mau rebellion which culminated in the capture of the militant movement’s leader Dedan Waciuri Kimathi and his hanging on February 18 1957. It deals with the revolutionary sacrifices of the Mau Mau and the capitulation of the revolutionary goals by some of Kenyan’s nationalist leadership. On the other hand, |I Will Mary When I Want” deals with the post-struggle era when the ideals of the revolution are being betrayed by the nationalist leadership which has marginalised the peasants and workers into the periphery in the making of the new nation-state.

The second aspect of the plays is that they were both written in Gikuyu and later translated to English. They were performed by peasants and workers and aroused so much interest among the populace in that they depicted their daily struggles and explored ways of how they can overcome their toils. The interest in turn drew the ire of the establishment, leading to the arrest and incarceration of Ngugi including the rape of his wife in his presence by unknown assailants.

Thirdly, the plays are pertinent in that they tap into the historical reservoir of both real historical events and the African oral traditions infused in a dramatic performance that is identifiable in every part of post-colonial Africa. Dedan Kimathi is an actual historical figure who never wavered in his quest to achieve political, social and economic freedom for Kenya and “I Will Marry When I Want” is an allegory of the common thread that underpins post-colonial Kenya where indigenous people lost their land to the greedy and heartless black bourgeoisie working in cahoots with so-called “white capitalist investors”.

The fourth pertinent aspect of the play has to do with the struggle between virtue and vice. As an ardent Marxist Ngugi views the capitalist system as the root of the evil that has manifested in Kenya both in the pre and post independence era and sees the need for a second revolution to uproot the evil system.

He situates the workers and peasants at the centre of that revolution and envisages a Kenyan or an African utopia where citizens craft their own economic and political trajectory that is cognisant of its history and places humanity and not profit at the centre of its survival.

Ngugi clearly sets the tone for the problems inherent in the attainment of independence and casts serious aspersions on the foundation that gave birth to majority rule in most African countries.

His assertion is encapsulated by Dedan Kimathi when he responds to a politician trying to convince him to relinquish the struggle on the basis that negotiations will soon be in progress; “In State House. In London. We shall sit around a conference table. We shall be given independence.”

In apparent fury, Kimathi answers back saying: “Give! Given! Give! Given! Beggars. Hands outstretched. Ten cents. Thirty pieces of silver. Independence on a silver platter. Away. Vile creatures. Rats. Blood suckers.”

In other words, Kimathi challenges the whole aspect of negotiated independence in that it came with conditionalities. Kimathi advocates for an ultimate military victory that will vanquish the colonialists.

Ngugi’s revolutionary art in radical African social philosophy is critical in the context of drama as a genre in African literature. Drama maybe categorized as the high priest of all other genres of literature given its natural closeness to reality and life situations.

Kimathi represents a typical Marxist heroic figure who never falters and suffers for the collective good of people as illustrated by the woman character who says: “Kimathi wa Wachiuri will never betray the people’s liberation.” And true enough, Kimathi refuses to bend to the demands of the colonial system for him to surrender, and is hanged.

The role of the church in both plays is put under microscopic examination as in The Trial of Dedan Kimathi the priest who visits him in prison on his death bed tries to convince him that real riches and inheritance are in heaven when he says “surrender your heart, Dedan. Let Jesus speak to you today.” (page 49).

It is also true that The Trial of Dedan Kimathi is Ngugi’s and Micere Mugo’s response to colonialist writings about the Mau Mau movement, which traditionally depicted the movement in negative terms and painted its leader as mentally unbalanced and vicious. In The Trial of Dedan Kimathi, wa Thiongo and Micere Mugo are trying to counter this blatant negative portrayal by reconstructing an image of a courageous and committed revolutionary.

It is apparent that like most authors of his time, Ngugi converted his art to assume a utilitarian value as an instrument or ideological weapon of social-political change in post-colonial societies. His art is never art for art’s sake. Although it was adorned with language and cultural aesthetics that had qualities of entertainment, it was never a beauty producing factory.

While Aristotle asserts that drama is “an imitation of an action,” contemporary critics affirm that it is a “fluent expression” of the actor’s whole being.

In the case of I Will Marry When I Want and The Trial of Dedan Kimathi, the two plays are influenced by the socio-economic and cultural values at work in the mangled relations of the masses and the state under colonialism and neo-colonialism. In turn, drama creates changes in economic, social and cultural relations in the world. Thus Ngugi’s vision in both texts is aimed at influencing the human social behaviour and the transformations of the human thought and reason. He does this through the redefinitions of its theory and practice as an instrument of the social enlightenment and transformation of African society.

But Africa is not the only place where the battleground for the reversal of alienation and the deconstruction of imperial laced historicism is being challenged.

All over the world, in United States, Ireland, West Indies and other nations that share a history of slavery and neocolonialism, drama is an enterprise of “cultural nationalism” and the political practice and commitment to “political correctness.”

African post-colonial drama like The Trial of Dedan Kimathi and I Will Marry When I Want are attempts at interrogating dialogue with history, an attempt to transcend the boundaries of political, economic, social and cultural alienation.

In The Empire Writes Back Ashcroft, Tiffin and Griffith (1989) draw attention to the categories of ‘dislocation and displacement’ which fuel the tension between the colonial imperial ‘centre’ and the colonised at the ‘margins’.