African Rhapsody

by Nadežda Obradović

An anthology of twenty-five short stories by the best emerging and award-winning contemporary African writers illuminates modern-day concerns and realities of African life

Genres: Short Stories

353 pages, Library Binding

First published February 1, 1994

Reviews

[Bob Newman · Rating 4 out of 5]

a mixed bag of mostly sad tales

With the recent obituaries written at Chinua Achebe's death, with the Nobel Prizes given to Naguib Mahfouz, Wole Soyinka, Nadine Gordimer and J.M.Coetzee and with dozens of African writers breaking into mainstream print, it can hardly be a surprise to anyone that Africa is producing good literature.

AFRICAN RHAPSODY contains 25 stories written by authors from all parts of the continent, but skewed towards English-language writers. A number of stories (9) are translated from French, Portuguese, and Arabic but as I rated all the stories as I read, I noticed that I tended to downgrade those stories, leading me to believe that there might have been something "lost in translation". In any case, if you're interested in African lives, or in modern world literature, you should get hold of this book. Today we are often told that the African nations are rising economically; they are making progress, etc. This may well be true, but life has been difficult for a long time and not everyone has emerged from wars and poverty yet. The overwhelming tone of these stories is sad, quite far from the upper middle class/emigrant tones of Chimananda Adichie. From Tayeb Salih's (Sudan) brilliant, brief piece called "A Handful of Dates" to the horrors of the Biafran War in Nigeria in two stories by Ossie O. Enekwe and Adewale Maja-Pearce, "The Last Battle" and "Civil War I-VII", you will get the African eye view of the often-dire state of the continent. Many of the stories are written from the point of view of children; I am not sure why the editor decided to choose in this way. The most ironic choice was "Africa Kills Her Sun" by Ken Saro-Wiwa (Nigeria) purporting to be the last letter from a soon-to-be-executed criminal who has not committed the crimes he's accused of. Saro-Wiwa himself was later executed for political reasons, even though people around the world asked his government for clemency.

Literature runs close to life everywhere, but perhaps more so in Africa. That is another reason why reading AFRICAN RHAPSODY would be worthwhile.

[Maria Skyllas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great anthology of 25 diverse short stories from sixteen African countries showing different cultures, traditions and lifestyles.

I was particularly interested by Her three days, about polygamy and the psychological struggles of a wife waiting for her turn with her shared husband.

I like how those stories were reassembled. In the preface, the editor explains that "the stories could have been arranged in several ways: alphabetically by author for example, or by geographical region". But he chose to present them by the plot, starting with stories involving children, and ending with stories of war, destruction and death.

This was the second collection of African short stories I've read, and I will keep looking for more...

[Beth Robinson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book was a solid collection of short stories. I especially liked that each was introduced with enough information to be able to decide if I wanted to read more from the author. All were good, although a couple confused me. Some were more compelling than others, as is usual in a collection. It was a worthwhile window to another continent for me.

[Lara · Rating 4 out of 5]

good one to read if you're seeking more African writers. Some of my favorites: "The Brother" "A Handful of Dates" "The Dignity of Begging"