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Tales of Tenderness and Power
This is an anthology of stories, personal observations and historic legends. It reflects the author's fascination with Africa's people and their history as well as her identification with individuals and their conflicting emotions.
Let me tell a story now ... --
Oranges and lemons --
Snowball --
Sorrow food --
Chibuku beer and independence --
Village people --
The old woman --
Summer sun --
The green tree --
Tao --
The woman from America --
Chief Sekoto holds court --
Property --
A power struggle --
A period of darkness --
The Lovers --
The General --
Son of the soil --
The prisoner who wore glasses --
The coming of the Christ-child --
Dreamer and storyteller.
Let me tell a story now ... --
Oranges and lemons --
Snowball --
Sorrow food --
Chibuku beer and independence --
Village people --
The old woman --
Summer sun --
The green tree --
Tao --
The woman from America --
Chief Sekoto holds court --
Property --
A power struggle --
A period of darkness --
The Lovers --
The General --
Son of the soil --
The prisoner who wore glasses --
The coming of the Christ-child --
Dreamer and storyteller.
144 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 1991
About the author
Bessie Head
48 books209 followersBessie Emery Head, though born in South Africa, is usually considered Botswana's most influential writer.
Bessie Emery Head was born in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, the child of a wealthy white South African woman and a black servant when interracial relationships were illegal in South Africa. It was claimed that her mother was mentally ill so that she could be sent to a quiet location to give birth to Bessie without the neighbours knowing. However, the exact circumstances are disputed, and some of Bessie Head's comments, though often quoted as straight autobiography, are in fact from fictionalized settings.
In the 1950s and '60s she was a teacher, then a journalist for the South African magazine Drum. In 1964 she moved to Botswana (then still the Bechuanaland Protectorate) as a refugee, having been peripherally involved with Pan-African politics. It would take 15 years for Head to obtain Botswana citizenship. Head settled in Serowe, the largest of Botswana's "villages" (i.e. traditional settlements as opposed to settler towns). Serowe was famous both for its historical importance, as capital of the Bamangwato people, and for the experimental Swaneng school of Patrick van Rensburg. The deposed chief of the Bamangwato, Seretse Khama, was soon to become the first President of independent Botswana.
Her early death in 1986 (aged 48) from hepatitis came just at the point where she was starting to achieve recognition as a writer and was no longer so desperately poor.
Bessie Emery Head was born in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, the child of a wealthy white South African woman and a black servant when interracial relationships were illegal in South Africa. It was claimed that her mother was mentally ill so that she could be sent to a quiet location to give birth to Bessie without the neighbours knowing. However, the exact circumstances are disputed, and some of Bessie Head's comments, though often quoted as straight autobiography, are in fact from fictionalized settings.
In the 1950s and '60s she was a teacher, then a journalist for the South African magazine Drum. In 1964 she moved to Botswana (then still the Bechuanaland Protectorate) as a refugee, having been peripherally involved with Pan-African politics. It would take 15 years for Head to obtain Botswana citizenship. Head settled in Serowe, the largest of Botswana's "villages" (i.e. traditional settlements as opposed to settler towns). Serowe was famous both for its historical importance, as capital of the Bamangwato people, and for the experimental Swaneng school of Patrick van Rensburg. The deposed chief of the Bamangwato, Seretse Khama, was soon to become the first President of independent Botswana.
Her early death in 1986 (aged 48) from hepatitis came just at the point where she was starting to achieve recognition as a writer and was no longer so desperately poor.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
November 1, 2021
In the first story to this collection the narrator explains an encounter with a lawyer of the practical unfeeling kind: "I struggled quite unsuccessfully to explain a delicate matter to him that needed just a bit of understanding and humane feeling and couldn't understand why he kept pulling me to shreds."
These stories are just the opposite, full of understanding and humane feeling.
These stories are just the opposite, full of understanding and humane feeling.
May 17, 2016
Rather than me ramble about why she is great, I will let Bessie herself tell you a short story from this collection, which should show you all you need to know.
Summer Sun
All day long I lie asleep under the thorn tree, and the desert is on this side of me and on that side of me. I have no work to do. We are all waiting for the rain, as we cannot plough without rain. I think the rain has gone away again, like last year. We had a little rain in November, but December has gone, and now it is January; and each day we have been sitting here, waiting for rain: my mother, my grandmother and my grandfather, my cousin Lebenah, and my sister and her little baby. If it were to rain my grandfather would push the plough and my cousin Lebenah would pull the oxen across the great miles of our land. We women would follow behind, sowing maize, millet, pumpkin and watermelon seed. I feel great pity for my family, and other families. I wonder why we sit here like this. Each day the sun is hot, hot in the blue sky. Each day the water pool of November rain gets smaller. Soon we will have to leave the land and return to the village.
In the village we have a politician who takes the people up on the hill to pray for rain. He wears a smart suit and has a big black car and a beautiful deep African voice. His mind is quick and moves from one thing to another. He can pray, and cry, and speak politics all at once. People always expect the rain to fall the minute after he has stopped praying and crying. They call him the one who has shaken God loose.
Actually, I have not been sleeping the whole day. I am trying to learn English. My cousin Lebenah tells me that things are changing in Africa, and that it is necessary for women to improve themselves. I love my cousin Lebenah so much that I do anything he tells me to do. He tells me that English is the best language to learn, as many books have been written in English, and that there is no end to the knowledge that can be gained from them. He gave me a geography book and I have read it over and over. I am puzzled and afraid. Each year the sun is more cruel. Each year the rain becomes less and less. Each year more and more of our cattle die. The only animal that survives is the goat. It can eat anything and we eat the goat. Without the goat, I do not know what we would do. It is all about us, like the family. It has the strangest eyes. They are big and yellow, and the pupil is a black streak right across the yellow ball of the eye.
I am trying to improve myself too, as I am very afraid that I may have an illegitimate baby like my elder sister. My family will suffer much. And the child too. It may die. There is never enough food and we are always hungry. It is not so easy for a woman to have too many babies when she has improved her mind. She has to think about how she will feed the baby, clothe it, and wash it. My sister's baby is lovely, though. He laughs a lot for no reason at all.
My geography book makes me wonder and wonder. It tells me that water is formed by hydrogen and oxygen. I wonder so much about that. If we had green things everywhere, they might help to make the oxygen to make the rain. The soil is very fertile. If there is only a little rain, green things come out everywhere, and many strange flowers. How can we live like this? Here are our bags with the seeds of maize, and millet, and the land is hard as stone.
Tomorrow the sun will rise, quietly. The many birds in the bush will welcome it. I do not. Alone, without the help of rain it is cruel, killing and killing. All day we look on it, like on death. Then, at evening, all is as gentle as we are. Mother roasts goat meat over the coals of the wood fire. Sister feeds her baby. Grandfather and cousin Lebenah talk quietly to each other about little things. The stars spread across the sky and bend down at the horizon. The quiet talk of grandfather and cousin Lebenah seem to make earth and heaven come together. I do not know what we would do if we all did not love one another, because tomorrow the sun will rise again.
Summer Sun
All day long I lie asleep under the thorn tree, and the desert is on this side of me and on that side of me. I have no work to do. We are all waiting for the rain, as we cannot plough without rain. I think the rain has gone away again, like last year. We had a little rain in November, but December has gone, and now it is January; and each day we have been sitting here, waiting for rain: my mother, my grandmother and my grandfather, my cousin Lebenah, and my sister and her little baby. If it were to rain my grandfather would push the plough and my cousin Lebenah would pull the oxen across the great miles of our land. We women would follow behind, sowing maize, millet, pumpkin and watermelon seed. I feel great pity for my family, and other families. I wonder why we sit here like this. Each day the sun is hot, hot in the blue sky. Each day the water pool of November rain gets smaller. Soon we will have to leave the land and return to the village.
In the village we have a politician who takes the people up on the hill to pray for rain. He wears a smart suit and has a big black car and a beautiful deep African voice. His mind is quick and moves from one thing to another. He can pray, and cry, and speak politics all at once. People always expect the rain to fall the minute after he has stopped praying and crying. They call him the one who has shaken God loose.
Actually, I have not been sleeping the whole day. I am trying to learn English. My cousin Lebenah tells me that things are changing in Africa, and that it is necessary for women to improve themselves. I love my cousin Lebenah so much that I do anything he tells me to do. He tells me that English is the best language to learn, as many books have been written in English, and that there is no end to the knowledge that can be gained from them. He gave me a geography book and I have read it over and over. I am puzzled and afraid. Each year the sun is more cruel. Each year the rain becomes less and less. Each year more and more of our cattle die. The only animal that survives is the goat. It can eat anything and we eat the goat. Without the goat, I do not know what we would do. It is all about us, like the family. It has the strangest eyes. They are big and yellow, and the pupil is a black streak right across the yellow ball of the eye.
I am trying to improve myself too, as I am very afraid that I may have an illegitimate baby like my elder sister. My family will suffer much. And the child too. It may die. There is never enough food and we are always hungry. It is not so easy for a woman to have too many babies when she has improved her mind. She has to think about how she will feed the baby, clothe it, and wash it. My sister's baby is lovely, though. He laughs a lot for no reason at all.
My geography book makes me wonder and wonder. It tells me that water is formed by hydrogen and oxygen. I wonder so much about that. If we had green things everywhere, they might help to make the oxygen to make the rain. The soil is very fertile. If there is only a little rain, green things come out everywhere, and many strange flowers. How can we live like this? Here are our bags with the seeds of maize, and millet, and the land is hard as stone.
Tomorrow the sun will rise, quietly. The many birds in the bush will welcome it. I do not. Alone, without the help of rain it is cruel, killing and killing. All day we look on it, like on death. Then, at evening, all is as gentle as we are. Mother roasts goat meat over the coals of the wood fire. Sister feeds her baby. Grandfather and cousin Lebenah talk quietly to each other about little things. The stars spread across the sky and bend down at the horizon. The quiet talk of grandfather and cousin Lebenah seem to make earth and heaven come together. I do not know what we would do if we all did not love one another, because tomorrow the sun will rise again.
December 16, 2016
The best stories in this book are the ones set in South Africa. Perhaps having read 3 of Bessie's novels set in Botswana, I have become too eager to see Bessie write about the land of her birth. Nevertheless, her writing about South African history - the oppression and the resistance - is truly compelling. This does not mean that the stories set in Botswana are bad. Not at all. Bessie perfectly captures the climate - natural, historical and political - of early post-colonial Botswana. Definitely recommended.
October 22, 2011
I love the small pieces of this I am able to read at a time. She makes me cry for her illness and her isolation. I feel kinship with Bessie like with no other author.
November 11, 2025
I was ready to give this book a lower rating because it seemed to me that Bessie Head had a decidedly bleak view on the possibility of redemptive political and national subjectivity emerging from the community. However, much like Achebe, what Head offers in this text is an analysis of "the restless beauty of the earth in motion" (72), confronted with the turmoil of the Boer/African dialectic.
"A black man needed to be horse-whipped as a daily natural occurrence in his life; a black man needed to be a servant of a master. A Black man had no life beyond that" (118). This narrative view of the African by the Boer functions as both a creation myth for the nation and as a generative source for the identities of the settler and Native. The world begins here, in 1913, with the Native Land Act.
Head is interested in the more beautiful dreams of the universe (72), disrupted by the many world-rendering intrusions of the settler. To the Boer, "Africa is not alive"(60), and the ‘dead’ world of the native necessarily produces his - the settler’s - boundless agency as the world maker in Southern Africa.
By concluding this short story collection with her analysis of historical materialism in Southern Africa, the first two-thirds of the collection stand in stark contrast with the final 3-4 stories. The early stories (far more local and far more interested in local contradictions) coalesce into what can be described as an indigenous social and political ontology of South Africa before conquest. Much like Okonkwo’s Umuofia before the arrival of the missionaries, this section of the text is instructive. It reads as a record of what was lost.
Bessie asks us, "How does one communicate with the horrible?" (143). How does one make something coherent here, next to people "who would shoot unarmed women dead?" (137). For the author, the answer is to enunciate one’s identity, to evolve a name - a collective expression - of an African humanity. “They were Africans. Formerly, people had names imposed on them, to suit the times. ‘Kaffir’, which was synonymous with ‘heathen’ or ‘unbeliever’ was abandoned when Native was found to be more appropriate” (128).
A new ontology emerges linking Africa with rebellion. They were African, they were beyond the limits of settler subjectivity - beyond the associative constraints assigned to the identities of the ‘Kaffir’, Native, and Bantu. For Head, this vision of Africa functions as a site for restoration - the collective will of a people who have “suppressed violence as though silently waiting for the time to set right the wrongs that afflict [them]” (142).
What a fantastic collection!
"A black man needed to be horse-whipped as a daily natural occurrence in his life; a black man needed to be a servant of a master. A Black man had no life beyond that" (118). This narrative view of the African by the Boer functions as both a creation myth for the nation and as a generative source for the identities of the settler and Native. The world begins here, in 1913, with the Native Land Act.
Head is interested in the more beautiful dreams of the universe (72), disrupted by the many world-rendering intrusions of the settler. To the Boer, "Africa is not alive"(60), and the ‘dead’ world of the native necessarily produces his - the settler’s - boundless agency as the world maker in Southern Africa.
By concluding this short story collection with her analysis of historical materialism in Southern Africa, the first two-thirds of the collection stand in stark contrast with the final 3-4 stories. The early stories (far more local and far more interested in local contradictions) coalesce into what can be described as an indigenous social and political ontology of South Africa before conquest. Much like Okonkwo’s Umuofia before the arrival of the missionaries, this section of the text is instructive. It reads as a record of what was lost.
Bessie asks us, "How does one communicate with the horrible?" (143). How does one make something coherent here, next to people "who would shoot unarmed women dead?" (137). For the author, the answer is to enunciate one’s identity, to evolve a name - a collective expression - of an African humanity. “They were Africans. Formerly, people had names imposed on them, to suit the times. ‘Kaffir’, which was synonymous with ‘heathen’ or ‘unbeliever’ was abandoned when Native was found to be more appropriate” (128).
A new ontology emerges linking Africa with rebellion. They were African, they were beyond the limits of settler subjectivity - beyond the associative constraints assigned to the identities of the ‘Kaffir’, Native, and Bantu. For Head, this vision of Africa functions as a site for restoration - the collective will of a people who have “suppressed violence as though silently waiting for the time to set right the wrongs that afflict [them]” (142).
What a fantastic collection!
October 21, 2013
Tales of Tenderness and Power (144) is a collection of twenty-one short stories by the South African-born Botswana writer Bessie Head published posthumously by Heinemann African Writers Series (1989). All the stories, with the exception of three were published in various magazines prior to her demise. In this collection, the beauty and tenderness of Bessie's writings, her keen observation, and her ability to relate her environment to occurrences in lives of the people come to the fore. She does not set out to tell a totally fictitious tale as fiction is sometimes interpreted to be; she writes about the lives of real people who lived those lives - their hardships, their aspirations, their fears, their hopes - in as direct a manner as possible. In addition, some of the stories are are not stories at all but historical, but not necessarily ancient, narratives.
continue from here http://freduagyeman.blogspot.com/2013...
continue from here http://freduagyeman.blogspot.com/2013...
June 26, 2024
"In reality, she was as lovely as the tall cool grasses that swayed in the summer wind. At least, the man saw her that way with his own magic eyes. People were all kinds of things to him: nothing like the dull pretentious clothes of custom which they all wore; but in flashes, and at moments of crisis they revealed their real selves: some were giant icy mountains, some were wide wind-swept plains in breadth of thought and depth of suffering; some were stark bare twigs perpetually bent before the storms and winters of life and some, like his mother were the evening sunsets. And because his wife was young she had no way of concealing that she was the grass that swayed in the summer wind."
September 22, 2022
Tales of Tenderness and Power is a collection of twenty one stories of which eighteen stories have been published in various literary journals, magazines and anthologies. The stories reflect her experience in exile, love and conflicting emotions of the people.
Also, she highlights the sweeping hope as Ghana and other sub saharan countries gain their independence from the white man. This is the very hope Black South Africans need after their long night of apartheid and oppression.
Also, she highlights the sweeping hope as Ghana and other sub saharan countries gain their independence from the white man. This is the very hope Black South Africans need after their long night of apartheid and oppression.
July 29, 2017
Algunas de las historias se hacen entretenidas y emocionantes, otras un tanto confusas. Aún así, es un libro agradable.
May 27, 2018
fantastic, revelant, under read.
May 29, 2025
There were some very interesting stories in this book.
May 31, 2022
Today I'm re-reading A Power Struggle, and just for this story it is worth reading this collection of stories. But of course, all the stories are relevant. They've got the descriptions coming from talent of a good observer of society, and the wisedom coming from a very valuable person for the species, may I say! In this story, you'll find wisedom for your private self, about African traditions, and wisedom that allows you set "colonialism", the European invasions, in its right place for analysis.
December 25, 2012
I love Bessie and her stories. Nuf' said.
July 2, 2013
Short fiction, nonfiction, and "historical tales" all from Botswana and South Africa. The best short story collection I've read to date.
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October 10, 2013Fiction H4323t 1990
September 16, 2021
Good book
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews