review of Under the Udala Trees by Chinelo Okparanta

[Meggie]

Under the Udala Trees by Chinelo Okparanta features a heroine facing incredible obstacles in her attempt to realize her true identity. Ijeoma is a young girl living during the Biafran War, to which she loses her father. In the midst of this intense backdrop of violence, Ijeoma must grapple with her newly unfolding queer identity as she explores romantic and sexual relationships with two women: Amina, her first love, and Ndidi, her last. Nigerian law calls for extreme punishment of those caught engaging in queer romantic or sexual relations, forcing her to live in fear of persecution. She also faces extreme opposition from her mother, who believes that her daughter’s queerness is an abomination in the eyes of God. Her emotions are stifled, and she is forced into a marriage with a man who loves her, but whom she can never love. She and her daughter, the beloved result of the failed marriage, eventually flee this abusive and complicated relationship, and she spends the rest of her life with Ndidi.
This novel is a beautifully written, daring take on the bildungsroman. Okparanta uses language that is at once soft-spoken and fearless. The result is a story that is deeply honest and thought-provoking without being brazen. Although major conflicts surround the queer identity of the protagonist, it would be a mistake to limit the impact of the novel to advocating for acceptance of all kinds of romantic love. Okaparanta does achieve this, but Under the Udala Trees also accomplishes a fresh take on the form of the bildungsroman using the shifting of temporal lens. In the first part of the novel, we see the circumstances of the war and the effect of her father’s death on her relationship with her mother in Ijeoma’s childhood. But in part two, the story jumps ahead to the outcome of her relationship with Amina, before we actually know the history of that relationship. Okparanta then returns to fill in the gaps. The effect of temporal shifts like this is that the novel is read somewhat like Ijeoma is relating her memories aloud to herself, flitting from memory to memory as it comes to her. I would highly recommend reading Under the Udala Trees because of Okparanta’s soft, mesmerizing, almost ethereal language and methods of storytelling, as well as her refreshing take on the typical coming-of-age narrative.