The Mookse and the Gripes discussion
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An Orchestra of Minorities
Booker Prize for Fiction
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2019 Booker Shortlist: An Orchestra of Minorities
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Sam
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rated it 4 stars
Aug 07, 2019 07:45AM
There is an element to this novel that I have wished to be further discussed. The novel opens with the chi arguing in defense of Nonso's soul, trying to illustrate that Nonso is a good man. From my Western perspective, much of what is then recounted damns Nonso more than saves him since Nonso's pride and self-righteousness seem to cause much of his problems and his rationalizing away of his personal responsibility for these problems compounds them. Obioma seems to be making ethical philosophy a theme in this novel. My question is about those character flaws of Nonso. I could not tell if they were flaws consciously attributed by the author to Nonso as tragic flaws such as we see in Othello, or if they were qualities with which the author sympathized or did not recognize as flaws. Does anyone have an opinion on this? If the author is attributing tragic flaws to prompt ethical analysis from the readers, the novel's rating would be elevated, IMO.
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That is a good topic for discussion Sam.I agree with you that 'Nonso's pride and self-righteousness seem to cause much of his problems and his rationalizing away of his personal responsibility for these problems compounds them' added to his tendency to take impulsive actions and decisions, most of which he later regrets.
Also from a Western perspective, I would compare the chi's arguments to those of a defence barrister before a court: he (it?) is not arguing his client's innocence, but is pleading for a lighter sentence based on him being a victim of circumstances and doing what many other people have done in the past.
It is not as easy to work out what an Igbo god would consider a crime or not. Are character flaws a valid defence? Does Chinonso have personal responsibility, or is this all fated? His crime is to hurt a pregnant woman; would it have been fine to hurt her if she wasn't pregnant?
Interesting comment. Nonso’s defence barrister failed completely in the Cypriot court - the Chi seeming unable to assist Nonso to defend himself partly due to Nonso’s resignation to his fate and partly due to the Chi’s complete ignorance of the Cypriot law (the question the ancestors eventually ask him in my least favourite scene of the novel).
The link below goes into a bit more detail on Obama's view of fate and free will. Note the last paragraph.
https://time.com/5498894/chigozie-obi...
I just finished and the third part actually worked better for me than expected, despite generally knowing the tragedy it was working towards. My previous comments stand true with the story being a bit long-winded and predictable, but I enjoyed the chi narration and the characters felt believable, if also quite frustrating at times. While the book is a self-proclaimed Odyssey story, it also felt like a Shakespearean tragedy. Ultimately, I enjoyed it quite a bit and think it will be on the cusp of my top 6. I wouldn’t be disappointed or surprised if it makes the shortlist, but I expect it may be just outside.
Sam, that final paragraph is fascinating. When I read the book, I didn’t get the impression of divine plans in place that Chinonso was unable to influence. I more got the impression that the chi was trying to influence human plans using the limited means of communication/intervention available to it.
Finished it - my review will be up tomorrow morning.I had problems but that will be in the review.
Took this one on a holiday to Cyprus - but even reading it in such a great setting did not salvage the novel for me. When this novel was published I had made the conscious discussion not to read it (which is rare for me I have an M.A. focussing on African Literature(s)) but after having read The Fishermen - which I liked okay - I decided to pass on Obioma because, and I struggled to put it in better words, he felt like such a "masculine writer". Now having read An Orchestra of Minorities I feel valdiated?The idea of having a chi narrate - and plead - is great and there are passages within the novel where it works really well. But unfortunately I found the narration uneven: for one, the chi explains more than once what a chi is - but it speaks to a deity who really should not need this kind of explanation, and secondly what the chi is able or unable to recount is often pretty convenient for the narrative but inconsistent (so he can leave his host and narrate from other places but he cannot narrate what is host does not want to remember?). Also, on the one hand, the chi is to be fully embedded in Igbo culture and only speak out of this context (for example what people mentioned before about the way he speaks about year dates) but then, on the other hand, he drops - without any further explanations - allusions to the Odyssee? There are many more examples. Of course, some of them I could just acknowledge as taking creative licence but some things did grate on me and I found unconvincing.
Though this is not my biggest gripe with the book (actually these are minor points). @kenyanbibliophile at Instagram wrote in her review: "At 512 pages I am still not sure whether Obioma meant to highlight toxic masculinity in an African setting or justify it." I don't know either but I can tell you what my reading experience looked like. I read more of 500 pages of someone justifying the deeds of violent men and the narrator wanted me to feel for him. This coupled with the fact that Ndali was a character who pretty much reads like the perfect male fantasy (a bit unstable thus in need of rescue, unconditional in her love, clever and beautiful and all there for great sex). And she is still the most fleshed-out female character in this book...
I have nothing against morally grey characters or the depiction of a sexist character as such, but this book had nothing to counteract the endorsement of this character.
The more I've thought back on this one, the more it has slid down my list. The story just doesn't resonate with me and the further removed I am from the novelty of the Chi narration, the harder it is for that aspect to rescue sub-par plot and character development. This is landing near the bottom of my list.
Charlott quoted: "At 512 pages I am still not sure whether Obioma meant to highlight toxic masculinity in an African setting or justify it."and wrote: I have nothing against morally grey characters or the depiction of a sexist character as such, but this book had nothing to counteract the endorsement of this character.
The chi narrator is trying to justify Chinonso's behaviour and portray him as a victim, but I don't think Obioma is, for the following reasons.
Everything which befalls Chinonso is at least partly his own fault and none of it is Ndali's. She was quite happy with him being a chicken farmer and to share his humble life, despite her privileged upbringing. He does not decide to sell up and study abroad 'for love', but because his pride is hurt by her family's attitude. He knows that Ndali would not agree with his decision, as her previous boyfriend did the same thing and it drove her to contemplate suicide, so he doesn't tell her until it is all arranged.
He is conned, but it was easy to do so. He sees a boy he despised at school make a success of his life, and his pride convinces him that he can do the same.
The incident with the nurse and her husband is unfortunate, but he makes no attempt to defend himself. If he had given his version of events, the police might at least have considered the possibility of his innocence and perhaps investigated whose hands fitted the bruises on the nurse's neck. This is probably a flaw in the plot, but it could be him resigning himself to his fate and casting himself as a victim or it could be his pride again, offended that anyone might think he had to rape a woman to get sex.
When he is released, he spurns all those who went out of their way to help him, including the college, and returns home. He does not return to or for Ndali and does not contact her for a long time. I don't remember what other reasons were given why he did not resume his studies, but one reason was that he was so ashamed and offended at being raped in prison that he could not remain in a country where someone might know about it.
There is no endorsement of toxic masculinity in any of that.
The final tragedy, in which Ndali is a victim, is entirely Chinonso's fault and the chi's special pleading sounds desperate. Chinonso did not intend to harm Ndali herself, but he did intend to destroy her business and her source of independence.
Val wrote: "The chi narrator is trying to justify Chinonso's behaviour and portray him as a victim, but I don't think Obioma is, for the following reasons."Thank you, for explaining your reasoning in such detail. While reading the novel, I did see that it shows how Chinonso contributes to his own downfall immensely. Also I am aware that the chi is not only making its case for Chinonso but also tries to prove to Chukwu that it is "a good chi". But still, that couldn't sway my general icky feeling with the novel. One of the reasons besides the premises of having a chi excuse a man's violence (and yes, I know, a very rough description) is just the general way in which Obioma writes women. Though I feel, my judgement would be less harsh if I hadn't had to read more then 500 pages of this novel. If I were forced to, of course, I could make an elaborate argument why the sprawling nature of the text is an integral part of the narration etc pp, but as a reader, I did not particularly appreciate it.
You guys are acting out the fight I was having with myself during the entire second half of reading of this one. Thank you for being more eloquent than me.
I can quite understand Charlott's general icky feeling, because I felt it too.
It took me quite a while to finish this one, partly because I was on a sightseeing vacation, but partly because it didn't call loudly to me to continue. I did like the Chi and I was engaged in the book, but I found it a bit slow. I have read through the comments here and agree with Ella that there are many eloquent words to consider. I'm interested in the morality question and I will continue to read more comments and articles about the book, but I don't think it's worthy of the shortlist.
I posted this to the main discussion thread but in a longer post. Obiama says in today’s Times that the book was “inspired partly by my encounter with John Milton’s Paradise Lost, contrary to the idea it was inspired by the Odyssey”
Which makes the publishers blurb (see opening post) seem odd.
He does say that the “influence ends at the level of structure”
The actual story is of course based on the true life story he witnessed
It’s impressive for an author to have their first two novels Booker shortlisted - but I cannot help feeling the literary merit of the two books falls short of that accolade.
Although a bit harsh to penalise the second (which I do feel is fringe of shortlistworthy) by the first (which I really felt wasn't). And as a alternative to the Western worldview and way of telling stores, it is an important inclusion on the list: a lot of us were expecting Freshwater and/or On Earth I'm Briefly Gorgeous for similar reasons.
Paul wrote: "Although a bit harsh to penalise the second (which I do feel is fringe of shortlistworthy) by the first (which I really felt wasn't). And as a alternative to the Western worldview and way of tellin..."I agree with you concerning the assessment of An Orchestra of Minorities versus The Fishermen. I was not at all a fan of The Fishermen while I feel that Orchestra is very worthy of the shortlisting this year.
In some ways, it reminds me of A Brief History of Seven Killings in that both books were frustrating to read (I wanted to fling A Brief History against the wall quite a few times with its repetitions and convoluted sentences) and required more heavy-handed editing but they both have ambitions that they more or less achieve.
In the case of A Brief History, the author displays a masterful command of voice; I can't think of any other novelist with that same level of mastery- not just depicting different classes of people, different levels of mastery of English but even how the way the characters spoke changed with time; in the case of this book, as I said earlier, it is an appropriation/reclamation of the English language by a writer growing up in a former British colony and bending it to tell a very different story. Apparently, this is a topic that Salman Rushdie also addresses in Imaginary Homelands (haven't had a chance to read the book yet).
Well, this was a disappointment, and would probably fall at the bottom of this year's Booker longlist that I have read. I really liked The Fisherman so I was hoping to disagree with most of you on this one. I like Ctb's descriptive "chi-splaining" - that's what it felt like. As Charlott explains also, some of it just didn't work - why would the chi have to explain how a chi works to the god that he is speaking to?I am interested in the defense of Chinonso though. Like others have said above, I don't think he was a nice guy at all. He was extremely cruel to birds who misbehaved which I took as the first clue to his true nature, despite what the chi said.
Why would the chi have to explain how a chi works to the god that he is speaking to?I don't know if true in Igbo cosmology, but a lot of religious ceremony / aural history does work like that.
Although I do like the chisplaining label!
From skimming the posts here I was under the impression that this book was not well liked by this group, but I read your reviews and almost everyone gave it 4 or 5 stars. I guess I will read it.
It feels a flawed book - the "chisplaining", the slightly concerning toxic masculinity, a story that can verge on the dull - but equally an ambitious and important one, particularly in terms of a non-Western approach to writing novels in English. Hence the 'not well liked' impression vs the end ratings I think.
I understand that. We can admire a book we don’t particularly enjoy reading. Sadly for my Booker goal I am not forcing myself to read it now. Haunted houses, unexplained sounds and dark shadows are more intriguing to me right now.
The author explicitly addresses the “toxic masculinity” assertions in some reviews, in this Front Row recording from the official Booker Book Groupshttps://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00...
Apologies I don’t know if the link works outside the UK
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I had trouble pushing myself through this one, but it was one of those books I felt was important despite maybe not loving the actual read. I have been trying to figure out what it is I find so compelling about both of his novels that I've read, and I think he handed it to me in the Guardian article GY posted in another thread: the pre-colonial experience in Africa was not one long night from which the white man came to save us. I’m persuaded that at the heart of our problem in Africa (and the black diaspora) is that we have not come to understand fully that we already had successful systems, and thus we carry an unconscious sense of inferiority that must be destroyed.
I believe it is my duty, my calling, to dig up these buried cities, reveal these cosmologies, and point my people to these truths and say: “See who we used to be.” It begins from writing our own cosmological novel, an Igbo Paradise Lost in which a spirit attempts to justify the ways of man to the gods.
The Black Panther film did the same thing.
WndyJW wrote: "The Black Panther film did the same thing."yes. yes it did. So do many books, and I've noticed this trend changing here in the US recently, but I wonder if I'd think that if I lived in Nigeria. I keep remembering an interview with Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie where she said she was leaving Baltimore/ returning to Nigeria because she didn't want her daughter growing up being black in the US, though there were many reasons returning was not good particularly for a daughter. I guess it's just about perspective.
The Mookse and the Gripes
Books mentioned in this topic
An Orchestra of Minorities (other topics)The Famished Road (other topics)
Freshwater (other topics)
An Orchestra of Minorities (other topics)
