Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is an award-winning Nigerian author who writes
about her homeland and how its people are conflicted between their own unique
African identities and the onrushing tide of Westernisation.
Her first novel,
Purple Hibiscus was set in a time when Nigeria was ruled by an army
dictatorship; her second, Half of a Yellow Sun, covers the civil war at the
end of the 1960s when the state of Biafra attempted to form a separate country
for the Igbo people. Americanah moves to more recent times when teachers and lecturers
are on strike, causing many students to leave Nigeria to seek higher education
in the USA or UK. Adichie is a very talented writer and I would strongly
recommend all three.
In Americanah we follow the lives of Ifemelu and Obinze from
the friendship of their school days through to a growing affection and a deepening
relationship in their teens. They have become soulmates but are now forced apart when
Ifemelu leaves Nigeria for the USA to continue her stalled education. She
expects Obinze to follow her, but he is unable to do so and ends up in the UK.
Unable to pay her rent and unable to get a job Ifemelu cuts herself off from all contact with Obinze, not replying to his many letters and emails.
Here are two intelligent, aspirational, young Nigerians seeking
an education worthy of their talents but now seen as strangers and aliens, having to fight
to achieve status and recognition against immigration barriers and endemic racism. Their ambitions are frustrated at every turn and Obinze is forced back to Nigeria.
Adiche studied in the USA and cleverly throws a strong
light on racist issues by means of Ifemelu starting a blog called "Raceteenth". Some blog posts are interspersed with the text of the
novel and take the reader out its fictional world into the harsh reality of the
real thing.
One particularly moving episode in Americanah is the election of Obama as
the first black president of the USA
Blaine was crying holding Araminta who was crying
then holding Ifemelu squeezing her too tight and Pee was hugging Michael and
Grace was hugging Nathan and Paula hugging Araminta and Ifemelu was hugging
Grace, and the living room became an altar of disbelieving joy.
Her phone bleeped with a text from Dike, “I
can't believe it. My president is black like me.” She read the text few
times her eyes filling with tears.
On television, Barack Obama and Michelle Obama and
their two daughters were walking onto a stage. They were carried by the wind,
bathed in incandescent light, victorious and smiling.
“Young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and
Republican, black, white Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight,
disabled and not disabled, Americans have sent a message to the world that we
have never been just a collection of red States and blue, states. We have been
and always will be the United States of America”
Remember those heady days when the world seemed to turn a corner of tolerance and hope? Read this and weep.
Although this novel is rich in many things, the central core is
a love story. Can young love survive change and maturity, the separation of
distance and time, and the emotional turmoil of other relationships?
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has given a TED talk on "The Danger of a Single Story" and this
beautifully written novel challenges the reader to open his/her mind to the
multitude of stories of other people and other nations so we may better
understand our common humanity.
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