Petals of Blood by Ngugi Wa Thiong’o

 Petals of Blood 

              by 

         Ngugi Wa Thiong’o

Hello Readers! This blog is a part of Thinking Activity. It was assigned by Megha Ma'am, Department of English, MKBU. In this blog I am going to write about some of the ideas about Petals of Blood by Ngugi Wa Thiong’o.

                                              

Author : Ngugi Wa Thiong’o

 

Ngugi wa Thiong'o was a famous writer from Kenya. He was born on January 5, 1938, in Limuru, Kenya. He wrote many important books, and one of his most famous ones is called "Weep Not, Child," which came out in 1964. It was a big deal because it was the first important novel in English written by someone from East Africa.

As Ngugi learned more about how colonialism affected Africa, he became more aware and changed his name to his traditional one. He also started writing in the language of the Kikuyu people, who are from Kenya. Ngugi wa Thiong'o was a well known writer from Kenya who wrote important books and made a big impact on African literature.

Ngugi received bachelor’s degrees from Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda, in 1963 and from Leeds University, Yorkshire, England, in 1964. After doing graduate work at Leeds, he served as a lecturer in English at University College, Nairobi, Kenya, and as a visiting professor of English at Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, U.S. From 1972 to 1977 he was senior lecturer and chairman of the department of literature at the University of Nairobi.  Click here (Britannica)

Petals of Blood 

      

‘Petals of Blood’ is a novel written by Ngugi wa Thiong'o. This novel was published in 1977 and set in Kenya after it gained independence from colonial rule. The title of the book comes from a line in a poem by Derek Walcott called ‘The Swamp’. The story follows four characters whose lives are greatly affected by a rebellion, as they try to adapt to a rapidly changing society influenced by Western ways.

Ngugi once said in an interview in 1969 that the perfect African novel should cover the time before colonialism, during colonialism, and after independence, while also pointing toward the future. Critics believe ‘Petals of Blood’ embodies this ideal. Ngugi spent five years working on the novel, completing it in 1975 while staying at the Soviet Writers Union in Yalta.

During the book's launch in 1977, the Kenyan Vice President, Mwai Kibaki, attended, suggesting Kenya supported freedom of speech. However, Ngugi was detained and later arrested the same year after releasing his Gikuyu play, ‘I Will Marry When I Want’.

Major Characters of the Novel : 

Wanja

Wanja is Nyakinyua's granddaughter. She is described as smart, passionate, intuitive, and determined. When she was young, she had to stop going to school because she got involved with Kimeria, a wealthy businessman, and got pregnant. Her father didn't support her, so she had to fend for herself. She ended up working as a barmaid and prostitute. She felt deep sadness for the child she lost and always wanted to be a mother again. She moved to Ilmorog to be close to her grandmother and became friends with Munira and Abdulla.  

Munira

Munira is one of the four main characters in the story. He left his wife and his controlling, wealthy father to start fresh in Ilmorog, where he worked as a teacher. He tried hard to fit in with the community, but he always felt a bit like an outsider. Munira was deeply in love with Wanja, but she did not feel the same way about him, which made him very upset. He was not very interested in politics or the struggles of the people around him, and he usually avoided those conversations. Because he grew up in a Christian family, he often felt guilty about his own actions, especially his romantic feelings for Wanja. Munira wanted recognition from his bosses, even if they were controlled by Europeans.

Karega

Karega is a determined and passionate young man who cares deeply about fighting for the people's rights. He grew up on Munira's father's land with his mother, but he never got to know his older brother Ndinguri, who was executed during the Mau Mau Rebellion. Karega attended the prestigious Siriana school for a while, but he got kicked out for protesting against the strict and unfair rules. He stayed there for some time and was the one who came up with the idea of the journey to Ilmorog. After the journey, Karega became a teacher at the school but felt frustrated. He believed the children weren't learning about Kenya's true history and the challenges they faced in Ilmorog.

Abdulla 

Abdulla is one of the main characters in the story. He is a shopkeeper who lost his leg during the Mau Mau Rebellion, which helped Kenya gain independence. He became friends with Wanja, Karega, and Munira after they all came to Ilmorog. Abdulla lived a simple life with his adopted son Joseph and his donkey. Abdulla was intuitive but often felt cynical and pessimistic. He did not like how people in power treated them in Nairobi, and he struggled with the changes happening in Ilmorog after their trip. Karega leaving and Wanja going back to her old life deeply affected him. He spent a lot of time feeling miserable and living in poor conditions before the murder happened. 

Themes of the Novel : 

Colonialism: 

Colonialism reflects a long lasting impact on Kenyan society particularly through the lens of exploitation, oppression, and the disruption of traditional ways of life.

Identity and Cultural Struggles:

Ngugi wa Thiong'o explores the complexities of identity and cultural heritage in the face of modernization and Westernization.

Corruption and Injustice:

Corruption and injustice are pervasive themes throughout the novel, reflecting the reality of post-colonial Kenya. The narrative exposes the exploitation of the working class by the ruling elite and the collusion between political power and economic interests.

Capitalism: 

‘Petals of Blood’ critiques the capitalist system and its detrimental effects on society and particularly in the context of neocolonialism. This novel depicts how capitalist exploitation exacerbates poverty, inequality, and environmental degradation. It exposes the ruthless pursuit of profit at the expense of human dignity and social justice.

History, Sexuality, and Gender in Ngugi’s Petals of Blood : 

In this article,  Petals of Blood offers at least two models for anti-Imperial history. The first is a model of black world historical struggle. We might call this epochal struggle. The second is a model of Kenyan national struggle.

Petals of Blood is interesting, because in it we see Ngugi’s political vision widening out from a decolonising nationalism to broader anti Imperial axes of identification. Ngugi’s University of Leeds research on George Lamming in particular, and to his wider reading in Caribbean literature more generally.

It is useful here to recall that Petals of Blood is named after a line in Derek Walcott’s poem, ‘The Swamp,’ and that it alludes to at least two of V. S. Naipaul’s novels reference The Mystic Masseur and The Mimic Men as the narrative unfolds.

In Caribbean literature and in the black diaspora more generally, Ngugi discovers a shared past of world historical proportions, and a community whose grievances and possibilities are global in scope. Petals of Blood undertakes an aesthetic of reconnection in which Caribbean, African American and African struggles for liberation are mutually informing and enlivening. 

Accordingly, the affiliations of Petals of Blood are diasporic, the scale of its ambition is epic, and its structure is almost biblical. This is no exaggeration. In Homecoming, Ngugi writes that ‘there is something about the Jewish experience, the biblical experience which appeals to the West Indian novelist. Biblical man has been a slave and an exile from home’.

Kenyan national history as a generational history of struggle. The novel is using an idea of generational history, derived from Kikuyu customary institutions, to think about democratic forms of political power. 

Petals of Blood relies to some extent upon indigenous mechanisms of naming associated with circumcision and clitoridectomy. Gikuyu oral history was remembered via the significant names given annually to the circumcision age-sets, and these names link each generation to the significant historical events that accompany their rite of passage into manhood or womanhood.

The novel also draws on the Gikuyu custom of itwika, in which there was a peaceful transfer of power from one generation to the next, approximately every 30 years. This peaceful transfer of power ensured a ‘democratic’ system of government, because no generation could exercise power for all time.

There are signposts in Petals of Blood that it is reviving this idea of itwika as a form of cyclical and revolutionary democracy. Itwika was introduced when the iregi age-set revolted against a despotic king, following which power passed peacefully to the ndemi age-set who settled to cultivate the land. 

Re-historicizing the conflicted figure of Woman in Petals of Blood : 

‘Petals of Blood’ by Ngugi wa Thiong'o shows his interest in strong female characters like Wanja. Wanja excels in areas where women characters don't often get the spotlight. She shows strength in her connection to the land, acts as a nurturing figure for the whole village, and takes charge of her own destiny.

Wanja decides to go back to the city despite it being difficult for her, showing her determination. Even after facing a terrible ordeal of rape during the journey, she keeps going. Wanja helps improve Abdulla's business using her knowledge of advertising and marketing. She also makes a good profit for both of them by introducing the theng'eta drink.

Wanja's turn to prostitution is sad and cynical, it's also a practical solution to her problems. Despite the hardships she faces, Wanja remains a powerful and determined character throughout the story.

Wanja's character indeed represents a significant departure from traditional portrayals of women in literature, particularly within the African and postcolonial canon. She embodies agency, resilience, and resourcefulness, qualities that challenge stereotypical depictions of women as passive or dependent on men. Wanja's portrayal resonates strongly with many feminists who appreciate her as a symbol of female empowerment and strength.

As Govind Narain Sharma suggests, Wanja is the spirit and earth of Kenya, humiliated, exploited and ill used . This all affirming acceptance of Ngugi's use of Wanja as trope has left him open to other important and little discussed criticism that has gone unanswered; or perhaps the lack of discussion is the answer in itself.

Ngugi's Marxist philosophies and that he also complicates this characterization with the use of Kenyan women's historical specificity. The fact of and meaning behind this specificity eludes Stratton's criticism precisely because her critique is Western feminist before it is postcolonial. 

In bringing to light the historical position of Kenyan women at the time the book takes place, to illuminate Wanja's character in such a way that we can see her, like Munira, Karega, and Abdulla, as a very real representative of the Kenyan nation.

The relationship between women, land, and sexuality than Ngugi's politics: it is also related to Gikuyu tradition. Carolyn Martin Shaw argues, the Gikuyu women do most of the extensive heavy labour in the fields. Thus, as Wanja works the fields with the Ndemi Nyakinyua Group and feels, in her ripening relationship with Karega, "about to flower" , she may be seen as culturally specific as well as archetypal.

According to Gikuyu tradition, woman is associated with land and land transfer; she functions as a mark of purity in this process. 

As Cora Ann Presley explains:

Women of Gikuyu tradition played an important role on ceremonial occasions, acting as witnesses and participants in rituals of primary importance to the community the ceremony of transfer was not complete without the presence and involvement of the Kikuyu participant's wives in the ritual that finalized the transfer of land. In another case when the kiama elders wished to purify a village women's participation in the ceremony was required.

References : 

• Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Ngugi wa Thiong’o". Encyclopedia Britannica, 1 Jan. 2024, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ngugi-wa-Thiongo . Accessed 28 January 2024.

• Nicholls, BL. “History, Intertextuality and Gender in Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s Petals of Blood.” Moving Worlds: A Journal of Transcultural Writings, 2014, pp. 71-76. E-print, https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/97268/ . Accessed 28 January 2024.

• Open AI. "Chat GPT-3.5"

• Roos, Bonnie. “Re-Historicizing the Conflicted Figure of Woman in Ngugi’s ‘Petals of Blood.’” Research in African Literatures, vol. 33, no. 2, 2002, pp. 154–70. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3820979 . Accessed 28 Jan. 2024.

Thanks for reading. 

Words : 2072