The outsider figure in Lewis Nkosi's Mating birds and Underground People.
Loading...
Date
2005
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
This thesis will examine the trope of the outsider figure in Lewis Nkosi's two
novels, Mating Birds (1986) and Underground People (2002). Since both novels
are set in South Africa and are informed by the political context of this country at
particular junctures, the thesis will focus on the. effects of apartheid on the two
black protagonists - central characters yet 'outsider figures' - in these novels.
This thesis will argue that Lewis Nkosi's own position as an 'outsider figure' in
South African letters plays an important function in his writing. In support of this
point, I will therefore also refer to his non fictional books, Home and Exile and
Other Selections (1965) and Tasks and Masks: themes and styles of African
Literature (1981). These books are particularly important because they document
Nkosi's comments on South African literature and his position as the 'outsider'
acerbic critic. Nkosi can be seen as an outsider figure being a young, black
South African living in an apartheid South Africa, and also, later, as a writer in
exile.
I have chosen Mating Birds and Underground People to illustrate my argument
because they are not simply 'protest' novels, (in the sense Nkosi argued in Home
and Exile and Tasks and Masks that so much black South African literature of a
certain era was), but rather they examine the complex effects of exclusion, with
regard to race and politics, on the individual. As the 'outsider' figure found full
expression in French existentialist writing, I will also look at constructions of the
outsider figure from an existentialist perspective. In his preface to the 2002
edition of Mating Birds, Nkosi reveals that the novel was to a large extent
influenced by Albert Camus' The Outsider (1942). In writing The Outsider,
Camus explores questions raised by the philosophy of existentialism. Similarly,
Nkosi looks at black existence in a hostile apartheid environment, the absurdity
of Sibiya's predicament and how he came to be there. He also explores the
harshness of the physical environment which is a literal representation of Sibiya's
anguish. Postcolonial analysis of 'othering', a logical extension of existentialism's
'outsider' figure will be used to support my argument.
Mating Birds (1986), among other accolades, won the prestigious Macmillan
International Pen Prize. Set between the 1950's and 1960's, it explores the
divisions and prejudices that were experienced between white and black in a
country steeped in racism and division. It deals primarily with the obsession an
educated, young, black man, Ndi Sibiya, has for a white woman, Veronica Slater.
Their illicit sexual relationship results in Sibiya being tried and convicted, by a
white court, for rape. Underground People (2002), Nkosi's second novel, set in
the late 1980's and early 1990's, takes the reader into the world of politics and
underground resistance during the apartheid regime in South Africa. It narrates
the adventures of Cornelius Molapo, an awkward member of the "National
Liberation Movement", the fictional name of the African National Congress.
Chapter One of this mini-dissertation will focus on a definition and exploration of
the outsider figure in selected literary and theoretical works. Chapter Two will
focus on the life and works of Lewis Nkosi in an effort to link the trope of the
outsider figure to Nkosi's own life experience. His books, Tasks and Masks and
Home and Exile, both collections of essays, help the reader to develop a picture
of Nkosi, not only as a writer but also as a literary critic whose writing developed
while in exile.
Chapter Three and Four will provide a literary analysis of Mating Birds and
Underground People, respectively. The analysis will deal with the outsider figure
as a prominent feature of both these novels. Post-colonial analyses such as
forwarded by Edward Said, Gayatri Spivak and Homi Bhabha will be used to
advance the thesis.
The conclusion (Chapter Five) will refer briefly to Nkosi's current writing projects
and situate them in the post-apartheid South African context. An assessment of
the on-going potential for the 'outsider' figure in Nkosi's contemporary work will
be made.
Description
Thesis (M.A)-University of Durban Westville, 2005.
Keywords
South African fiction., Theses--English., South African fiction--Criticism and interpretation.