Hello readers!
I am Nidhi Jethava and I am a student of MK Bhavanagar University department of English. As a part of our syllabus, we have one paper on ‘African Literature’. So in this thinking activity, I am going to write a brief note on the double colonization of women in the context of ‘The Joys of Motherhood.’ This novel is written by Buchi Emecheta.
About Buchi Emecheta:
Buchi Emecheta, who has died aged 72, was a pioneer among female African writers, championing the rights of girls and women in novels that often drew on her own extraordinary life, its trajectory spanning her struggle for an education to having her books set on school curriculums. Whether in her early vivid documentary novels, In the Ditch (1972) and Second-Class Citizen (1974) – about a young black single mother living in the slums of north London – or in the ironically titled The Joys of Motherhood (1979), set in a traditionally male-oriented society in colonial Nigeria, or in her autobiography Head Above Water (1984), or Gwendolen (1989), Emecheta’s writings epitomised female independence, the necessity to grow stronger in the face of any setback.(Margaret Busby)
About ‘The Joys of Motherhood’
The Joys of Motherhood is a novel written by Buchi Emecheta. It was first published in London, UK, by Allison & Busby in 1979 and was reprinted in Heinemann's African Writers Series in 2008. The basis of the novel is the "necessity for a woman to be fertile, and above all to give birth to sons". It tells the tragic story of Nnu-Ego, daughter of Nwokocha Agbadi and Ona, who had a bad fate with childbearing. This novel explores the life of a Nigerian woman, Nnu Ego. Nnu's life centres on her children and through them, she gains the respect of her community. Traditional tribal values and customs begin to shift with increasing colonial presence and influence, pushing Ego to challenge accepted notions of "mother", "wife", and "woman". Through Nnu Ego's journey, Emecheta forces her readers to consider the dilemmas associated with adopting new ideas and practices against the inclination to cleave to tradition. In this novel, Emecheta reveals and celebrates the pleasures derived from fulfilling responsibilities related to family matters in child bearing, mothering, and nurturing activities among women. However, the author additionally highlights how the 'joys of motherhood' also include anxiety, obligation, and pain.
Double colonization of women (With reference to The Joys of Motherhood)
“What has she seen? What terrible thing has this young woman seen?”
There are the beginning lines of ‘The Joys of Motherhood’. It’s very manifesting. The title sounds like joysness, happiness ans some kind of cheerful life of nigerioun women but it is totally opposite work, which describes the harsh reality of women who were firstly colonized by the colonizer and later on by their husband. Protagints Nnu Ego has also become a victim of this double colonization.
“Emecheta gives an unbiased and detailed account of all kinds of subjugation. In The Joys of Motherhood, the mother (Agunwa) and mistress (Ona) are both victims of patriarchy. While Agunwa dies of heartbreak, Ona’s tragedy lies in her traits, which do not empower her in any way. Agbadi’s jumping on her is less about lust and more about authority and power struggle. It was his way of ‘disciplining’ her. Most of the relationships that we encounter in the text are loaded with toxicity and deep-rooted patriarchy.” (Ankita Ghoshal)
“The glorification of motherhood strips the women off sexuality and erases the physical and psychological pain of childbirth.”
This quote clearly describes the glory of motherhood earned by sexual lust and the pain of childbirth. Nnu Ego is the mother of more than four children. She has suffered from laborer, no wealth, health, or money. This novel clearly put a light that how women at one hand suffered from colonizer and then suffered from subverting by their own husband. It is mostly on basis of physical and sexual desire. Throughout their life, she had struggles with social identity, wealth, and patriarchy. Her husband brings his dead brother’s wives too for his sexual desire and Nnu Ego feeds them too.
“She constantly tries to negotiate with all these forces with all her might but, apparently, constantly fails. She is chastised when she tries to hold onto her traditional values resisting colonial modernity. The alien world marginalizes her even more, and people claimed that Lagos contaminated her. She is stuck at a place devoid of privileges and joys of community. The men are all slaves of white men’s pride. The colonizers are controlling personal lives. From a community-based secured place, Nnu Ego moves to an industrial space devoid of security and hope. It is a clear binary between the pre-colonial Igbo village and the colonial Lagos, where men have no time to love. Nnu Ego gradually internalizes the colonial way of living. Adaku, on the other hand, when writes her own destiny, is heavily criticized and bashed by her own folks. Initially, we see a perfectly well-balanced patriarchal contrast where the man provides food and impregnate women. Then, things take a different turn, and ultimately, Nnu Ego becomes the breadwinner of the house.” (Ankita Ghoshal)
So concluding everything we can say that the work by Buchi Emecheta tries to dreg the idea of double colonized women in Nigeria as well as she talks about universal truth.
Thank you.
Works Cited
Busby, Margaret. “Buchi Emecheta obituary.” The Guardian, no. 3rd February,, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/feb/03/buchi-emecheta-obituary. Accessed 8 February 2022.
Ghoshal, Ankita. “The Joys of Motherhood by Buchi Emecheta [Review].” BookWritten, 5 May 2021, https://bookwritten.com/the-joys-of-motherhood-by-buchi-emecheta-review/2133/. Accessed 8 February 2022.
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