Pre-Colonial Africa in Colonial African Narratives by Donald R. Wehrs

Abstract

MLR, 104.3, 2009 879 English as 'compearance' (p. 11)). Her precision that forNancy sense' implies not abstract meaning but coexistence or touch (p. 16) gestures towards the complexity imbedded inher study's title. The book is comprised of seven chapters, each focused on a specific novel. As a group, Britton's choices suggest a canonical reading of Antillean literature, covering the best-known authors from the region, ifnot always their best-known work: Jacques Roumain's Gouverneurs de la rosee (1946); Edouard Glissant's Le Quatrieme Siecle (1964); Simone Schwarz-Bart's Pluie et vent sur Telumee Miracle (1972); Patrick Chamoiseau's Texaco (1992); Daniel Maximin's Vile une nuit (1995); and Maryse Conde's Desiderada (1997). The one novel likely to be less familiar to readers isVincent Placoly's VEau-de-mort Guildive (1973). Because Britton's book is addressed to specialists, she provides scant background information about the textsor their authors. Still, one of the evident challenges of Britton's project ishow to 'make sense' of texts that are, in fact,worlds apart.While she avoids the trap of synthesizing the disparate?her conclusion highlights rather the telling differences among the novels discussed?as a presentation of French Caribbean fiction, the study is somewhat uneven. Britton includes three novels each from Guadeloupe and fromMartinique, but only one from Haiti. Her corpus also spans a period ofmore than fiftyyears, moving from the deeply rooted agricultural community depicted in Roumain's Gouverneurs to Conde's Desiderada, where community is shaped by translocation from Guadeloupe to Paris to Boston. This leaves one to wonder how Britton might have approached works by contemporary Haitian diasporic authors, Dany Laferriere or Marie-Celie Agnant, for example, or even Rene Depestre. Similarly, Britton's brief discussion of the rich intertextual allusions inMaximin's Vile une nuit should encourage other scholars to take up where she leftoff,and topursue not only the novel's engagement with jazz and contemporary artmusic, but also the community of readers implied by intertextual reference. To return to the book's cover, the dust jacket features a painting Peaceful Market, by theHaitian painter Claude Dambreville. Like Britton's own title,Dambreville's suggests the stillness of themoment captured. What ismost striking, however, are the faces of the figures at themarket: several are turned full away from the viewer and none offersmore than a partial profile. This provides a strongmetaphor for the complex and disparate images of community that emerge from Britton's study. Revealing 'the sense of community' requires a patient interrogation ofwhat is, too often, obscured or taken for granted. Britton's book is a thoughtful and valuable contribution to discussions both of Nancy's work and about community in the French Caribbean; it will certainly become a touchstone for scholars in the field. New College of Florida Amy B. Reid Pre-Colonial Africa inColonial African Narratives. ByDonald R.Wehrs. Aldershot and Burlington: Ashgate. 2008. xii+206 pp. ?50. ISBN 978-0-7546-6088-0. Donald R.Wehrs's study explores the portrayals of pre-colonial Africa by African writers and is an impressive contribution to the field of (postcolonial) African 88 Reviews literature. It is extremely well researched and the author's deep understanding of indigenous African traditions permits him to gain valuable insights, allowing him to challenge current understandings of Africa before the colonial era. The work succeeds in shining a spotlight on thisneglected section ofAfrican literaryresearch and provides a critical overview of the differing perspectives available toAfrican authors. One of its major strengths is the comparative element. It compares both English and French-language textswith those ofHausa and Yoruba and, indoing so, investi gates thepolitical reflection in twentieth-centuryAfrican fiction inboth colonial and indigenous languages. This, in turn,encourages amulti-faceted approach toAfrican literature and its thematic complexities. In his introductionWehrs notes thatEuro pean fictionmerely perpetuates the colonizers vision of pre-colonial Africa. While he concedes thatEuropean fiction has a role toplay, he aims toprovide an overview of how African writers use their own, African strategies in order towrite of a past that is not exotic' but of livingmemory, communal debate, and personal identity' (pp. ix-x). Wehrs's principal objective is to examine the various...