Fantastic Subversion of the African Postcolony in Songs of Enchantment
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20156009 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Maurice Taonezvi Vambe (0000-0002-0070-5049, University of South Africa, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2012 |
| Volume | 28 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 57-86 |
| Publication date | 2012-12-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Literary Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0256-4718 • E-ISSN: 1753-5387 |
| Publisher | Unisa Press (PUBLISHER • ZA) |
| DOI | 10.1080/02564718.2012.735068 |
| OpenAlex | W2056310983 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 19 |
This article explores the elements of the fantastic in Ben Okri's novel Songs of Enchantment. The novel has received little critical attention on its own terms. In contrast, this article demonstrates that Songs of Enchantment contributes to African cultural renaissance by questioning the politics of Nigeria in particular and the African postcolony in general. This article argues that through the spirit-child, Azaro, Songs of Enchantment not only renounces the notion of African history as repetitive; the novel itself is also made up of fragments of stories whose apprehension of reality is equally fragmented in order to partialise literary/narrative accounts and critical interpretations of politics in the African postcolony. The figural tropes Okri uses include deployment of the fantastic elements embedded in classical realism, folk tale, dreamlore, and the cautionary tale imbued with parabolic qualities. These literary strategies enable Okri to fundamentally fracture the unbearable tyranny of the abiku cycle and replace it with the dialogical notion of history that anticipates an open-ended reinterpretation of African liberation. Therefore, the novel's originality is based on its symbolical break with the archetypical myth of the abiku cyclic tradition
Aesthetics · Appropriation · Art · Epistemology · Literature · Narrative · Politics · Realism · Reinterpretation · Subversion · History · Literature, Magical Realism, García Márquez · Philosophy · Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies · Shakespeare, Adaptation, and Literary Criticism
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,11 |
| Citation span | 2017 - 2017 (1) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |