A Momentary Taste of Being

I do not read books in translation nor books by authors outside the United States simply for the pleasure of being able to claim some sort of faux-eclecticism.  I read a book because something about it engages me, and Ms. Gappah's book of short stories certainly did that.  I've posted numerous excerpts from the book in the recent past, so you already have a sense of the quality and breadth of the writing. An Elegy for Easterly is a book of short stories and it is an uneven book.  Some of the stories are superb--masterful, controlled, eminently entertaining.  Others seem to have lost their sense of purpose and it is at times difficult to make out what the author was trying to get at.  All of the stories have a very highly refined sense of place that allows one a better sense of a small portion of the African continent. Let me start with the perceived flaws: at times it seems that Ms. Gappah wishes to limit her audience to those with a robust knowledge of the...

I'm really enjoying Petina Gappah's collection An Elegy for Easterly --and what follows shows one of the reasons why. from "The Mupandawana Dancing Champion" in An Elegy for Easterly Petina Gappah Fame is an elastic concept, especially in a place like this, where we all know the smells of one another's armpits. Mupandawana, full name Gutu-Mupandawana Growth Point, is bigger than a village but it is not yet a town. I have become convinced that the government calls Mupandawana a growth point merely to divert us from the reality of our present squalor with optimistic predictions about our booming future. As it is not even a townlet, a townling, or half a fraction of a town, there was much rejoicing at the recent ground-breaking ceremony for a new row of Blair toilets when the district commissioner share with us his vision of town status for Mupandawana by the year 2065.

from "Something Nice from London" in An Elegy for Easterly Petina Gappah We wait for the Friday morning flight from London, as I stand with my mother, my brother Jonathan, and his wife, Mukai, and watch through the transparent glass of the observation platform. Our somber faces are out of place, surrounded by those that smile in anticipation, with mouths that laugh and fingers that point out to children, there they are, there she is, he is here at last; they arrived on time. My mother stares unseeing at the passenger below us who crane their necks to look up at the platform, anxious to catch a glimpse of a familiar face, arms waving and jangling with bracelets, faces broad with smiles. They have made an effort for the flight, the women in manicured wigs and weaves, their England clothes fitting well, their skin lightened by years and maybe even by just as little as six months of living out of the heat and stress of poverty. Those receiving them have also made an effort, ...

Another moment with Petina Gappah, showing a different side, a different mood: from "The Annex Shuffle" in An Elegy for Easterly Petina Gappah Only outside this window is there change, yet even there, a repetitive pattern asserts itself. On Second Street Extension, the cars, buses, emergency taxis are filled with people going about the business of living, the occupants within unaware of the gazes without. One time, two times, five times a day she sees the van and cars from her suspended life. Up and down goes the little green bus, moving between the city center and the university. UNIVERSITY OF ZIMBABWE, a white station wagon says in blue lettering, FACULTY OF LAW. The car is so close that she can make out the faculty motto below the university crest FIAT JUSTICIA, RUAT CAELUM. The motto is more than just the words of Caesoninus on a crest, it is a song in her soul, the reason she is a law student, the meaning she wants to give to her life. "Let justice be done tho...

Moving now swiftly from Ethiopia to Zimbabwe (with a brief refresher in Dublin, more about which, perhaps later), we encounter a writer new to me, at least, who while lacking the sometimes gorgeous prose of Maaza Mengiste, certainly does not lack her discerning eye.  And that eye is accompanied by a sharper and perhaps more acerbic wit than is witnessed in Beneath the Lion's Gaze .  This all makes for a very nice change of pace: from "At the Sound of the Last Post" in An Elegy for Easterly Petina Gappah [at a funeral oration] I listened to the rhythm of his speech. Having addressed theme number one, the liberation struggle, it was time for the second theme. By the time I counted down from ten, he would have begun to attack the opposition. I reached six, his voice echoed out over the hills. "Beware the puppets in the so-called opposition that are controlled from Downing Street. They seek only to mislead with their talk of democracy." The microphone h...