Stylistic Features in Balisidya's Short Stories

  Dedication  4

  Asanteni  5

  I Introduction  6

2.  The Choice of Balisidya s short stories brief note about the author  11

3.  Aim Theoretical Framework and methodology  15

3.1  Aim  15

3.2  Theoretical Framework  16

3.2.1  The short story  16

3.2.2  The Swahili short story  18

3.3  Features of the Swahili short stories  20

3.4  Methodology  21

4.  The Gist of the Stories  24

4.1  Ushindi wa Majeruhi Victory of the victims Wounded Victory  24

4.2  Akusamehe Dhambi zako May God forgive your sins  26

4.3  Jongomeo The next world  27

4.4  Mwano The struggle  28

4.5  Hadi Kifo Kitakapotutenganisha Until death brings us apart  29

4.6  Semeni Say it  30

4.7  Ndoa Masihara Is marriage a joke  33

5.  Choice of the Titles of the Stories  35

5.1  Justification for the choice of each title of the stories  35

5.2  Titles and the meanings of the Stories  37

5.3  Titles and their artistic embodiments  38

5.4  Titles and psychological implications  39

6.  Structures of the Stories  41

6.1  The plots and the spatiotemporal movement of each individual story  41

6.1.1  Ushindi wa Majeruhi  41

6.1.2  Akusamehe Dhambi Zako  43

6.1.3  Jongomeo  43

6.1.4  Mwano  44

6.1.5  Hadi Kifo Kitakapotutenganisha  45

6.1.6  Semeni  45

6.1.7  Ndoa Masihara  46

6.2  Characterisation in each individual story  47

6.2.1  Characterization in Ushindi wa Majeruhi  47

6.2.2  Characterization in Akusamehe Dhambi Zako  49

6.2.3  Characterization in Jongomeo  50

6.2.4  Characterization in Mwano  51

6.2.5  Characterization in Hadi Kifo kitakapotutenganisha  51

6.2.6  Characterization in Semeni  52

6.2.7  Characterization in Ndoa Masihara  53

6.3  Narrative techniques  55

6.4  Voices and point of view (s)  63

6.5  Beginnings and endings of the stories  64

7.  Linguistic techniques-Style  67

7.1  Salient figures of speech  67

7.1.1  Allusions  68

7.1.2  Contrasts  69

7.1.3  Enumeration  69

  2  

7.1.4  Gradation  70

7.1.5  Hyperbole  71

7.1.6  Imagery  72

7.1.7  Implication  74

7.1.8  Onomatopoeia  75

7.1.9  Oxymoron  76

7.1.10  Repetition and its manifestations  76

7.1.11  Tropes (antonymy metaphor extended metaphor metonymy simile synecdoche  

  and synonymy)  77

7.1.11.1  Antonymy  78

7.1.11.2  Metaphor  78

7.1.11.3  Metonymy  79

7.1.  11 4 Simile  79

7.1.11.5  Synecdoche  80

7.1.11.6  Synonymy  80

7.2  Double meaning general truth idioms and proverbs  81

7.2.1  Double meaning  81

7.2.2  General truth  81

7.2.3  Idioms  82

7.2.4  Proverbs  83

7.3  Lexical creativity and borrowing  84

7.4  Punctuation sentential length and shortness  85

7.4.1  Punctuation  85

7.4.2  Sentential length and shortness  86

8.  Change and experimentation  88

8.1  Experimentation in Balisidya s short stories  88

8.1.1  Songs  89

8.1.2  Magical Realism  89

8.1.3  Shift of Topics  91

8.1.4  Fragmentation  92

9.  Conclusion  93

  Bibliography  96

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Dedication

This dissertation is dedicated to family Ngasseu in Douala (Cameroon), family Putschli

in Chemnitz(Germany) and to the two angels who give a real sense to my life. You are loving

people, my pride and source of inspiration. ALLAH YA BA DA SA’A!

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Asanteni

As in any human enterprise, the completion of this work obtained, thanks to the joined efforts of many people who each at individual level offered me their help. First and foremost, I would like to extend my sincere gratitude to my academic supervisor Prof. Dr. Said Ahmed Mohamed. Khamis. Throughout my studies and the writing of this dissertation, he has been a special academic guide and a mentor. Without him I would not have overcome the lack of cultural background that sometimes frustrated me. During lectures and outside lectures, he shares with students his broad knowledge of the Swahili language, linguistic, literature, culture, history and his pedagogical skills. I profoundly esteem his readiness to elucidate students on troublesome aspects even away from the campus.

I am very grateful to Lecturers of Afrikanistik I and II. They have in various areas developed my interest in research. I thank particularly Prof. Dr. Gudrun. Miehe for her strict training, inspiring lectures and always recommending some readings. I thank Prof. Dr. Dymitr Ibriszimow for his meticulous remarks and the attitude of good criticism. They have all been a source of motivation.

I thank Clarissa Dittemer for reading this work and making useful suggestions, Ramzi Ben Amara for helping me out in the cumbersome issue of giving a uniform format to this dissertation, Nana Serge and Antoine Yaovi Hounhouenou for their friendly and moral support.

The University library was my second informant in writing this dissertation. Thanks to Mr Detlev Ngassong for his expertise.

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I Introduction

Each piece of literary work is a storehouse for boundless possibilities. The author of any work, be it poetry, novel, drama or short story composes his work or puts his thoughts into words or actions, because he has certain feelings to express or a message to convey. This can be done consciously or unconsciously. This hints at the fact that writing can be considered as one side of the coin, perceiving or reception ¹ being the other side, which in my opinion, is mainly personally and textually oriented. Generally speaking, factors that account for works on particular writers are: number of publications, targeted audience and topics tackled, sales record, amount of critical interest, presence or absence in institutional curricula and fame of the author to name just a few. However, my argument is that the best writers are not only those who are known even if this seems to be the tendency. Therefore, my intention here is to break this rule by exposing my understanding and interpretation of short stories known as hadithi fupi in Swahili. These short stories were written between 1977 and 1982 by Balisidya Ndyanao, ² an unknown Swahili scholar and a creative writer.

A priori, one might question the validity and objectivity of interpretation and grounds on which it is based. I do not pretend that the ‘meaning’ I give to the texts are the referential truth. Rather, my analysis is a commentary based on correspondence and coherence between parts of the texts, the meaning of similar texts, textual linguistic evidences, my ‘historical knowledge of the subject matter’, ‘rules or public conventions of the language in which the texts are written and the author’s intention. It should be reminded that what is called the author’s intention is a debatable topic. In short, my interpretation falls within the lines of what Juhl (1980:6) conveniently calls a ‘statement about the critic’s personal preference based on his own beliefs, attitudes, habits of mind; in short on his own individuality’.

As a starting move, it might be useful to have a look at the state and status of the short story. The main problem with the short story lies within what I am tempted to call here its generic classification. In this regards, I would like to substantiate the controversy assigned by

¹ Here a mention can be made of the reception theory in literature which opens reader’s endless interpretation possibilities.

² Balisidya being unknown as a writer is confirmed by Khamis, Said (personal communication, December 2005) who, on taking part in a Swahili Conference attended by Swahili scholars in November 2005 at Eldoret was very surprised, even upset to note that Balisidya’s collection of short stories have not reached the deserved audience though it was published by Dar es Salaam University Press in 1994. Moreover, it is quite surprising to find out that no mention is made to Balisidya’s works in Ohly’s (1981) monumental work on Swahili prose of the 1970s.

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pessimistic academic terminologists to the short story by referring to two anecdotes that I find worth questioning in order to capture the worthiness of the topic at scrutiny. The first anecdote is an interview between Katherine Mansfield, the New Zealand greatest literary figure who revolutionised the 20th Century English short story and a friend who inquired about her job. It reads:

A B

What do you do in life?

Do you write dramas?

Do you write tragedies, novels, romances?

After the conversation, she added that she wished she would have said at least one ‘yes’ to the big things; these being in this case tragedies, novels and romances.The implication here seems to be that the friend questioning Mansfield about her work does not know much about the stance of the short story in the literary field. This justifies the choice of the second anecdote involving literary specialists. It is a comment made by Zola, a writer of masterpieces. To him, despite the grandiose repertoire of Maupassant’ s short stories published in several volumes and still acknowledged worldwide as some of the best of the genre, ⁴ Maupassant had not reached the stage of being regarded as a full writer given that his plots are limited to the short story. It clearly appears that short stories are to him, in opposition to his “oeuvre de longue haleine”,” oeuvre de courte haleine” ⁵ .

These two yarns draw the light on the difficulty to assess short stories. Added to this classificatory problem, there is also the hair-splitting issue of theory and terminology. Reid (1977:1) observes that theoretical discussions were begun by Edgar Allan Poe in the 18 ^th century with the emphasis being laid on criteria such as : slightness, slickness, brevity and causal linking of events in a story. This might be true but how effective are these criteria?

³ Quotation taken from Shaw 1983. p.2 ⁴ See for example Maupassant Contes et Nouvelles, two collections of more than 150 masterly short stories including some which have been translated into several languages. Some recommendable titles would be: Boule de Juif, Une Aventure parisienne, Le condamné à mort, L’héritage, Malades et Médecins, Le retour, la veuve.

⁵ To me, “oeuvre de longue haleine” means an exhaustive work or a work which is long enough and complete, therefore, “oeuvre de courte haleine” would mean a brief work and to a derogatory extent a work that can be achieved by anyone.

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As regarding the problem of terminology, a wide range of terms has been proposed to short story in several languages. One has to keep in mind the fact that these cognates are not always strict equivalents to short story and might have been influenced by the literary trends of the time such as renaissance, (revolutionary) romanticism, structuralism, formalism and enlightenment. About ‘roman languages’, Gillespie (1966:225) points that ‘Novel, from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries, had a meaning, which, like the French nouvelle, stemmed from Italian novella and Spanish novella’. Worth keeping in mind is the novelty aspect given that a short story is almost always a ground for new experimentations and should not thereof be taken for the novel. Nevertheless, how was the situation like in non-roman languages areas? In German, in contradiction to roman languages, the cognate Novelle developed. Here attention should be paid to this false friend, for as Ludwig Tieck (in Reid’s 1977:12-13) observes:

The action of a Novelle must have “sonderbaren, auffallenden Wendepunkt” [curious, striking turning point] and that its plot follows “aufsteigende und scharfabfallende Kurve [rising and sharply falling curve] whereas that of a Kurzgeschicht ⁶ , Kilchenmann notes should present “ein Stück herausgerissenes Leben” [a fragment of extracted experience] and as a plot “netzhafte Verflechtung” [netlike interweaving] (Reid’s translation).

Added to derogative remarks such as “only short stories, just short stories, journalistic writing, how long is short, small thing, short novel or kind, abbreviation of a romance, illegitimes Kind der Novelle ⁷ ”, this innuendoes that the short story till a certain age had not received the scholarly attention it deserved; if that is still not the case today. It is with strong argument that Reid (1977: 2) asserts:

Probably the most widely read of all modern genres… yet even now, it seldom receives serious critical attention commensurate with that importance… Good books about the novel are legion; good books about the short story are extremely scarce.

⁶ “Kurzgeschichte” is the literal or word to word translation of the word “short story”.

⁷ “Illegitimes Kind der Novelle” means illegal child of the novel. This terminology was used by Johanes

Klein.

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This quotation rightly figures out the imbalance between the originality of the genre, its long tradition incorporated in tales and myths and the lack of scientific attention it has benefited from. Reid is supported in this regard by Chukwuma (1978) who pictures the genre as “the prose of neglect” insisting on the scarcity of scholarly critics especially of African short stories.

Obviously, almost three decades have gone by since their observations were made. Scholarly works on the genre have improved. Reviews, articles, essays, books and anthologies of short stories are now commonplace in most European languages and attempts are also made to compile short stories in some African languages such as Swahili, Hausa and Yoruba. All the same, in comparison to the volume of publications concerning genres like novel, play or poetry, the metaphor of the tree that hides the forest comes into play. The picture of the short story still being scanty in European languages, what would be the case with African languages whose literature is in significant terms still unknown if not difficult to access? Some factors accounting for the neglect of the short story in African languages are: poor documentations of many languages connected with the incapacity to write and to be read in these languages, lack of interest from publishing houses, probably due to readability and buying quota, editorial exigencies, authors choosing to write in languages such as English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and surprisingly enough the attitude of Africans themselves towards writing and reading in African languages, be it from scholars or from the common men. This argument requires an example. A scholar arguing against the publication of a booklength study of African short stories in which special attention would have been paid to the stories of Chinua Achebe and Taban Lo Liyong made a disparaging observation that I am quoting in extenso:

The appeal of the subject will be mostly at the tertiary level and within a very limited circle of Achebe devotees. The audience is unfortunately limited and even for a regular honours degree class “Girls at War” is mostly taught as a peripheral text and in very few institutions in Nigeria. “Fixions” and Lo Liyong’s other works are hardly familiar texts to most students and indeed teachers of modern African literature, and I am not sure there will be a significant change in the reception of Lo Liyong’s works largely because of the artificiality of his so-called experimental forms ⁸ .

⁸ Quotation taken from Balogun (1991:4).

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Such a comment about works by Achebe and Liyong, two well-known African writers in English despite their overemphasis on tradition for the first and sometimes the misconceptions of experimentation for the second, portrays the misfortune of short story in many African countries and can help in anticipating the desperate situation of writing in African languages. Hence, one of the main objectives of this dissertation is to prove wrong those who assign a pessimistic future to writing in African languages. My contention is that literature in African languages, Swahili in this case, can in various respects contribute to literature in general, be it in terms of techniques, topics, creation and especially experimentation of new features. The next section will explain the choice of Balisidya’s short stories.

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2. The Choice of Balisidya’s short stories, brief note

about the author

Having read and studied a number of short stories in Swahili from different renowned writers such as Euphrase Kezilahabi, Mohamed Said A, Mohammed Said Abdulla, Mohammed Suleiman Mohamed, Kyallo Wamitila, Ken Walibora, Said Waziri and Ali Hassan Marshad, I was stroke by the fact that the field seems to be quite a misogynistic one. ⁹ So far, I have come across four female short story writers in Swahili namely: Clara Momanya, Rayya Timammy, Rosa Shake and lastly Balisidya Ndyanao whose collection of stories Ushindi wa Majeruhi na Hadithi Nyingine really gained my attention. Blommaert (1999:146)

talks of the development of a feminist trend of writing and literary critique, epitomized in the works of Penina Mlama and Balisidya Dyanao. It is urgent to strengthen that this work does not target feminist studies though elements of feminism if attested in the texts will not be overseen. My intention is to undertake a stylistic study of the collection of shorts stories Ushindi wa Majeruhi na Hadithi Nyingine written by a feminist writer of the 1970-80s in

Tanzania.

Ushindi wa Majeruhi na Hadithi Nyingine is a collection of short stories written between 1977 and 1982 but published posthumously in 1994. The booklet comprises seven short stories with length varying between five and nineteen pages and made up of nine hundreds to four thousand words. We ought to stress here that the length does not have any implication on the quality of the text. It rather seems to be a deliberate choice from the author aiming at either ending the text abruptly to create space for imagination and creativity, or narrating the story to a point that can be assumed ¹⁰ to be its obvious end. This issue will be left aside given that my task is not to entangle myself in the polemics of the appropriate or convenient length ¹¹ of what can be considered a modern short story, ¹² for I consider this parameter as a minor one in assessing a good piece of writing. However, it is clear that categorization is necessary to avoid divorcing from the context of the study. For this sake, I

⁹ This assumption is confirmed by Bertoncini (1996(a): 9) who remarks that there are very few Swahili female writers.

¹⁰ I use the word “assume” because the short story seems to me to be a genre whose end cannot be easily identified as a finite category.

¹¹ Here see (Reid’s 1977: 9) discussion about the ‘hard-and-fast-rule among contemporary magazines of keeping inside the range between six and eight thousand words.’ ¹² Another problem is that of defining a modern short story.

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consider Balisidya’s stories by virtue of their length, nature of composition and criteria of the Swahili short stories that will be sketched in section 3.3 to be short stories. Balisidya has, according to Said Khamis ¹³ introduced new pre-modern and challenging experimental features that I intend to investigate in what Mulokozi (1985:174) rightly calls “serious” Swahili fiction. Her writings do echo the political context of Tanzania at the time of their composition. In this case, the ’identity-constitute labels’ ¹⁴ such as Ujamaa 15 [communism, kinship], Utaifa [African nationalism] and the Azimio la Arusha [Arusha Declaration] These were key words of Nyerere’s politics whose results can only be discussed at encyclopaedic length. The texts that I am assessing highlight the need for a new society wherein human values and rights, excellence and common interest should take precedence over selfishness and resources squandering. This might explain her departure from the realistic mode ¹⁶ to the surrealistic and existentialist ¹⁷ mode of writing. On the whole, she is a revolutionary writer of her time who voices out her frustrations and bitter feelings about a society experiencing multilayered chaos in the name of development and cooperation with the centre. To her, this cooperation benefits only to unscrupulous political opportunists with unchecked backgrounds who squander state money for their leisure whereas the workers paying high taxes are missing basic resources such as: clean water, clothes, food and medicine to name just a few. For sure, such a context is appropriate for critical creative work. It is with strong arguments that Ohly (1981) refers to the literary scene of the 1970s in Tanzania as “aggressive prose” in the sense that writers, be it of fiction, drama or poetry, all allocated themselves ¹⁸ the task of demystifying Nyerere’s fabulous promises whose poor results could be spurred by the common man. Funnily enough this common man was arguably the target of this politics ¹⁹ .

Interestingly enough, Balisidya herself, in the preface of her collection describes the context in which she composed her short stories as that of an experimentation, which then

¹³ Said Khamis, Said (2005: personal communication).

¹⁴ Expression borrowed from Blommaert (1994).

¹⁵ Wamitila (1998:83) well puts this situation in talking of ‘the cruelty and inhumanity that characterized Tanzania’s implementation of its Ujamaa type of socialism…the implementation was riddled with corruption and had a revenge motif as a motivating force.’ ¹⁶ It is worth noting that her novel Shida (1975) falls under the realistic mode whose aim is simply to describe life constraints following some prescribed rules.

¹⁷ The surrealistic mode is mainly characterized by the freedom writers take in terms of techniques whereas Wamitila (1998:81) sees existentialism as a historical mood expressing despair and disillusionment. 18

It is necessary to isolate from this category writers of Ukuta: Chama cha Usanifu wa Kiswahili na Ushairi Tanzania; the society for Swahili composition and Poetry in Tanzania, led by Mathias Mnyampala. The reason is that they were members of a literary society created by the development of Swahili literature and committed into singing praises to governmental actions.

¹⁹ Here, reference is made to Nyerere’s Shabaha ni mwanadamu: [the target is man.]

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gained weight in terms of shape, form and especially content. Her statement reads ‘Utungaji wake ulikuwa ni shule na majaribio, kwa hiyo zinapitana kiuzito katika fani, mtindo na hata maudhui’.

At this level, it appears to be crucial to say a few words about Balisidya Dyanao ²⁰ given that biography, though an external feature, cannot be separated from internal textual evidences. Nonetheless, one should also keep in mind that ‘biography does not have the same weight as textual evidence.’ ²¹ May Lenna Balisidya was born in Dodoma on 10 ^th May 1947. She died on 27 ^th December 1987. During her primary and secondary education, she attended schools designed for girls; that which might have nurtured her critical stance regarding women issue. These are: ‘Mvumi Girls’ primary school, ‘Msalato Girls’ school in Dodoma and ‘Jangwani Girls’ school at Dar es Salaam where she brilliantly passed her high school certificate in 1966. Regarding her academic curriculum, she mainly taught at the University of Dar Es Salaam where she got a Bachelor of Arts in 1970 and seven years later a Master in oral literature. The last degree she obtained in a very precarious health state is a PhD on The Impact of language Planning on Oral Literary Creativity from the Department of African languages and Literature of the University of Wisconsin, Madison. She started her professional career in 1970 as a teacher of English, History, Swahili language and literature in secondary school. At that time, the school was no longer designed only for girls. In 1974, she was recruited as a tutorial assistant at the Kiswahili Department at Dar es Salaam University where she later became assistant lecturer, lecturer and finally a senior lecturer. In Madison, she was first a research assistant, then a teaching assistant. This good progression was the result of hard work, attendance to numerous conferences worldwide and her dedication to research in different fields. A witness to her scholarly commitment is the number of articles and books she published and academic awards she was granted.

As far as publication is concerned, she is author of the novel Shida that was published in 1975. She has co-authored two plays, a book on Swahili literature and theatre and two children books. More than ten of her articles were published and a great number of her scientific contributions were selected for posthumous publication. Her areas of research were mainly language planning, theatre, Swahili literature with a focus on the oral aspect, children and women education. At the international level, she was granted renowned scholarships such as Fulbright, Ford Foundation and DAAD.

²⁰ See the dedication to Balisidya by Senkoro (1987: 6-13).

²¹ Cf. Juhl (1980: 88-89).

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In short, she was a lecturer of African oral literature and Swahili language at the University of Dar Es Salaam between the 70s and 80s; a job that she perfectly combined with her commitments to several organisations outside the university and her family role as a mother of two children ²² . The last years of her life were a constant nightmare due to her acute health problems. She died of a cancer, which was probably diagnosed while she was on a PhD ²³ grant in Wisconsin Madison, United States of America.

The justification for this background knowledge is that it entails facts that are relevant to the understanding of each of the stories that enhance some biographical elements. By this, I mean that all stories in a refined way, reflect her philosophy towards the societal and therefore political life, her reflections on being a woman, a mother, a teacher and a citizen on the whole, life and especially death. Regarding death, it will certainly be illustrative to quote her resolution from a letter ²⁴ to the Head of Kiswahili Department at the University of Dar es Salaam some months before her death:

If death comes in a month or two or more, so what? I am not immortal and so is no one of this flesh…I shall not live in anticipation of death. That is a domain I have no power over. I shall live a life worth dying; and so here I am, carrying on as normal until such a time.

It is therefore without surprise that the topic of death is very pervasive throughout the stories I am going to investigate. This condensed biography aims at introducing the author in concrete terms but also to anticipate biographical elements in the texts that will be studied. As far as possible, I would try to examine the extent to which biography is to be considered in her collection of short stories. I will try to answer questions such as : how much biographical features can be tolerated in a textual criticism? Which impact do they have on text understanding? Are we supposed to adopt an intra-textual approach or an extra-textual approach? My argument is that it is enriching to consider biographical elements in literary criticism for, to me, totally separating biography from writing seems to be restrictive and, to a certain extent superficial. The justification for this observation is the fact that a writer mostly composes his texts from the point of views of his life experiences or those of people immediately surrounding him.

²² She was married though as a firm feminist she rejected the name Mrs. Matteru.

²³ “A PhD that she defended in bed and celebrated her success in a wheelchair” as Senkoro (1987:6) put

it.

²⁴ Id

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3. Aim, Theoretical Framework and methodology

3.1 Aim

The foregoing section gave an appetizer for the thrust of this investigation. It is clear that Balisidya’s neglected ²⁵ collection of short stories is a significant contribution to Swahili literature, be it thematically, structurally, stylistically, experimentally, historically, psychologically and to a good extent philosophically. Her writings embody the use of salient figures of speech to which she gave new functions. These are among others: allusions, enumerations-doublets and triplets, hyperboles, oxymoron, repetitions of various types, sharp ironies, parallelisms, personification and depersonalisation and tropes. In order to strengthen some ideas, she makes use of specific features such as: biblical references, expressive language, fragmentation that will turn out to be a key feature in modern Swahili novel, intentional misspellings, “irregularity as a structural device suited to capture the heterogeneousness of modern experience” ²⁶ , literary translation, linguistic deviations ²⁷ , lots of appropriate neologisms, maxims, new syntactic patterns, poetic licence and poetic transfiguration, private metaphors and personal idioms, profusion of words with double meaning and proverbs. The local and trans-cultural nature of the texts are revealed through the use of: colloquialisms, dialectal terms and sociolect, lexical and cultural transfer. Moreover, an original aspect of her work lies in the successful use of features of oral literature in her short stories. Elements of orality ²⁸ that could be identified include: epics, the dialectic narrator-audience, fables, legends, myths, songs and imitation of spoken language. Worth stressing is also her extension of the structural scope of narration. She manipulates with artistry the apocalyptic mood, intriguing plots, under-plot and extended plot, varying voices and points of views, switch from active to passive heroes, archaic and reactionary forces versus progressive and modern forces, special characterization, complex settings, various moods and tunes and a particular graphology. Furthermore, I am tempted to agree with Khamis Said who observes that Balisidya had started to put into practice a feature, which is

²⁵ My use of the term neglected can be explained by the fact that there is to my knowledge no scholarly essay or thesis on this collection of short stories. I stand corrected.

²⁶ Expression borrowed from Bertoncini (2000(b)).

²⁷ By deviation, I mean the author’s attitude of voluntarily breaking the rules established by conventions. ²⁸ A key feature of orality being the narrator or storyteller standing in front of the audience to narrate his story. In many stories of the collection, I have the feeling that there is a kind of conteur [French word for storyteller] whose job is to inform if not to educate the reader.

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still a threat to non-trained readers namely magical realism ²⁹ . This is considered as a trend that involves many elements of metaphysics. Finally, I see in Balisidya’s writings a great number of historical elements. By this I mean social events, which have taken place outside Swahili areas. An example is the Mau Mau war. So to say she is not only a socio-political writer, but also, a writer of her time whose style is a labyrinth that has to be explored. As far as possible, I will attempt to provide textual evidences to the above-mentioned observations focusing on how the message is rendered. In so doing, I will undertake to investigate the fictional and narrative techniques rather than just what is said ³⁰ keeping an eye on merits and demerits of the various techniques she used. This is indeed an essence of literary criticism. Another perspective of this work is to contribute to the assessment and documentation of literature in Swahili, at least at a pre-doctoral level.

3.2 Theoretical Framework

In order to elucidate the nature of the question, which I undertake to survey, the frame of reference for this discussion is the short story as a genre with the focus on the Swahili short story. At a first view, it is quite difficult to give a draft of such a broad and highly debated topic, but the following section will present the scope of the genre.

3.2.1 The short story

There exists a quite impressive volume of works about short stories, but what is striking is still the dilemma to come to an agreement regarding a unanimous definition and establishment of features of the genre. This openness is certainly a clue to the dynamic nature of the genre that is a constant subject to experimentation and novelty. Therefore, the features I take into consideration are those that can, to a very restricted sense, be considered universal or at least conventional. According to Garland 1989’s ‘representative cycles’ construed on the basis of famous short story writers such as James Joyce, Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, William Faulkner, Flannery O’ Connor to name just a few, an overview of short story

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Wamitilla (1998:89) defines magical realism as transgression of ontological and generic boundaries, fusing spaces, worlds and systems, fantasy, hallucinatory scenes and phantasmagorical characters. Good examples of African works exhibiting magical realism in English are Ben Okri’s The Famished Road and Cheney-Coker’s The Last Harmattan of Alusine Dunbar.

³⁰ This is referred to in the literature as the dialectical relationship between the ‘what’ and the ‘how’.

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principles is attainable. Her book is to me, among the plethora of titles and despite some overgeneralisations one of the most illuminating on the short story. Foremost, she convincingly argues that the term “short story” has been introduced in 1880s and that the short story cycle has existed only since the nineteenth century though it underwent major changes in the twentieth century. To Garland (1989:xii), the short story is a work of

appropriate size (shorter than novels and generally longer than one or two pages, as far as size is concerned, it would be impossible to be more specific than this), if they contain some kind of development (physical or psychological) or revelation and if they create a sense of closure.

Her definition overtly acknowledges the impossibility to talk of a precise length regarding the short story. All the same, she identifies unifying patterns such as ³¹ : chronology, plot, character and conventions associated with the short story cycles, which are listed below:

• generic signals: titles being named after a single story to which the phrase ‘and other stories’ is appended. Generally placed first or last in

•

•

•

•

•

•

• narration.

³¹ Id.p.14.

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Conscious of the everlasting debate about the short story being a child of the novel, Garland insists on the fact that a short story is neither a short novel nor a novella. She advances two main distinctions between the short story and the novel, namely: character and plot. This is expressed in the following lines:

As far as character is concerned, there is much less emphasis on a protagonist in the short story cycle than is generally the case in other fiction. There is considerably less emphasis in unified short story collection on plot or chronology, at least as these terms are usually defined, no notion of chapter to chapter familiar to the novel.

These criteria are sketchy and especially formal though they appear to be tendencies towards basics of short stories. All the same, they are not clear and rigid enough. They are simply conventional guidelines. If we strictly follow them, a collection of stories without a table of content for example would not be considered as such; that which is not true. Generic signals are quite important but I think it is exaggerated to say that the title of a single story reflects what the author ‘feels is the best work or, in some cases, the best-known work’; ultimately the decision regarding the title is generally influenced by publishing houses which consider this aspect as crucial in gaining potential readers’ s attention. She claims that characters dominate stories that which is not quite true because it is possible to have good short stories without a visible and recognisable character. Now we will check whether these standards apply to Swahili short stories and if yes to what extent?

3.2.2 The Swahili short story

Swahili short story is a particular subject of curiosity regarding the context in which it emerged, the attention it gained from various organs and the speedy transformations it has been undergoing over the years. Here is what an authoritative voice has to say about this development:

A prose that has received far less attention than the novel has been the short story. East-African Swahili newspapers like Mambo Leo, Taifa Leo, Baraza, and Mzalendo seem to have served as the initial outlets for short-story compositions, going back to the early years of colonial rule. Later, beginning in the 1960s, Kiswahili, the official journal of the Institute of Swahili Research in Dar Es Salaam, also began publishing

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Swahili short stories on an irregular basis. Anthologies on short stories, however, do not seem to have appeared until the early 1970s. An important stimulus in this direction was the BBC radio Swahili short-stories competitions that were launched in 1967. Mazrui (2004:212)

He goes on by mentioning some authors whose talents clearly emerged and were acclaimed following the BBC competitions. These are among others: Mohamed Suleiman Mohamed, whose stories were first published in a joint authored publication of Hekaya Za Kuburudisha Pavumapo Palilie in 1971 and later on in 1978 in a collection entitled Kicheko cha ushindi (Laughter of Victory), Saad Yahya, author of Pepeta (Rice Flakes), 1973,

Mohamed S.A, author of Si Shetani si Wazimu (It’s neither spirit nor insanity), 1985, Gabriel Ruhumbika with Uwike Usiwike Kutakucha (Cry or not, Dawn will break), 1978 and Msokile with his book Misingi ya Hadithi fupi (Foundations of the short story),1992.

It helps to learn about the emergence of the Swahili short story but a clear definition of the genre would have been more illuminating. Regarding the definition of Swahili short stories, I consider the attempts made so far not be substantial for two reasons. Firstly, works such as Msokile 1992 and Mbatiah 2000, which in the first section aimed at defining or categorising the Swahili short stories, are to a great extent the translation of features identified for the genre in western languages especially from English into Swahili. For example, Mbatiah (2000:viii-xiii)’s section on Mwongozo wa kuhakiki Hadithi Fupi [A critical approach to short stories] is essentially a translation of features mentioned in Forster (1927), Reid (1977), Ohly (1981) and Shaw (1983). Secondly, I strongly believe that a static definition of the genre is not possible given that short story writing as novel writing is a genre permitting endless flexibility and changes at a tremendous speed. Therefore, I am of the opinion that it is possible to talk of short stories of a given period thematically as Ohly (1981) qualified the Tanzanian prose of the 1970s as an aggressive prose. A clear-cut definition and categorization would be vague for newly published short stories and those in publication will surely challenge the features established. All the same, there are features, which can be taken to be common to short stories as shown in the previous section. Following this gap, the definition of the Swahili short stories in this work is mine, evolving from texts I had the opportunity to read. It is clear that it varies from one text to the other, but this is intended to be a primary guide to my argumentation. Under Swahili short story, I understand a text of limited length, understood by the writer himself as a short story, involving actions undertaken

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by either a character or characters (living or not) ³² . The text should enhance a clear degree of causality not only in a chronological order but especially in a logical one, and which verbally narrated would fulfil the functions of a modern tale. Of course, it should be written in Swahili and should ideally be inspired by life in a Swahili area.

3.3 Features of the Swahili short stories

What I am attempting to name the features of the Swahili short story listed below are my suggestions. They are based on short stories I have read and appear to me, to be frequently used. For sure, this list cannot be exhaustive given that characteristics of any genre are also associated to the period, but it is intended to be a catalogue helping in mirroring the commonness and uniqueness of the genre in Swahili. These are:

complexity that is different than the tram of a novel, it might be more intricate than a novel or not; the point is that it is definitely an independent genre with its own rules. titles which are mostly simple, but sometimes perplexing. Generally, they give a hint at the meaning of the story. Generally speaking, the title involves the first or last story of collections; a feature that Garland identified with right.

it narrates a series of events always culminating in a climatic or dramatic incident.

the ending hardly couples with the beginning (surprising ending).

behaviour. Moreover, they can easily be recognised in reality in the sense that they reflect social life. Mostly they do not give good examples because they are intentionally portrayed as: robbers, corrupted politicians, children who disobey to their parents, educated who look down upon those who are not educated. If they are good natured, they face numerous (social) obstacles.

female characters are generally portrayed as destitute if not prostitutes who cause sufferings to male characters. They are also victims of male domination and social constraints. Regarding maternal and marriage obligations, they are good examples. Very few female characters rebel and proclaim women rights, but once they do, they are very frightening.

³² This restriction is influenced by Hadi kifo kitakapotutenganisha [Until death brings us apart].

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topics: deeply rooted in daily life and inspired by them, especially situations causing sufferings. Recurrent themes are : colonial and postcolonial politics, traditional versus modern life, rural/urban, (the rural area being the repository of moral values whereas the city is mostly depicted as the centre of abomination where the motto is ‘man-eat-man culture’), injustice, corruption of educated people, marriage and aids.

setting: mostly culturally specific: Swahili area though characters sometimes travel in the course of their motif; a feature peculiar to genres like epic, legend, and tale. plots are mostly based on the ‘third person narrator’, though the author’s views are consistently geared in his characters’ voices.

tune: mostly pessimistic, satirical and overwhelmingly critical given that it depicts in an urgent mood social crises.

language: well articulated, intentionally breaking conventions, praising traditional values such as marriage, religious education, culture of secret and respect of prohibitions though admitting that change cannot be overcome, rather the direction of change should be examined. It is a rich language full of anecdotes, idioms, biblical and Koran verses, maxims and proverbs.

tendency towards didactic: to me, there is hardly such a thing as “art for art sake” regarding Swahili short stories. In general, they enhance a moral lesson. I am convinced that each Swahili short story can be summarised in a proverb or is inspired by a proverb. a genre steadily in transition, be it thematically, stylistically or regarding experimentation.

dynamic: it adapts to social changes and changes in the literary scene.

its nature, content and forms of expression.

3.4 Methodology

Indeed, understanding literature needs a bit of cultural background for as it is known, literature is neither produced ex nihilo nor in a cultural vacuum. It is always the mirror of a society that produces it. In this regards, Ohly (2005:223) remarks that: ‘tt is essential to stress that a certain author is every time spokesman of viewpoints connected with a certain society culturally constituted’.

I find it important to lay emphasis on key words of his quotation: ‘author’, ‘spokesman’, ‘viewpoints’, ‘society culturally constituted’. I do share his opinion about the role of the

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