Dealing with a Troubled Rhodesian Past: Narrative Detachment and Intimacy in Peter Godwin’s Mukiwa (1996)
Abstract
This article argues that one of the challenges white Zimbabwean writers have to deal with in their narratives is a troubled colonial past. In Peter Godwin’s Mukiwa, A White Boy in Africa, there is a plain acknowledgement that Rhodesia had problems of legitimacy, which made the treatment of blacks before and during the war unjustified. Godwin’s rendition of the past is therefore informed by this recognition, compelling the author to employ narrative strategies which make it possible for him to embrace certain aspects of the past while simultaneously distancing himself from others. This analysis of Godwin’s Mukiwa shows how a re-imagined childhood consciousness enables an understanding of the Rhodesian past. Through this narrative strategy, Godwin is supposedly faithful in rendering the past, including its imperfections. Furthermore, the Rhodesian past is depicted as a baneful entity that estranges whites from the Zimbabwean present.
Opsomming
In hierdie artikel word aangevoer dat een van die uitdagings waarmee Zimbabwiese skrywers in hul narratiewe te kampe het ’n gekwelde koloniale verlede is. In Peter Godwin se Mukiwa, A White Boy in Africa word openlik erken dat Rhodesië probleme met legitimiteit ondervind het, wat gelei het tot ongeregverdigde optrede teenoor swart mense voor en gedurende die oorlog. Godwin se weergawe van die verlede is gebaseer op hierdie erkenning, wat die outeur verplig om narratiewe strategieë te gebruik wat dit vir hom moontlik maak om sekere aspekte van die verlede toe te eien terwyl hy hom terselfdertyd van ander distansieer. Hierdie ontleding van Godwin se Mukiwa toon hoe ’n herverbeelde kinderbewussyn begrip van die Rhodesiese verlede moontlik maak. Deur sy narratiewe strategie is Godwin skynbaar waarheids-getrou in sy weergawe van die verlede, die onvolmaakthede ingesluit. Verder word die Rhodesiese verlede voorgestel as ’n verderflike entiteit wat blankes vervreem van die huidige Zimbabwe.
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