ABOUT THE BOOK IN DEPENDENCE- BY
SARAH LADIPO MANYIKA
“In Dependence” was published in the UK in 2008, in Nigeria
in 2009 and in the US in 2011. It is Sarah Ladipo Manyika’s first novel. The
novel begins in the early 1960s when Tayo Ajayi meets Vanessa Richardson, the
beautiful daughter of an ex-colonial officer. Their story, which spans three
continents and four turbulent decades, is that of a brave but bittersweet love
affair. It is the story of individuals struggling to find their place within
uncertain political times – a story of passion and idealism, courage and
betrayal.
In Dependence can be described as a love story. But it is
more than that. It traces the trajectory of Nigeria’s political history; the
military coups, the bad and treacherous leadership, and its renewed tentative
steps towards democracy. It speaks to the demise – in the 1980s – of Nigeria’s
international reputation and the country’s rapidly destabilizing reality. It
looks at the poor whose situation never improved but actually worsened. Using
events in Tayo’s life, it describes the effects of misrule on the country’s
universities and the ensuing massive brain drain that Africa experienced. Sarah
Manyika achieves all this with a voice and an outlook that is truly authentic
and objective. The author captures the mood and feel of different decades and
the three continents – Africa, Europe and America – that serve as settings for
the story. Its scope is vast and sweeping.
REVIEW ON THE NOVEL IN DEPENDENCE- BY SARAH LADIPO MANYIKA
Tayo Ajayi, a Nigerian, and Vanessa Richardson, an English
woman, had their affair boiling when it started, but as circumstances were
meant to intervene, the relationship went sore and it seemed nothing could ever
bring them together.
The book has
characters that behaved in like-patterns, like in the case of Tayo’s friend,
Yusuf, who had dated lots of white English ladies. He (Yusuf) ended up marrying
a Nigerian Woman as predicted (Yusuf knew what he wanted and seemed to get it).
Tayo also ended up the same way in as much as his affair with Vanessa
Richardson had been gleaming, although his had been out of the mistake of
getting a young woman (Miriam) pregnant. And talking of pattern, the novel’s
beginning had opened up introducing Tayo’s affair with Christine, a Nigerian
Igbo lady. One would think that Manyika had to end Tayo’s relationship with
Christine for the sake of bringing in Vanessa into Tayo’s life, but still, Tayo
had to end up marrying Miriam. And still the marriage failed, giving in to the
familiar pattern.
Miriam in Manyika’s novel represented the breeds of the
Nigerians that would always run away to live abroad due to the collapsing image
of their home country. Miriam went away with her daughter leaving Tayo behind.
In as much as she persuaded Tayo, he wouldn’t go. She didn’t like an
inconveniencing life. She wanted the best life for her daughter. Tayo, on the
other side represented the crude breeds of Nigerians that felt home was home
even though the country was boiling in corruption. In as much as the failure of
the country stared firmly at his face with daggers, he chose to stay. Towards
the late pages of the novel he had to leave the country under threatening
circumstances against his life from the ruling military regime.
The entire novel is told from the good days of Nigeria’s
independence down into the nineties. I applaud Manyika’s ink, here. In as much
as the setting of this novel floated through England, Senegal, USA, and France,
she was able to use her third eye to draw out Nigeria’s journey into the worse
lanes of corruption, and hopelessness.
Faith is another issue that Manyika dealt with. It didn’t
matter to her if one was a Moslem or Christian. Reading through this novel, one
couldn’t tell if Tayo came from a Moslem or Christian family but we did know he
embraced more of the Christian faith. She failed to point out the difficulties
of inter-religious marriages in the novel, but centred more on the difficulties
of interracial marriage.
During Tayo’s life as a part time lecturer in Sans Francisco,
Manyika used a scene to unbolt some deeper issues of racism. She pointed out
the racist ties between the African American and the pure African. These issues
she raised apply everywhere even within Nigerians. A Yoruba would refer to an
Igbo as a greedy money monger and dubious monster, and in turn the Igbo would
refer to the Yoruba as a dirty, loquacious and foolish personality who spend
all he earns on parties and alcohol. It had to be understood that racism was
one those existences that would live for a long time as far as misunderstanding
between people existed.
I captured lines that are coated with humour in this novel,
but could be called racial remarks. Young black Yusuf came clean in his
conversation with Tayo. He said white women were for sex treats while black
women were for decent relationships that could lead to marriage. He added that
a white woman looked so old when she turned thirty.
The worst racist in this book is Vanessa’s father who was a
one time colonial master in Nigeria before 1960. He was against Tayo marrying
his daughter, and had refused to accept Vanessa’s adopted half-cast son. He
seemed more racial against half-casts earlier in the novel confronting Tayo
about his fears for a half-cast grandchild. It was later understood that his
hatred for the blacks was as a result of an affair his wife had with a black
man during the colonial era. Manyika, whose picture shows she is perhaps
half-cast, was able to make a point here. She drew a difference between being
black and being a half-cast (brown). This would have been quite a storm for her
to write about because of the racial wind against the brown people living in
whitely dominated regions. In contrast to a pure black country, half-casts are
seen beautiful which Manyika failed to point out. In fact in the black
continent, the typical black man may feel inferior to a half-cast.
Manyika was also able to portray the polemic attack Nigerians
receive from around the world these days. She didn’t bring this to print but
the image was represented, and I had to figure it out. I can say it clouds
around the pain felt each time an IELTS or TOEFL exam is required before a
Nigerian could study abroad. This doesn’t exclude a masters’ degree. Does the
world think Nigerians speak Latin or Greek or some kind of language called
‘Nigerian’?
‘I said I haven’t heard you speak Nigerian,’ Joyce says.
Joyce is one of Manyika’s English characters. And I like the
way Yusuf replies this. ‘Nobody speaks Nigerian, you daft thing,’
A coincidence in this novel which I refuse to accept was the
scene in which Vanessa had just come across one of her best music, Hugh
Maskela, a song that reminded her of Nelson Mandela… And on the same day, not
even up to two hours if I could rightly predict, her white husband is
presenting her with ‘Long Walk to Freedom’, Nelson Mandela’s biography. What a
coincidence!
I also do not embrace the fact that Manyika saw hope for
Nigeria through the eyes of Tayo only when Abacha died. There are still Abacha
loyalists in Nigeria today who will find this offending. She should have kept
the line in a riddle.
Vanessa did meet with Tayo at the end of the novel, but it
was hard to predict if at all a love relationship was ignited between them.
Vanessa was still married, but Tayo wasn’t. Manyika maintained a non-adulterous
plight between the two here. The happy-ending-formula which most romance writers
adapt was blurring in the novel.
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