1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910484289703321

Autore

Spencer Robert

Titolo

Dictators, Dictatorship and the African Novel : Fictions of the State under Neoliberalism / / by Robert Spencer

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cham : , : Springer International Publishing : , : Imprint : Palgrave Macmillan, , 2021

ISBN

9783030665562

3030665569

Edizione

[1st ed. 2021.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (ix, 276 pages) : illustrations

Collana

New Comparisons in World Literature, , 2634-6109

Disciplina

823

809.39351

Soggetti

Literature

African literature

Imperialism

Literature, Modern - 20th century

Literature, Modern - 21st century

World Literature

African Literature

Imperialism and Colonialism

Contemporary Literature

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Chapter 1: Introduction: The unfinished project of decolonisation -- Chapter 2: Neoliberalism and the 'recolonization' of Africa -- Chapter 3: Performance and power I: Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's Wizard of the Crow -- Chapter 4: Performance and power II: Ahmadou Kourouma's Waiting for the Wild -- Chapter 5: Allegories of dictatorship in Nigerian fiction: Chinua Achebe's Anthills of the Savannah and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Purple Hibiscus -- Chapter 6: Conclusion: The counter-counter revolution. .

Sommario/riassunto

This book examines the representation of dictators and dictatorships in African fiction. It examines how the texts clarify the origins of postcolonial dictatorships and explore the shape of the democratic-



egalitarian alternatives. The first chapter explains the 'neoliberal' period after the 1970s as an effective 'recolonization' of Africa by Western states and international financial institutions. Dictatorship is theorised as a form of concentrated economic and political power that facilitates Africa's continued dependency in the context of world capitalism. The deepest aspiration of anti-colonial revolution remains the democratization of these authoritarian states inherited from the colonial period. This book discusses four novels by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Ahmadou Kourouma, Chinua Achebe and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in order to reveal how their themes and forms dramatize this unfinished struggle between dictatorship and radical democracy. Robert Spencer is Senior Lecturer in Postcolonial Literatures and Cultures at the University of Manchester, UK. He is the author of Cosmopolitan Criticism and Postcolonial Literature (2011) and the co-author of For Humanism: Explorations in Theory and Politics, with David Alderson (2017), and co-author of Postcolonial Locations: New Directions in Postcolonial Studies, with Anastasia Valassopoulos (2020). .