Lost Books – Fragments

Ayi Kwei Armah is a Ghanaian writer whose first novel, The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born, has become a landmark of African Literature. Published in 1968, it remains in print to this day. Armah’s other fiction, however, largely written during the 1970s, has slowly fallen out of favour. Spurrred on by Joy delire’s month of African Literature, I decided to read his second novel, Fragments, which tells the story of a young man, Baako, returning to Ghana after spending time abroad; above all, it is a tale of frustrated idealism and disillusionment.

The novel opens with Baako’s departure, but even at this point it is clear that his return is what excites his relatives: “there was such hot desire impatient for his return at his departure.” His mother is confident “He will come back a man. A big man.” Only his grandmother worries for him, picturing him abroad as she accompanies him to the airport:

“All the people were white people all knowing only how to speak the white people’s languages…But Baako walked among them neither touched nor seen, like a ghost in an overturned world in which all human flesh was white.”

Her fears are justified: we discover later that during his five years away Baako has been ill with a “sickness of the soul”; where she is wrong is in the assumption that he will no longer feel isolated once back home. In fact, her picture of him applies as much on his return to Ghana as it does in America, his idealism contrasting with the cynical realities of the time and how he is expected to act as a “been-to.” Even before he sets foot on Ghanaian soil again, he is faced with the crass materialism he will experience on his return in the shape of fellow passenger Brempong:

“It’s no use going back with nothing. You may not have the chance to travel again in a long time. It’s a big opportunity and those at home must benefit from it too.”

Brempong regularly ships goods over – a widespread expectation, as Baako will discover when he is asked again and again when his car will be arriving. (Later doubts will be voiced regarding his time abroad on the evidence that he is regularly seen at a bus stop). Brempong is also not impressed with Baako’s attitude to employment – that is, his expectation that his qualifications will gain him a job with state television: “You have to know people.” Which is, of course, what he eventually has to resort to, contacting an old teacher:

“It all keeps coming back to this, in the end,” he said, lifting the receiver, “The organisations might just as well not exist. You keep getting pushed into using personal contacts.”

His idealism is similarly undermined by the job itself. Believing that film is the art of the future – “in many ways, I’ve thought of the chance of doing film scripts for an illiterate audience would be superior to writing, just as an artistic opportunity” – he is disillusioned to discover that the television station sees as its main purpose the coverage of state events:

“We have to follow the Head of State and get pretty pictures of him and those around him…We had a lecture before you came. A nation is built through glorifying its big shots. That’s our job anyway.”

Literature itself doesn’t escape censure: as one writer says at an event Baako attends, “Nobody meets to discuss real writing anymore. This has become a market where we’re all sold.”

The corruption that Baako sees all around him is also evident in his own family, particularly when his sister gives birth. The outdooring ceremony for the child is held early to quickly follow payday and maximise returns. Much is made of the money given by the important guests to encourage others to be generous. The child later dies.

The novel is not entirely gloomy, however – Baako finds love when he meets Juana, a Puerto Rican doctor who also gives the reader an outsider’s view of Ghanaian society: “another defeated and defeating place.” But even love cannot save him form the frustration he feels at the corruption around him and the expectation that he be a part of it:

“I know what I’m expected to be…It’s not what I want to be.”

This sentence demonstrates why the novel has universal appeal. It’s version of Ghana may be dated, but its portrayal of a man struggling against both his family and his society, unable to accept their values, remains as relevant as ever.

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Tags: ayi kwei armah, fragments