Never Look an American in the Eye: A Memoir: Flying Turtles, Colonial Ghosts, and the Making of a Nigerian American by Okey Ndibe (review)

Never Look an American in the Eye is Nigerian-born Okey Ndibe's hilarious but penetrating and, as some critics have concluded, charming memoir, which details aspects of his life and times in America. In it, he provides information on substantive relationships that he has had with some of Africa's leading writers, including Chinua Achebe, who passed away a couple of years ago; Wole Soyinka, the first black Nobel laureate in literature and a distinguished author and playwright; Kenyan-born Ngugi wa Thiong'o, a distinguished professor; and Ghana-born Kofi Awoonor, a well-known diplomat, cited in the acknowledgments—together with Achebe, and Aliu Babatunde Fanfunwa—as being the memoirist's "three inspiring ancestors" (p. 210).

In chapter three, Ndibe spells out what brought him to America, prompting him to implore his readers "never [to] look an American in the eye"—part of the title of the book. He visited Achebe at home in Nsukka, Nigeria, adding: "The purpose of my visit was to receive my marching orders. [Achebe] was the person who had invited me to America, and he was my sponsor in chief" (p. 37). Ndibe was moving to America to edit African Commentary Magazine, owned by Chinua Achebe, author of Things Fall Apart, a famous novel, which has been translated into more than fifty foreign languages. Ndibe "had visited [Achebe's] home several times before and had sat with him for long hours, in a spare, neat living room or under the garden's shaded foliage" (p. 37), but this time the memoirist decided to have a good look at the renowned writer: "He always had a calm avuncular air about him. A Nigerian journalist had once observed, aptly, that Achebe 's clean-shaven, placid face resembled a cleric's" (p. 37). As it could easily be, when a young person comes into the presence of an influential or a dominant personality, Ndibe was so nervous that "the drippy bottle of beer [he was offered] did little to calm me. My agitation had nothing to do with being in Achebe's presence" (p. 37). Instead, "it was the weight of my impending assignment in the United States that left me uneasy, a bit shaky. I fixed on Achebe's every gesture. He spoke in Igbo, a choice that somehow rendered the occasion more solemn. . . . Sometimes his voice hardly rose above a whisper as he expressed his vision for the magazine he was handing me the challenge to birth in the United States" (p. 38).

Following his visit to Achebe, Ndibe's decision to travel to the United States became more solidified. The distinguished novelist had spoken delicately, but the context did lend clarity to the statements he made. Achebe "didn't have to spell out what he meant. For me, the only question was whether I was up to the task. And I felt ready, even if a tinge of anxiety was present" (pp. 38–39).

Of the memoir's eighteen chapters, including the acknowledgments section, chapter two, "Never Look an American in the Eye," explains the riddle behind the title. Those words, as shown here, were uttered by Ndibe's Uncle Ochendo, as he admonished his nephew: "And the first thing to remember is this: never look an American in the eye" (p. 33). Ndibe indicates that he did not understand the uncle's warning, not even after the uncle had elaborated on it: "Americans can't stand any stranger looking them in the face. They take it as an insult. It is something they don't forgive. And every American carries a gun. If they catch you, a stranger, looking them in the face, they will shoot" (p. 33). Other family members also offered their counsel. Auntie Eleti, for example, told him unambiguously: "Make sure you don't bring us...