Perspectives on Written Cameroon Literature in English

5. The Cameroonian Novel of English Expression

79 5 The Cameroonian Novel of English Expression Abstract This article is a brief but critical analysis of 22 novels written by 14 Anglophone Cameroonian imaginative writers. The themes treated by them, within the Cameroonian socio-cultural context, are many and varied. Although there seems to be no taboo subject beyond them, the novelists are not as ideologically radical as some of their counterparts in drama and poetry. All in all, the Anglophone novelists have adopted the novelistic form and the English language to serve the Cameroonian vision, and they have done so with varying degrees of success or failure. Some have handled plot, characterisation, structure, point of view, and language fairly well, but others have been less successful. Looked at globally, however, the literary output by Anglophone novelists is a positive contribution to the development of Cameroon literature in English. The paper holds the view that though vibrant, the Anglophone novel, technically speaking, needs improvement. In the heyday of British imperialism, when the British imperial flag fluttered with awe over her colonies, the prestigious English language, following the intentional undervaluation of the local languages of the colonized subjects, became the language of education, thinking, and conceptualization, in short, the language of success. Since serious creative writing by colonial subjects could be done only in English, the former appropriated the latter to articulate their cultural experiences, preoccupations and diverse fortunes in the aftermath of their historical encounter with disruptive British colonialism, giving birth to the now numerous English 80 literatures of post-colonial societies. It is in this broad context that we must situate the Cameroonian novel of English expression, since, following peculiar intervening historical circumstances, particularly the outcome of the First World War, the present English-speaking regions of Cameroon had become part of the British colonial empire. The opinion held in this paper is that contrary to the views of some critics, the Anglophone Cameroonian novel today is generally doing well, although, as an art form, it needs to be improved upon. In their seminal article, “Cameroon Literature in English”, in the now defunct ABBIA (1982), Nalova Lyonga and Bole Butake stated unequivocally that the Cameroonian novel of English expression, with only three published titles then, was the least developed genre in Cameroon. However, barely above twenty years after that pronouncement, at least twenty more titles have since appeared to the credit of the Cameroon novel in English. Because of limitations of space, this article takes but a bird’s eye-view of the novels’ central thematic concerns, and some aspects of their artistry. Like their counterparts in other post-colonial societies, the Anglophone Cameroonian writers, having adopted the novelistic form and the English language, are imaginatively exploring, dramatizing and exposing the social problems that preoccupy Cameroonians. Three novels are pre-occupied with the theme of cultural conflict: between the Cameroonian way of life and the European civilization. They are Kenjo Jumbam’s The White Man of God (1980), Joseph A. Ngongwikuo’s Taboo Love (1980), and Azanwi Nchami’s Footprints of Destiny (1985). Set in Nso in the North West Province of Cameroon, The White Man of God dramatises the consequences of early European Christian incursion into that part of Cameroon. In the text there are two opposed camps: the Nso people with their African traditional ways, on the one hand, and the European missionaries with their Western Christian values, on the other. Much of the conflict in the novel is played out 81 within the family of the adolescent Tansa, the first person narrator of the story. It pits Tansa’s Christian parents against his grandmother, Yaya, the epitome of African tradition, a conflict manifest in the contrasting lifestyles within the family. While Tansa’s Christian parents are doing their best to bring up their children in a Christian manner, Yaya is just as eager to let them follow the way of her ancestors. The ideological battle lines are drawn clearly in the manner Yaya carries out searching discussions, in turn, with her son-in-law and daughter, raising, in the process, fundamental questions about Christian theology. The high point of the broad conflict is reached when the Rev Father (Big Father) in anger unmasks a juju to the profane view of the public only to discover, to his shock, that the man behind the mask is none other than Matiu (Matthew) his own head catechist. This shock will eventually disable Big Father, symbolising...