The narrative then shifts to Mariamu's husband Pipa. Initially enraged at the thought that Mariamu was not a virgin when they married, he gradually grows to accept and love her. When their son Ali Akber Ali is born and has fair skin and grey eyes, their marriage becomes strained again. Meanwhile, World War I has reached the small town of Kikono and Pipa is enlisted as a messenger, first by Corbin on behalf of the English and later by the Germans. After being arrested by the English as a messenger for the Germans Pipa returns home only to find that Mariamu has been raped and murdered. After her death Pipa discovers that she had stolen Corbin's diary. Pipa believes that the diary holds the secret to Ali's paternity, but since he cannot speak English, and is illiterate, he is unable to read its secrets.
There are conversations in the narrative which are never spoken (secrets), and there are prejudices held and never revealed (more secrets), and crimes committed and entombed in memory (yet even more secrets). Layers upon layers of misery.
the book of secrets mg vassanji
This paper will concentrate on the three main characters namely Corbin, Pipa, and Pius. Focusing on their personal struggles, experiences, desires and their relationship with other characters. Analysing their perspectives will help to identify their true motifs and therefore giving more implications and clues on how to solve some of the secrets. Before the conclusion, the pasts influence on the present will also be slightly touched upon.
When Pius Fernandes, a retired schoolteacher living in modern day Dar es Salaam, discovers a diary of a British colonial administrator from 1913, he is drawn into a provocative account of the Asian community of East Africa, and the liaisons, feelings and secrets of its people, over the course of a century. Part generational history, part detective story, part social chronicle, M.G. Vassanji's award-winning novel magnificently conjures setting and period as it explores notions of identity and exile. ...read more Format ebook
In 1988, a retired schoolteacher named Pius Fernandes receives an old diary found in the back room of an East African shop. Written in 1913 by a British colonial administrator, the diary captivates Fernandes, who begins to research the coded history he encounters in its terse, laconic entries. What he uncovers is a story of forbidden liaisons and simmering vengeances, family secrets and cultural exiles--a story that leads him on an investigative journey through his own past and Africa's.
"Venice has its gondola, London its cab, and Mombasa has its gharry, as I always say," says Hanning. He is a drifter, who answered the Club's notice, which was placed in the Cape Town Times, and came over to see the place, he says. The gharry is a tram running on rails and pulled by one or two natives. It is the only way to travel on the island, I am told. The PC is away and I might as well enjoy the metropolis while I can, before I get posted somewhere where I'll be lucky to have a roof over my head. He has given me a list of the sites to visit. The Club has a small guide book, which he has lent me to browse through. The old Portuguese fort is a must. The old name of Mombasa was Mvita, for war. ... Then the ancient mosque, the northern harbour where the dhows anchor, the water gate. And, no visitor to Mombasa misses the boat ride around the island ...
In 1988, a retired schoolteacher named Pius Fernandes receives an old diary found in the back room of an East African shop. Written in 1913 by a British colonial administrator, the diary captivates Fernandes, who begins to research the coded history he encounters in its terse, laconic entries. What he uncovers is a story of forbidden liaisons and simmering vengeances, family secrets and cultural exiles--a story that leads him on an investigative journey through his own past and Africa's.
History is a living force that sweeps up its characters in an ongoing narrative; the novel itself, "a living tapestry to join the past to the present," foregrounds the related processes of storytelling and historical reconstruction. History is a book of secrets that can never be fully exposed; it can only be interpolated and passed on, and the reading and telling of history is neither absolute nor objective. Vassanji's novel also investigates notions of home and community and the insidious legacy of colonialism and war. The Book of Secrets won the inaugural Giller Prize for fiction.
The book starts with the diary and grows into the narrative that Pius writes around it, based on research and interviews with descendants of three people who figure in it. Pius weaves in a reflection on his own lost life and a world that has passed away. 2ff7e9595c
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