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The bildungsroman is a genre of novels that has been popular since the 18th century. In modern African literature, Peter Abrahams’s Mine Boy marked the first exploration of the genre in 1946. Since then, whether as an allegory of the transitioning of a colonial state to an independent one or as a metaphor for the naivety of the human spirit, stories about children’s lives and growth have interested African writers.
In our latest book recommendation, we have compiled a list of seven books that will connect you to your inner child. From the story of a teenage girl growing up under an abusive father during a military regime in Nigeria to the boyhood memoirs of one of Africa’s literary giants, the books on this list will take you back to your childhood, reminding you just how far you have come in how you view the world.
Read our recommendations below.
Purple Hibiscus
Author: CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE
Genre: Fiction
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s debut is a story about a wealthy family in Enugu, Nigeria, headed by a successful businessman Eugene Achike. An overly religious Catholic, Eugene runs his household like a military dictator, enforcing his rule and holding his wife Beatrice and two children, Jaja and Kambili, in perpetual fear. He is an abusive husband and father who is both physically and psychologically violent to his family, while maintain a laundered public image.
The story is told from the perspective of Kambili, a bright but socially awkward 15-year-old girl who does her best to avoid her father’s rage. She experiences true freedom when she goes with her brother Jaja on holiday to their aunt Ifeoma’s house. There, they are struck by how free their cousins are, with lives not restricted by strict rules and routine. In Aunty Ifeoma’s house, Kambili and Jaja get to be kids for the first time, an experience that will forever change the course of their lives.
The Teller of Secrets
AUTHOR: BISI ADJAPON
GENRE: fiction
Nigerian-Ghanaian author Bisi Adjapon’s debut novel, The Teller of Secrets (originally published as Of Women and Frogs) has been described as ‘a tale of self-discovery and feminist awakening’—and rightly so!
It is the story of Esi Agyekum, a Nigerian-Ghanaian girl growing up in 1960s Ghana. Esi is an observant girl, paying attention to the complexities of the world around her. She knows about her father’s adultery and her half-sisters’ sex lives, but maintains silence about these, keeping the family’s secrets. However, when she engages in her own sexual exploration and is punished for it, she begins to question the double standards that characterizes society’s responses to men’s and women’s secrets.
WE NEED NEW NAMES
AUTHOR: NOVIOLET BULAWAYO
GENRE: fiction
Darling, a ten-year-old girl, lives in a shantytown named Paradise. She and her friends go around the neighborhood, navigating the chaos of an impoverished live after their homes are demolished by the paramilitary police. They spend their days playing, getting into mischiefs, and nursing big dreams for the future.
Through Darling’s eyes, we get a child’s view of the political climate of the country as well as the ugly realities of life in a shantytown. She soon moves to the United States to live with her aunt, and it feels as though she might be on the cusp of a better life. But there are new struggles to deal with as an African immigrant in America.
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NERVOUS CONDITIONS
AUTHOR: TSITSI DANGAREMBGA
GENRE: fiction
Tambu, a young girl growing up in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) has a dream to be educated. However, the men in her life prevent this. Her father, Jeremiah, believes girls have no business in school, and her brother, Nhamo, often mocks her for wanting to go to school.
When Nhamo suddenly dies, her uncle Babamukuru decides to sponsor her education in the missionary school where he is the headmaster. Thus, Tambu moves in with Babamukuru, finally getting her chance to actualize her dreams. However, she will quickly realize that things won’t be as rosy as she thought.
TOMORROW I WILL BE TWENTY
Author: ALAIN MABANCKOU
Genre: fiction
Congolese author Alain Mabanckou’s Tomorrow I Wil Be Twenty is a fictionalized memoir of the author’s childhood. It is narrated by ten-year-old Michel, carefree and kindhearted, growing up in Pointe Noire, Congo, in the 1970s.
Though only ten, Michel has grown-up problems: his twelve-year-old girlfriend, Caroline, has many demands and threatens to leave him for a bully in the football team, and a witch doctor has told his mother that Michel has hidden the key to her womb and that is why she cannot have another child. Michel must find this key for his mother to conceive again.
THE FAMISHED ROAD
AUTHOR: Ben Okri
GENRE: fiction
Nigerian author Ben Okri takes readers into the mystical world of the Abiku in his 1991 Booker-prize-winning novel The Famished Road.
In the book, we meet Azaro, an abiku born into a low-income family in an unnamed African city. Despite being incessantly harassed by his spirit siblings to leave his mortal life and return to the spirit world as is custom, Azaro decides to stay. He is bound by his love for his parents. Through his wise and curious eyes and his affecting lyrical voice, we experience the struggles of his impoverished family and the complexities of life in a post-colonial society. We also experience the poignant overlapping of the supernatural and the physical worlds that characterize the novel as a work of magical realism.
AKÉ: THE YEARS OF CHILDHOOD
AUTHOR: WOLE SOYINKA
GENRE: NON-Fiction
Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka has earned a reputation as the most detailed biographer of his own life, with memoirs capturing different periods of his lives. Aké: The Years of Childhood, is the first of these memoirs in terms of chronology. It gives a detailed account of his life as a little boy growing up in Aké, Abeokuta, before and during World War II.
Though non-fiction, Aké: The Years of Childhood comes with all the characteristics of the best fiction, bringing to live the preteen Soyinka for readers on the page. As American critic Carolyn Clay once put it, with the book, Soyinka re-creates ‘the sounds and smells and breaths of everyday…[capturing] the world as it must have seemed, in all its enchantment and perplexity.’