Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie brings us the fictional work entitled “Birdsong” in 2010, and as is usual for her, does so in a way that seems to be nonfiction. Reading anything by Adichie, the prominent Nigerian author, who frequently puts a 21rst century face on the Igbo people, is almost an invitation to reading the private diary of someone’s life, whether that life is that of a person living through a civil war, a person struggling to grasp American culture as she arrives from Nigeria in search for a better life, or as the girlfriend to a married man, who slowly comes to realize her place in that position, and begins to hate herself because of it. The last theme is that of “Birdsong,” and it fits right in with Adichie’s contemporary “this is just how life is” style of writing. She does it with the candor of a nonfiction artist, which seriously makes people question whether her work is really fiction or not at times. Recently, it was exposed that much of Americanah is based on her real life. Outside of that debate, there have apparently been outrageous claims that her work “Birdsong” cannot be considered literature. The commission of this essay is prove otherwise. “Birdsong” is not only literature, it is a phenomenal piece of literature that crosses lines, and further helps put Nigeria on the literary map — a piece that should be put on the Ark.
What makes a piece of literature worthy of being saved is its capacity to tell a culturally accurate story from an innovative perspective. There is not a work like it, it has not been done before in a better way. Note that culturally and historically accurate do not always align in an exact parallel nature, but are usually an expression of each other through a different lens. This creates a very unique opportunity for Nigerians. Very few people in the Western World know anything about the country in Africa that borders the continent’s Western Coast on the Atlantic with a population comparable to the United States. Americans or Europeans who know of the country usually know it by one of its famous soccer/football teams, or by the fact that its rich tribal history was forever infected by British Colonialism in the 19th and 20th centuries. The mingling of English with local Igbo is very evident of that.
Adichie confronts these issues in interesting ways in “Birdsong.” She injects her pieces of work with the mention of how women of different classes tend to have different skin colors, different types of hair, and throughout their daily demeanor. Adichie exclusively takes on the voice of the downtrodden Nigerian female, the one with darker skin, and does so to put them in the spotlight. The “poor dark-skinned lady” or Nigeria is still very much a part of contemporary culture (Mullane, 2014). Her characters react to the riches that surround them, rather than be diminished by them.
She almost always steamrolls the man’s character in her narratives. This is especially the case in “Birdsong.” The man is the one toying around with her heart and lying to his wife. The female character, though conscious of her guilty role, is the only one being truly hurt in the situation. He is the wealthy older man, after all — he should know better. This is only a singular and fairly simplistic dimension and interpretation of Adichie’s gender construct, however. If one really reads between the lines, she is really poking at how Nigerian women have looked upon older and richer “generals,” and how they are probably wrong in doing so (Opoku-Ayemang, 2013). In the piece, Chikwado and other characters have what most people in the Western World would consider a very primitive way of finding love, by having a priest do blessings upon them. However, they are redeemed as being contemporary by being just as judgmental: “’No wa! Look at how your eyes are shining for a married man. You need deliverance prayers’ Chikwado said” (Adechie/Literature, 875)
The entire time, we are only aware of the characters’ location whenever Adichie brings up landmarks of the capital city such as the elusive “Paradise Island,” and the busy streets where motorcyclists hit cars carelessly, the taxi drivers are rude, the buildings are own down. She eludes to the civil unrest that took place in Nigeria during the 19th Century, but makes sure it is placed in the past. To sum it up neatly from the perspective of culture and historical accuracy, Adichie achieves both, because she has to. She is one of very few voices in Nigerian literature, which gives her the unique edge to write about a culture that is large, robust, and ready to spill over across to nearby nations, and at the same time, she needs people in the Developed world to understand that the everyday lives and situations that Nigerians encounter are not so far removed from the rest of the world. It is a balancing act that Adichie achieves with grace and success.
When comparing Adichie to other work, it is hard not to notice that most of the work that is most comparable to hers is by people of the Western World. An interesting comparison is Katha Pollitt’s “Webtstalker” (2004) because it can be reread as a response to Adichie’s piece, or vice versa. We can imagine that Katha (the work is nonfiction) is telling the version of the lifetime companion (or wife-life character) of the male partner the two share, only Katha did not see her lover as often and had to ‘learn’ about most of his life online, though she already knew quite well: “I had found the magic Web site, the one that was a secret window to reality, but what did it show me that I didn’t already know?” (1094). Though it is extremely doubtful that one piece influenced the other, it is interesting how well two completely different types of authors can “telepathically” reinforce each other’s work. Pollitt as the long-term lover (who is also older) and Adichie’s character, who is far younger, and treated more like a pet-on-the-side.
Creative Writing, particularly creative nonfiction, is giving authors the license to be more intimate in their work, with less need to Academia to interrupt it. Poetry is another form of creative writing. There were two poems that struck out as fitting for this for this work. Both having to do with the duality of love and loss. What better storyteller is there about ironic love than Edgar Allen Poe, and his poem Annabel Lee. The poem is considered his best, a reason why he is more highly regarded as a short story macabre writer than as a poet.
The work still takes an interesting twist in which Annabel Lee seems either to be a part of the sea itself, or someone he loved who he lost to the sea, or a person he is reminded of by the sea: “And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side/Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride, [sic]/In her sepulcher[sic] there by the sea—/In her tomb by the sounding sea.” (lines 39-42). He leaves the ending open, without a total resolution. In this way, his work is like Adichie’s. We do not know if Adichie’s character learns from her mistake, or if she’ll just go out and do it again. We know by the way she shouts at the lady to the jeep that she’s upset at the situation. But her necessity or compulsion to yell about how she feels inside could either mean that she now feels trapped in this way of life, or that she wants to move on but doesn’t know how.
The Hate Poem, by Julie Sheehan, possibly encapsulates part of what Adichie’s character is feeling. Sheehan is projecting the hate and guilt she has for herself onto anything but herself, and it seems to be because she has fallen in love, only to be scorned, to be hurt. She regrets this choice and reacts by assigning hate to inanimate things, “The history of this keychain hates you” (line 15) or by disembodied actions, “My hesitation when you invite me for a drive: hate” (line 24). The reaction of Adichie’s character to hate the lady driving the jeep could be a very similar reaction.
When a piece can elicit a response by several critics, when it is anthologized and discussed in college classrooms, these are all pretty good indications that the piece is more than worthy of saving on an ark. It gives us a perspective in a part of the world we think has to be so foreign to us, yet still has relatable themes that make the work extremely readable and cherished by the new sense of globalism, especially when it comes to the arts. Adichie puts Nigeria on the map and does in a way that no one else can. The longer the country remains stable the more culturally relevant it will become still. If it were up to some, we would have maybe preferred one of her longer works, but with so much reading material probably in tow, maybe there’s not enough room for everybody to have their woks preserved entirely.
Works Cited:
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. “Birdsong.” Literature: The Human Experience:
Reading and Writing - 11th Edition, Ed. Richard Abcarian, Marvin Klotz, and Samuel
Cohen. Bedford Books 2010(2013). pg. 875. Print.
Mullane, Janet. "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie." Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Lawrence
J. Trudeau. Vol. 364. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale. 2014 Artemis Literary Sources. Web.
27 Apr. 2016.
Opoku-Ayemang, Kwabena. "Rituals of distrust': illicit affairs and metaphors of transport in
Ama Ata Aidoo's 'two sisters' and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's 'birdsong." Research in
African Literatures 44.4 2013. Artemis Literary Sources. Web. 27 Apr. 2016
Poe, Edgar Allen. “Annabel Lee.” PoeStories.com 1849. Lines 39-42. Web. 3 May 2016
Pollitt, Kathra. “Webstalker.” Literature: The Human Experience: Reading and
Writing - 11th Edition. Ed. Richard Abcarian, Marvin Klotz, and Samuel
Cohen. Bedford Books 2004(2013). pg.1094 Print.
Sheehan, Julie. “The Hate Poem.” PLEIADES Central Missouri State Press Vol. 24:2 lines 15,24
2006. Web. 2 May 2016
