GIRLS AT WAR: And Other Stories

by Chinua Achebe ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 23, 1973

This is a sum but fine collection of the well-known Nigerian novelist's stories, stretching back twenty years to college days, all written with ""unrelieved competence"" as the author wryly quotes a reviewer as saying. They are written in the English of one who has apparently and effortlessly absorbed an alien language and literary tradition, with only occasional divergence into an approximation of local dialect (""'I don talk say make una tell Manager make e go fin' more people for dis monkey work.'"") However, the foreignness is within the plots, as one sees the changes in custom (e.g. intermarriage between tribes), the desire for education, and the creation of political consciousness (with its inevitable brothers -- bribery and corruption) in a country that is just starting to create itself. The Biafran War (during which the author was a member of the doomed rebel Ministry of Information) gradually encroaches until it takes over the book as it did the country -- an accumulating mass of horror, indifference, black market thievery and heroism, often within the same person. Well-written stories that may rarely surprise, but never disappoint -- modest, tough, and informative.

Pub Date: March 23, 1973

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1973

Categories: FICTION