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NGUGI WA THION'O
(JAMES NGUGI)
JOHN HENRIK CLARKE

NGUGI Wa Thiong'o (formerly known as James Ngugi) has converted some of the themes of his novels into essays, and has added new themes. In his first book of non-fiction he has emerged as a social critic with insight and a facility for bringing new dimensions to old subjects. From an African intellectual vantage point he looks out on the world, especially the world of African people everywhere. His point of view goes beyond Pan-Africanism, and he alludes to the possibility of an African world union. He sees the African world in transition, trying to recover from more than 500 years of European greed and harassment, the slave trade and colonialism. In looking at the politics of Africa he sees a sad motely crew of former clerks imitating their former European masters, who are not so former or far away.

Ngugi is very clear about what political direction Africa will have to take in order to escape the traps that are causing confusion throughout the Black world. He sees no future in capitalism in Africa and he states his case well. No people can become free, he observes, by adopting the political and economic systems that enslaved them. Now that some of the former errand boys of the colonists are in power in some African countries, his observation is both prophetic and frightening.

The main emphasis in the book is on politics and West Indian fiction. Ngugi sees the writer as a unique kind of politician who has not realized his potential. In a general way his thinking might be called Marxist, because he believes in a world where the basic political and economic structure will not be capitalistic and the power to determine the direction of society will be in the hands of the people or their representatives. This is an over-simplification of the position of Ngugi and the brilliant essays that he has written for this book. His Marxism stems from his enlightened African nationalism

Introduction to the American edition of Ngugi's book of essays, Homecoming. Lawrence Hill and Co., Publishers, New York, N. Y.

John Henrik Clark, author and teacher, has been an Associate Editor of FREEDOMWAYS since 1962.

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