The Audacity of Hope in the Novels of Joseph Edoki

Abstract

That African literature of the twentieth century was, by and large, the product of the large scale despoliation and subjugation of Africa by European imperialism is hardly contestable. Western colonialism saw to it that Africa was plundered and her culture and resources were sequestered by rapacious white colonizers during the period of the colonial encounter. African literature sprang up to interrogate this trend by first refuting the myth of cultural superiority on which colonialism itself was founded and, by extension, it became a willing instrument in the hands of African writers to fight for the decolonization of Africa. This necessarily made much of African literature of the twentieth century lachrymal and protest laden. Neocolonialism has also deepened this culture since independent African states and nations have been mired in corruption, crass materialism, bad leadership, bad governance and the concomitant disillusionment of the African people. Rather than maintain a regenerative stance and be involved in reinventing Africa along the lines of positive development, much of African literature of the past century was concerned with weeping and protesting over the scenario we have painted above. However, Joseph Edoki in his novels, The African Dream and The Upward Path supports the reinvention of Africa in the twenty-first century by using his novels to support democracy, good governance and the regeneration of Africa and the value system of Africans, as prerequisites for repositioning Africa to be able to face the challenges of the new century, thus infusing his fiction with hope. The very nature of this hope, which Edoki’s fiction radiates, is the focus of this paper.