The Feminist Voice in Contemporary Ghanaian Female Fiction: A Textual Analysis of Amma Darko’s Faceless and Not Without Flowers

Abstract

This paper attempts a critical analysis of two of Amma Darko’s novels, Faceless (2003) and Not Without Flowers (2005). It identifies how Darko uses prose fiction as a vehicle to cross-examine the complexities of the Ghanaian woman’s life in relation to culture and gender. Through in-depth study, critical appreciation, and critical textual analysis of the novels, the paper explores feminist insights into Darko’s philosophical reflections on the plight of women and girls in contemporary Ghana. It plays on the theoretical assumption that literature is a mirror of society and, in its effectiveness, tenders different perspectives of existential problems and their solutions. It thus interrogates some of the themes in the novels from the Womanist Literary and African Feminists perspectives. The contention is that Darko’s novels reflect the nature, causes of, and possible solutions to the numerous feminist issues confronting the contemporary Ghanaian female. Finally, I conclude that the novels provide important lenses through which we can better understand some of the core cultural contexts of feminist issues in contemporary Africa as a whole.

Keywords: Feminism, Culture, Gender, Polygamy