RACISM & AESTHETICS IN ALEX LA GUMA’S A WALK IN THE NIGHT AND PETER ABRAHAMS’S MINE BOY
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1Â Â Â Â Â Â Background of Study
The dominant literature in Africa had been oral literature; oral literature has been existing since a long time. There was a long delay in the emergence of written literature because of the wide-spread illiteracy in Africa. The blacks have suffered injustice from the white race right from the time of slavery, this we got to know thru history. It was among this group of Africans that crossed the sea and came in closer contact with the West, this contact now brought about the first seeds of new literature like Phyllis Wheatly and George Horton, these poets were prepared to embrace the values of the whites in which they have been initiated, despite this they deplored their enslaved condition. The new world literature of the black in the eighteen and nineteen century was referred to as ‘apprentice literature’ by Jan Janheinz in a book titled A History of Neo-African Literature published in 1968. African nationalism and pan-Africanism started in the new world, between 1900 and 1945,two conferences on pan-Africanism which was held in various European capitals including New York were to play a decisive role in the growth of nationalism among African students who were studying abroad. Political independence was first proclaimed as a goal of nationalism at the sixth pan-African congress in Manchester in 1945. Blyden was the first black man to attempt an objective appraisal of African culture, in his book titled Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race published in 1887. In this book, he traced the history of African’s contact with the outside world and produced evidence from sociology, history and literature to show that Africans had something positive to show the world, he tried to rehabilitate the living cultures of African communities and took pride in blackness; he implored his fellow Afro-Americans to do the same. He urged the black race to embrace their history and their culture and use them as the foundation for building the future. Blyden’s meetings were coloured by romantic views of his contemporary world. Peter Abrahams in 1945 was the first non-white African novelist in his novel Sons of the City which later appeared in the fifties, this novel began to acquire its own identity and generate the present literary explosion in the fifties. Every writer is influenced by the tradition in which he acquire his tools of writing: the language, the styles and the forms which he’s familiar with before he starts writing, this can be seen in African writings which has its own distinctive characteristics that distinguished them from other areas of the world due to the acquisition of their tool of writing[the language, the styles, the forms] from their contact with their contact with the West. Critics such as Jan Heinz in the book titled A History of Neo-African literature, published in 1968 defended the view that there is an essential similarity between all literatures written by people whose origin can be traced back to Africa. At the first Congress of Negro writers which were held in Paris 1956, one of the delegates Ben Enwonwu insisted on the declaration on the need for literature to put itself at the service of nationalism. Ben Enwonwu (1956) declared that:
The present generation of African artists therefore haveto face their political problems, and try to look at artthrough politics, the kind of picture that the politicalaspect of African art shows is one of strife and pity.
