The River Between

by Ngugi wa Thiong'o, Uzodinma Iweala (Introduction), Chinua Achebe (Editor)

Overview

A 50th-anniversary edition of one of the most powerful novels by the great Kenyan author and Nobel Prize nominee

A legendary work of African literature, this moving and eye-opening novel lucidly captures the drama of a people and culture whose world has been overturned. The River Between explores life in the mountains of Kenya during the early days of white settlement. Faced with a choice between an alluring new religion and their own ancestral customs, the Gikuyu people are torn between those who fear the unknown and those who see beyond it.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780698166776
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/28/2015
Series:	Penguin African Writers Series , #4
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
Sales rank:	436,034
File size:	790 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

NGUGI WA THIONG’O is an award-winning novelist, playwright, and essayist from Kenya whose novels have been translated into more than thirty languages. He is Distinguished Professor of English at the University of California, Irvine. He lives in Irvine, California.

UZODINMA IWEALA is the author of the award-winning novel Beasts of No Nation and is one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists. He lives in Lagos, Nigeria, and New York City.

Read an Excerpt

From the Trade Paperback edition.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“Beautifully compact . . . It takes its reader on a journey out of the colonial matrix and into the world of the real, showing us life reclaimed in all its complexity from the simplifying template of colonialism. . . . It has an undeniable power.” —Uzodinma Iweala, from the Introduction

“Unparalleled as a chronicler of elemental change.” —The Guardian

“It has the rare qualities of restraint, intelligence and sensitivity.” —The Times Literary Supplement

“A sensitive novel about the Gikuyu in the melting pot that sometimes touches the grandeur of tap-root simplicity.”—The Guardian

Editorial Reviews

As has been the case for many of his fellow African writers, Kenya-born Ngugi Wa Thiongo has been at various times imprisoned, persecuted, and exiled for his writing and political activism. The River Between was Ngugi's first written, but not his first published, novel (Weep Not Child was published in 1964). It powerfully tells the story of the inevitable conflicts faced by African society as it attempts to reconcile its traditional beliefs with the imperatives of colonialism.

The novel is set in the 1930s and 1940s in rural Kenya and focuses on the conflict between Christian and traditional beliefs. The story is set among the Gikuyu people living on two adjoining ridges, Kameno and Makuyu, which are divided by a river. The people of Kameno follow a land-based religion; the people of Makuyu are led by the Christian convert Joshua. The young and charismatic Waiyaki is sent from Kameno to the mission school to learn the ways of the colonialists so as to resist their claims to the Kameno lands. The conflict centers around the initiation rites of the Gikuyu people. Muthoni, daughter of the cleric Joshua, defies her father's wishes and participates in the ritual. She dies when her wounds fail to heal, and the rift between the two factions becomes irreparable. Politically, the Kiamia, a militant anti-government, anti-Christian movement, continues to agitate successfully. When Waiyaki falls in love with Nyambura, Muthoni's sister and Joshua's daughter, the stage is set for a tragic confrontation.

The River Between is a powerful and gripping retelling of the passing of the African traditional life.

Sacred Fire

One of the greatest writers of our time.” —Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, The Guardian

“His novels . . . have been deservedly canonized by the iconic [Penguin Classics] series.” —The Wall Street Journal

“Beautifully compact . . . It takes its reader on a journey out of the colonial matrix and into the world of the real, showing us life reclaimed in all its complexity from the simplifying template of colonialism. . . . It has an undeniable power.” —Uzodinma Iweala, from the Introduction

“It has the rare qualities of restraint, intelligence and sensitivity.” —The Times Literary Supplement

“A sensitive novel about the Gikuyu in the melting pot that sometimes touches the grandeur of tap-root simplicity.” —The Guardian

From the Publisher