Abstract
This chapter analyses the process of migration as depicted in Ike Oguine’s A Squatter’s Tale (2000) and in short stories by Sefi Atta and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Oguine’s novel is a prototypical novel of migration that deals with its protagonist’s movement from Nigeria to the United States and his process of adaptation. It is concerned with the leaving of Nigeria, the arrival in a new country, the coming to terms with the cultural differences encountered there, and the re-evaluation of one’s expectations. Several of Atta’s and Adichie’s short stories share these concerns but differ by including the option of a return to Nigeria. Thus, they reflect the back-and-forth movements that distinguish the forms of migration depicted in Nigerian diaspora literature more generally.
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Notes
- 1.
Adichie’s short story ‘The American Embassy’ tells a similar story, albeit in a more serious manner, with a tragic event informing the protagonist’s efforts to get a visa.
- 2.
For a thorough exploration of the stereotypes about Africa held by Americans, see Curtis Keim’s Mistaking Africa (2014).
- 3.
For a more general discussion of the functions of letters and the epistolary mode in Nigerian diaspora literature, see Feldner (2018).
- 4.
The diasporic stories in The Thing Around Your Neck include ‘The Thing Around Your Neck’, ‘Imitation’, ‘The Arrangers of Marriage’, ‘On Monday of Last Week’, and ‘The Shivering’.
- 5.
News from Home comprises the following diasporic short stories: ‘Twilight Trek’, ‘A Temporary Position’, ‘Madness in the Family’, ‘Last Trip’, ‘News from Home’, and ‘Green’.
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Feldner, M. (2019). Leaving Nigeria: Ike Oguine, Sefi Atta, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. In: Narrating the New African Diaspora. African Histories and Modernities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05743-5_6
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