The Joys of Motherhood

Front Cover
Heinemann, 1994 - Fiction - 224 pages
...a graceful, touching, ironically titled tale. - John Updike A new edition of her classic novel to coincide with the publication of her other works in the African Writers Series. Nnu Ego is a woman devoted to her children, giving them all her energy, all her worldly possessions, indeed, all her life to them -- with the result that she finds herself friendless and alone in middle age. This story of a young mother's struggles in 1950s Lagos is a powerful commentary on polygamy, patriarchy, and women's changing roles in urban Nigeria.
 

Contents

The Mother
7
The Mothers Mother
10
The Mothers Early Life
29
First Shocks of Motherhood
40
A Failed Woman
56
A Man is Never Ugly
63
The Duty of a Father
72
The Rich and the Poor
82
Sharing a Husband
126
Men at War
141
A Good Daughter
151
Women Alone
156
The Soldier Father
170
A Mother of Clever Children
188
A Daughters Honour
198
The Canonised Mother
212

A Mothers Investment
101
A Man Needs Many Wives
111

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About the author (1994)

Buchi Emecheta, 1944 - Native Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta was born in 1944 near Lagos. She emigrated to London in 1960 where she pursued a career as a social worker and subsisted in the profession for several years. She began to write to fulfill her growing need to express herself artistically and to support her family financially. Her first two novels centered on life in London as a member of the working class. But her true strength as a novelist flourished as she explored her roots and focused upon the psychological impact of African women struggling with timeworn issues of male domination, economic exploitation, racism, and colonialism in twentieth-century Africa. The Joys of Motherhood (1979) is considered by most as her best novel, exploring the life a woman consumed by demands imposed by society upon motherhood. Her novel The Rape of Shavi (1983) concerns the continued exploitation of Africa by European factions. Emecheta continues to live and write in London.

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