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The Creaturely Modernism of Amos Tutuola
- Author(s):
- Matthew Omelsky (see profile)
- Date:
- 2018
- Group(s):
- LLC African to 1990, TC Postcolonial Studies
- Subject(s):
- African literature, Fiction, Criticism and interpretation, Literature, English-speaking countries, Twentieth century
- Item Type:
- Article
- Tag(s):
- Modernism, Novel criticism, 20th-century anglophone literature
- Permanent URL:
- http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/3h5q-b827
- Abstract:
- This article examines the global African modernism of Amos Tutuola through the lens of his nonhuman folkloric creatures. Though the work of the early Nigerian novelist is often characterized as modernism’s inversion, or “traditional,” Tutuola in fact articulates a succession of surreal monsters in The Palm Wine Drinkard (1952) and My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (1954) that literally embody commodities and technologies, rupturing the trite image of an insular, primitive Africa. With televisions for hands and footballs for eyes, Tutuola’s modern creatures situate West Africa as a global nexus of social relation, consumer culture, and commodity flows.
- Metadata:
- xml
- Published as:
- Journal article
- Status:
- Published
- Last Updated:
- 4 years ago
- License:
- All Rights Reserved
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