Dissertation

Confession of the Lioness

Under the Frangipani

Women

Transfiguration/metamorphosis

Outsider/Westerner

Traditional systems

lion people/invented lions

takatuka - pain with tree

sexual/physical aggression manifest as beast

madness

death/buried language as vehicle to illustrate oppression

excluded from tradition/spiritual knowledge

skeptical

saviour?

patriarchy

women possess the magic, men seem to have more of the 'rational' mindset

fertility and barrenness

the past

past dictates the present - sense of fate (esp. for women)

evocation of truth masked as madness

muteness/language

War

strong sense of Kulumani and its people being disillusioned and left behind by war

also interesting how women are implicated in this, but Hanifa mentions that 'their war' is more timeworn and neverending

storytelling

storytelling

biblical references - both for kulumani's creation and Archie's childhood stories

oral tradition

the journalist (as Mia?) what is his role in this? does he represent the new system of integrating magic and fact into language

sense of the timelessness and universality of this tale

quotes that preface each chapter - lots are proverbial

morphing with water

means of escape

"Mariamar, came from the river"

familial bond with animals - kin

lost people's humanity

myth/legend

tale of Ra and Sekmut

reoccuring theme of speaking a language that [x] can't understand

dreams

means of escape

"Makwala had always drawn a line between himself and the world that he called traditional"

resolution/reparation

Outsider/Westerner

dead man

the past

whiteness v. blackness

deracination

Mourao - left Portugal

oral storytelling

Navaia's life story

account of the murder

is there an objective truth in storytelling?

traditional systems

patriarchy - rape/violence against women

war - left behindness

forgotten stories - marginal peoples

nature

the sea

tree

truth - hero of the war

united by a common earth - kin

scepticism and doubts

inner monologue reveals insecurity

strong juxtaposition to the elderly

elderly - cut off, isolated, forgotten, disrespected, represent old forms of knowledge

city - modern, respected, globalised / corrupt, neocolonial

not racially, but in rules that govern life

notebook where he records their confessions

truth vs. lies

Marta - gateway for truth

detective genre

long for water because water has no past/memories

LMN transforms into water every night to recover from her trauma/past - no means to heal outside/in life

is he losing sight of reality?

belongs to another place, place he loves doesn't exist - liminal space

binaries

simultaneity

man-child (Navaia)

wife/daughter, orphan/widow (LMN)

fails to transition to understanding magic trads

mulatto

insight into izi

framing narrative

like Izi - he had a conflict of postcolonial subject

gives 'truth' to his story - not heroic

'the world that is coming is your world'

new age is for people like Izi

acceptance of fusion of knowledges

no questioning of truth behind dreams, love, life