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istaisa's review
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Religious bigotry and Colonisation
khakipantsofsex's review against another edition
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
3.5
Content Warnings
Moderate: Genocide and Colonisation
serendipitysbooks's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Kibogo is an intriguing novel which focuses on Ruzagayura, a great famine which occurred in Rwanda between 1943 and 1944 . The story looks at its causes, its impact, and, most especially, the reactions and responses to it, and is told in four parts. Each has a different focus yet they all overlap, retelling parts of the same story from different perspectives, adding some details while omitting others.
I found the storytelling fascinating. Rather than worrying about which version was right it was more productive to consider them all as being true, to think about the truth as being found somewhere between them all; and to realise that truth can be a remarkably subjective concept .
The other aspect of the story that really captured my attention was the intersection of colonialism and evangelism, the way the Catholic church was so active in the process of colonisation, buttressing and in turn being buttressed by Belgian colonial powers. This had a devastating impact on Rwandans - the audacity of both church and state arriving uninvited in the home of other people and telling them what to believe and how to behave never fails to stagger me. What is especially interesting, and can be clearly seen throughout the four sections of this book, is the way Rwandans interacted with the church - taking some aspects of its teachings, trying them out for size, combining them with their own pre-existing beliefs, resisting or rejecting others outright. They, like colonised peoples everywhere, were not passive receivers of church teachings who unquestioningly accepted what they were told. In this book we see all these factors play out and interact as Rwandans struggled to deal with the impact of a famine that may have been caused by drought but which was definitely exacerbated by the dictates of the Belgians.
I found the storytelling fascinating. Rather than worrying about which version was right it was more productive to consider them all as being true, to think about the truth as being found somewhere between them all; and to realise that truth can be a remarkably subjective concept .
The other aspect of the story that really captured my attention was the intersection of colonialism and evangelism, the way the Catholic church was so active in the process of colonisation, buttressing and in turn being buttressed by Belgian colonial powers. This had a devastating impact on Rwandans - the audacity of both church and state arriving uninvited in the home of other people and telling them what to believe and how to behave never fails to stagger me. What is especially interesting, and can be clearly seen throughout the four sections of this book, is the way Rwandans interacted with the church - taking some aspects of its teachings, trying them out for size, combining them with their own pre-existing beliefs, resisting or rejecting others outright. They, like colonised peoples everywhere, were not passive receivers of church teachings who unquestioningly accepted what they were told. In this book we see all these factors play out and interact as Rwandans struggled to deal with the impact of a famine that may have been caused by drought but which was definitely exacerbated by the dictates of the Belgians.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Religious bigotry and Colonisation
catandherbooks's review
informative
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Religious bigotry and Colonisation
Moderate: Death
joann_l's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.75
Kibogo reads like a gateway to a historical, colonial/postcolonial dreamscape. It reads like a fantastic reimagining of Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, but on a mythical, quasi-spiritual platform in Rwanda. It is inspiring as a work of decolonization, heart-wrenching as a historical fiction, a lyrical maze as a work of literature.
Like Things Fall Apart, Mukasonga’s Kibogo hinges on the binary opposition between the colonizer and the colonized, the imposition of Christianity on native peoples, and the annihilation of indigenous beliefs. But while similar to this famous predecessor, it is also unique in its own right. Kibogo is a nuanced novel. The Colonizer is not necessarily European and this point is pronounced. Sometimes — perhaps more than we would have wanted — the colonizer is our native neighbor, one of our own. Fanon was an astute observer of colonial culture; too often the enemy is a more intimate partner, the one who resides within. Mukasonga also draws a perforated line between Christian and Indigenous Belief; the characters and their stories reveal a more accurate historical account of colonization by highlighting how a syncretization of beliefs and practices is likely to have taken place.
This syncretization of cultures, beliefs, practices, and ideas is the heart of Kibogo. The novel is about the gradual development of a colonial culture, not through outright conquest, but through insidious means. Magic is a key component, a driving force that propels the stories to their ends. Ritual is the means by which the magic is released, and this is not only native Rwandan magic, but also European Christian magic, the kind imbued in holy water and Christian prayer. This lends Kibogo a mystical quality. The novel unfolds as would a myth; it is a fable about the meeting of Christian and Animist in Rwandan history. The characters are heroes, heroines, archetypes, and the plot moves forward through human and divine interventions. Each of Kibogo‘s four parts focuses on a particular character, as each of their stories builds upon the last to produce at the end a full view of Rwanda’s religious, spiritual, and colonial landscape.
This is not to say the characters are hollow; no, on the contrary, they are recognizable across colonial histories. For that reason Kibogo is larger than its central focus on colonization in Rwanda. This is a story that is recognizable in other African, Asian, Caribbean, South American, Australian, Pacific Island, and colonial contexts. Kibogo is centered and set in Rwanda, but it is a work of post-colonial literature for the rest of the “formerly” colonized world as well.
In short, a very thought-provoking work wrapped in beautiful, literary prose that unwinds like a yarn told late at night to children gathered around their grandmother’s hearth. (
Like Things Fall Apart, Mukasonga’s Kibogo hinges on the binary opposition between the colonizer and the colonized, the imposition of Christianity on native peoples, and the annihilation of indigenous beliefs. But while similar to this famous predecessor, it is also unique in its own right. Kibogo is a nuanced novel. The Colonizer is not necessarily European and this point is pronounced. Sometimes — perhaps more than we would have wanted — the colonizer is our native neighbor, one of our own. Fanon was an astute observer of colonial culture; too often the enemy is a more intimate partner, the one who resides within. Mukasonga also draws a perforated line between Christian and Indigenous Belief; the characters and their stories reveal a more accurate historical account of colonization by highlighting how a syncretization of beliefs and practices is likely to have taken place.
This syncretization of cultures, beliefs, practices, and ideas is the heart of Kibogo. The novel is about the gradual development of a colonial culture, not through outright conquest, but through insidious means. Magic is a key component, a driving force that propels the stories to their ends. Ritual is the means by which the magic is released, and this is not only native Rwandan magic, but also European Christian magic, the kind imbued in holy water and Christian prayer. This lends Kibogo a mystical quality. The novel unfolds as would a myth; it is a fable about the meeting of Christian and Animist in Rwandan history. The characters are heroes, heroines, archetypes, and the plot moves forward through human and divine interventions. Each of Kibogo‘s four parts focuses on a particular character, as each of their stories builds upon the last to produce at the end a full view of Rwanda’s religious, spiritual, and colonial landscape.
This is not to say the characters are hollow; no, on the contrary, they are recognizable across colonial histories. For that reason Kibogo is larger than its central focus on colonization in Rwanda. This is a story that is recognizable in other African, Asian, Caribbean, South American, Australian, Pacific Island, and colonial contexts. Kibogo is centered and set in Rwanda, but it is a work of post-colonial literature for the rest of the “formerly” colonized world as well.
In short, a very thought-provoking work wrapped in beautiful, literary prose that unwinds like a yarn told late at night to children gathered around their grandmother’s hearth. (
Content Warnings
Moderate: Child death, Death, Religious bigotry, and Colonisation