Novel
Ripples in the Pool
Rebeka Njau · 1975
Synopsis
In Kenya, just after independence, Selina, an independent woman of Nairobi who lives partly from her relations with men, grows weary of the city. With Gikere, a hospital assistant younger than she, she goes to settle in his village, in search of a new life. There, a pool guarded by a mysterious old man seems to watch over the land and its people, and Selina falls in love with Gaciru, Gikere's young sister.
Context
The novel appeared in 1975 in Nairobi from Transafrica, then in 1978 in Heinemann's African Writers Series; it reworks an earlier manuscript, Alone with the Fig Tree. The critic Gay Wilentz sees in it the first sustained portrait of a lesbian in postcolonial African literature. Still read in many universities, it was reissued in 2024 and relaunched in Nairobi with the university's literature department.
Who it is for
For reading a pioneering novel about desire between women in Kenya, accessible in English only.
Prizes and reception
The manuscript from which it came had won a prize from the East African Writers' Committee.
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