Purple Hibiscus

First edition, published in 2003 by Algonquin Books.

Purple Hibiscus is the first novel by the Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. It portrays Kambili Achike, a 15 year old Nigerian teenage girl who struggles in the hands of her father Eugene. Eugene is a rich businessman and a devout Catholic but violently abuses his family and his wife Beatrice poisons him. Kambili's brother, Jaja, takes the blame inorder to protect his mother and gets life imprisonment. A post-colonial novel, it received positive reviews upon publication. Literary editor of New Statesman , Jason Cowley writes that it is the best debut he's read since Arundhati Roy's  The God of Small Things ", and Yale University lecturer Bill Broun in reviewing it calls Adichie "the 21st-century daughter of that other great Igbo novelist, Chinua Achebe." ^[1] The novel was published in the United States on 30 October 2003, by Algonquin Books. A year later, Fourth Estate published the book in the United Kingdom and in 2006, Kachifo Limited published it in Nigeria.

The novel is a coming-of-age story: the characters psychological and moral growth from childhood to adulthood changes, particularly Kambili and Jaja's tough life in Eugene's house and later, a free living in Aunty Ifeoma's house. Adichie started writing the novel during her university education at Eastern Connecticut State University. ^[2] After publication, it won several awards including the Orange Prize for Fiction shortlist in 2004 and Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book in 2005. Adichie investigates the themes of family, womanhood, and religion. Her writing style, combined with her use of Igbo description to convey characterizations and action, demonstrates her as one of the third generation of Nigerian writers.

Background

Adichie was born on September 15, 1977, in Enugu, Nigeria, to a middle-class Igbo family, with her parents, Grace Ifeoma and James Nwoye Adichie, and her five siblings. ^[3] By the end of 2002 she has written two works - a poetry book, Decisions (1997) and a play, For the Love of Biafra (1998) - as well as many short stories, and other pieces. ^[4]

Publication history

Adichie was attending the Eastern Connecticut State University when she started writing Purple Hibiscus . ^{[5] [6]} She sent her manuscript to many literary agents and one agent told her to use the "African material" as background for a continued story set in America. Another rejected instantly with "NO" on the query letter and sent it back. Literary agents either asks for setting to be changed from Africa to America inorder to attract familiar readers or the manuscript gets rejected instantly. Djana Pearson Morris, an agent who works at Pearson Morris and Belt Literary Management, accepted the manuscript. Since Adichie was Black, Morris cited challenging commercial sales and sent the manuscript to publishers. ^[6]

During the summer of 2002, Antonia Fusco, an editor at Algonquin Books, received the manuscript and accepted it for publication. Elizabeth Scharlatt, the then publisher at Algonquin, also recounted difficult challenges of the book publication as Algonquin was not driven by market trends or shareholder pressures. Although they launch new debut novel every season and since there was a small list in that year, all energy would be in promoting Purple Hibiscus. ^[6] The novel was published in 2003. ^[7] The publisher created support for sales and promotion including providing copies to booksellers, reviewers, and the media. Fourth Estate later published the book in 2004 in the United Kingdom and in 2006, Kachifo Limited published it in Nigeria. ^[6]

Plot summary

Kambili Achike is a fifteen-year-old Nigerian girl from a wealthy family in Enugu State. The family is dominated by her father Eugene, who is a devout Catholic and businessman. Eugene is both a religious zealot and a violent figure in the Achike household, subjecting his wife Beatrice, Kambili, and her brother Jaja to violent abuse. Kambili tells the story beginning with Jaja missing the holy communion at church. Both later live at the house of their aunt, Ifeoma, with her three children. The household offers a different view of what they faced in their father's house. It practices a completely different form of Catholicism, making for a happy, liberal place that encourages its members to be inquisitive, form their own opinions and speak their minds. Kambili and Jaja become able to voice out their opinions. While at Aunty Ifeoma's house, Kambili also falls in love with a young priest, Father Amadi, which awakens her sense of sexuality.

Unable to cope with Eugene's continual violence any longer, Beatrice poisons him. Jaja takes the blame for the crime inorder to save his mother, and gets locked in the prison. Aunty Ifeoma and her family moves to America after she is unfairly dismissed from her job as a lecturer at the University of Nigeria in Nsukka. Purple Hibiscus ends almost three years after these events as Kambili becomes a young woman at eighteen. Her brother Jaja is about to be released from prison, hardened but not broken by his experience there. Their mother, Beatrice, has deteriorated psychologically to a great degree.

Themes and analysis

Colonialism

Aunty Ifeoma, the aunt of Kambili tells her that Eugene is a product of colonialism. She says he reasons like the colonial masters who have ill language. Eugene restrains his children from speaking Igbo. ^[8]

Trauma and silence

The characters of Purple Hibiscus faces fear in both present and past when Adichie quoted:

I was familiar with fear, yet each time I felt it, it was never the same as the other times, as though it came in different flavors and colors. ^[9]

Religion

Palm Sunday commemorates the beginning of the Holy Week in the Christian doctrine, and Adichie uses it to show that a new living will come into Eugene’s family in the future. ^[10] Thoa wrote that lent is a time for reflection on Jesus’ life, suffering, death, and forward to the promise of new life and hope through his resurrection. Similarly, it is seen as same to Kambili and her family to endure before they can experience a new life. ^[11] Ash Wednesday and Palm Sunday represents the symbols of the passion and resurrection. ^[12]

The novel depicts the seven sacraments, especially Baptism, Confirmation and Holy Eucharist. The sacrament of the Holy Eucharist is shown in the masses celebrated by Father Benedict, Father Amadi, and other priests in Abba. It also includes active participation by Papa and his family, and Aunty Ifeoma and her family. A sub-theme of the cultural absence of the Igbo culture is seen in Kambili's narration, where he narrated Father Benedict's decline of the Igbo language and culture. For instance, he allowed that the Credo and Kyrie should be recited only in Latin and that the rhythmical clapping of hands should be minimal but sustained singing in Igbo, offertory songs. ^[13]

Reception

Purple Hibiscus is a sensitive and intimate story that brings a reader the innocence and delicacy of childhood, the struggle of maturing into adulthood and the blurred lines between love and hatred. Chimamanda Adichie uses her captivating and mature style of writing to artfully endear character to readers in the intimacy of her plot twists and experiences. Her sense of irony is impeccable as she strays lightly into political waters, post-colonial rule and religions. — The New Times review of Purple Hibiscus, 7 June 2016. ^[14]

In a review by Kirkus Reviews , Adichie was praised for "creating a compelling narrative—and a surprising punch at end." ^[15] Östgöta Correspondenten wrote, "Purple Hibiscus" is a painfully brutal yet wonderfully moving educational novel about getting up and walking". Again, it praised Adichie writing, "Purple Hibiscus could be a tragic, depressing read at best, but Adichie is the kind of dizzying storyteller who manages to lure the reader further and further into the story, until you can no longer resist. She fills the novel with nuances and colors, scents and flavors, and with cautious hope." ^[16] Journalist Hephzibah Anderson of The Guardian praises Adichie's focus, writing that it "remains fixed on her heroine, enabling her to express the political in acutely personal terms, telling an intoxicating story that is at once distinctively feminine, African and universal." ^[17] Sue Arnold, in a review, praised the novel's audio narrator Adjoa Andoh's characterisation of the Kambili, whose confused love/hate relationship with her father underpins the story, is stunning. ^[18]

In 2004 the novel was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction ^[19] and John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, ^[20] longlisted for the Booker Prize. ^[21] It also won the Best Books for Young Adults Award by the Young Adult Library Services Association. It won the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for the Best Debut Fiction. It was listed in 2004 by Telegraph as one of the year's best fiction. ^[22] In 2005 it won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for the Best First Book. It was the winner of the 'One Maryland, One Book' Programme in 2017. ^[23]

References

1. Dave, Jagravi (15 October 2018). "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Purple Hibiscus Turns 15: The Best Moments of a Modern Classic". Brittle Paper. Retrieved 31 January 2025.
2. McGrath, Charles (23 September 2006). "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie". The New York Times. Retrieved 1 February 2025.
3. Braimah, Ayodale (13 February 2018). "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (1977- )". Blackpast. Retrieved 31 January 2025.
4. Sam-Duru, Prisca (22 January 2014). "Chimamanda Adichie, a growing literary prodigy". Vanguard News. Retrieved 31 January 2025.
5. Braimah, Ayodale (13 February 2018). "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (1977- )". Blackpast. Retrieved 31 January 2025.
6. Obi Young, Otosirieze (20 September 2021). "Cover Story: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie on Half of a Yellow Sun at 15, Her Private Losses, and Public Evolution". Open Country Mag . Retrieved 24 January 2025.
7. Lewis, Simon (3 December 2024). "20 years after the publication of 'Purple Hibiscus,' a generation of African writers have followed in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's footsteps". The Conversation. Retrieved 1 February 2025.
8. Okolo (2017), 2
9. Phan (2023), 1
10. Phan (2023), 8
11. Phan (2023), 8-9
12. Phan (2023), 9
13. Amaefule (2021), 79
14. Teta, Samantha (7 June 2016). "Book Review". The New Times. Retrieved 1 February 2025.
15. Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi (17 October 2003). "Purple Hibiscus". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 17 September 2024.
16. "Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: Lila hibiskus". Corren, Östgöta Correspondenten (in Swedish). 7 June 2010. Retrieved 24 January 2025.
17. Anderson, Hephzibah (21 March 2004). "Observer review: Some Great Thing, Long for This World, Purple Hibiscus". the Guardian. Retrieved 24 January 2025.
18. Arnold, Sue (13 June 2008). "Audio: Jun 14". the Guardian. Retrieved 24 January 2025.
19. Ezard, John (27 April 2004). "Debut novel from Nigeria storms Orange shortlist". the Guardian. Retrieved 30 January 2025.
20. Pauli, Michelle (14 November 2005). "Nigerian debut makes John Llewellyn Rhys shortlist". the Guardian. Retrieved 30 January 2025.
21. "Truth and power". The Mail & Guardian. 1 October 2004. Retrieved 30 January 2025.
22. "Best fiction". The Telegraph. 5 December 2004. Retrieved 24 January 2025.
23. "Chimamanda Adichie's Purple Hibiscus Wins the 2017 "One Maryland, One Book" Initiative". Brittle Paper. 21 April 2017. Retrieved 30 January 2025.

Bibliography

• Phan, Thoa (2023). The Impact of Family, Environment, and religion in Purple Hibiscus and Beloved. St. John's Scholar (Masters of Art thesis). New York City: St. John's University . Retrieved 31 January 2025.
• Okolo, Luke (2017). "Thematic and stylistic analysis of Chimamanda Adichie's Purple Hibiscus". ezenwaohaeto. Retrieved 31 January 2025.
• Amaefule, Adolphus Ekedimma (15 April 2021). "The Roman Catholic Church in Nigeria and Liturgical Inculturation in Chimamanda Adichie's Purple Hibiscus". Ecclesiology. 17 (1). doi:10.1163/17455316-bja10002. ISSN   1744-1366.

External links

Translations

• Oliveira, Leide Daiane De Almeida; Matos, Naylane Araújo (12 September 2018). "ADICHIE, Chimamanda Ngozi. Hibisco roxo. Tradução de Julia Romeu. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2011, 324 p." Cadernos de Tradução. 38 (3). Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (UFSC): 477–486. doi: 10.5007/2175-7968.2018v38n3p477 . ISSN   2175-7968 . Retrieved 24 January 2025.