Skip to main content

The Famished Road | Readings

‘If  you  misbehave the same thing will happen  to  you.’

‘What?’

‘The  forest  will  swallow  you.’

‘Then  I  will  become  a  tree,’  I  said.

‘Then  they  will  cut  you  down  because  of  a  road.’   

‘Then  I  will  turn  into  the  road.’  

‘Cars  will  ride  on  you,  cows  will  shit  on  you,  people  will  perform  sacrifices  on  your  face.’  

‘And  I  will  cry  at  night.  And  then  people  will  remember  the  forest.’

Azaro and Madame Koto 

Excerpt from The Famished Road

By Ben Okri. Pg 164

Azaro is surrounded by myths and mysterious things that no one sees but him,  perhaps because he is a myth himself. He is an Abiku that refuses to return to the spirit world and in some way becomes the cause of the ill luck that remains with his family. 

Madame Koto, having some connection to the spirit world, however, sees him as good luck. She negotiates with his parents to have him sit in her bar believing that he would attract customers. Even though he is constantly a bother to her when he comes to report the terrible things he sees in her bar, she still wants to keep him there.

On one occasion, Azaro discovers that the grotesque creatures who have filled up her bar are actually spirits who have stolen different human body parts to partake in human pleasures, he believes that these spirits are attracted by the fetish Madame Koto has hung in her bar, these spirits kidnap him on one occasion which he luckily escapes and on the next he cuts out the fetish and runs into the forest with it being chased by the invisible spirits and Madame Koto. When he returns, she asks him to come and sit again in her bar. 

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Short Story Fiction ~ On Top

Odd. Yes. That’s the word to describe the feeling when he’s on top of you, inside of you, thrusting rapidly like a mad man before he comes. You cannot feel anything but the hair on his chest. His husky breathing pollutes the air around you. His large belly seems to fill the space of the bed, he is surprisingly light.      As soon as he is done, he rolls off you and crashes into the bed, breathing a sigh of relief. He chuckles and prods himself on an elbow and looking into your eyes with a wide grin on his ugly mouth. He asks how you feel and if he was good. You want to say you hated every second of it but you simply ask why he had to be on top and he says a real man must always be on top.   You get off the bed and walk to the bathroom, with a tackiness between your legs. You lay in the tub staring at the tiled wall; the hot water doesn’t seem to wash away your filthiness. The soap smells nice however and you wrap it in your underwear to take it out...
1 comment
Read more

In The Eyes Of A Mad Man

In The Eyes Of A MadMan  A mad man sees things that no one else sees and he laughs because the things he sees are beautiful. Nnadi, a young man newly entering his second decade in Umuturu village, placed a pad upon his shoulder and lifted the basket of cassava onto it. He whistled as he plotted his way out of the farm wielding his knife against the undergrowth, the farm had yielded generously this season. The plot, well placed at the side of the hill–when the rains came, the water would rush calmly through – near the market, was the source of a tension between his father and an uncle after their father died. A legal battle had named Nnadi’s father the owner of the land. Nnadi walked away from the farm in his stoutly gait. He stared at the palm trees along the farm and could see red ripening nkwu, he made a mental note to come back for them. Suddenly he saw a bird coming at him hastily out of nowhere, its wings were steady, and it seemed to glide. He thought, as all birds did, th...
Post a Comment
Read more

A New Dream Of Politics | Ben Okri | Poetry

They say there is only one way for politics. That it looks with hard eyes at the hard world And shapes it with a ruler’s edge, Measuring what is possible against Acclaim, support, and votes. They say there is only one way to dream For the people, to give them not what they need But food for their fears. We measure the deeds of politicians By their time in power. But in ancient times they had another way. They measured greatness by the gold Of contentment, by the enduring arts, The laughter at the hearths, The length of silence when the bards Told of what was done by those who Had the courage to make their lands Happy, away from war, spreading justice And fostering health, The most precious of the arts Of governance. But we live in times that have lost This tough art of dreaming The best for its people, Or so we are told by cynics And doomsayers who see the end Of time in blood-red moons. Always when least expected an un...
Post a Comment
Read more