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Our Grandmothers' Drums by Mark Hudson  A review by Sheriff Bojang A novel on a Kiang village He acculturated himself with the people of 'Dulaba' learning to talk their talk and walk their walk. He ate with them from the same mani bolo (rice bowl), slept on the same straw bed, brewed and drank attaya from the same pot late into the starry nights, tilled the mani faro (paddy fields) with the women and even fasted when they fast during ramadhan. 'Marky Tubabo' as the native Mandinkas of 'Dulaba' christened him, became one of them, just a little paler in complexion. The members of the women's group, the Sani Yoro Kafo (Golden Chain Group) accepted him in their group and inducted him into their lores. Mark paid their gullibility with stealthily combing all their kung-lolu (secrets) and exhaustively recording everything on candid tape; from their petty personal jealousies to the seedy textual subtleties of their sex lives. The result was Our Grandmothers' Drums (the title taken from one of the many ditties sung by the women for him). Page 56-58. Hudson's ingenuity was his ability to live in the village for 14 months and gather like only a brilliant anthropologist could, all the little details of their lives and weave it into a captivating if gothic seamless tale. His sin was he abused the hospitality of the MRC and used the people of 'Dulaba' as the generic template for his book without their consent or consciousness. His understanding of the community he used as his guinea-pig should have alerted him about the irreparable damage his total exposé book could have had on the honour and person of for example, Munya, for writing he moonlighted with her (page 242), and Sona and the other women he so unashamedly wanted to "have connections" with. What makes it disgusting is that sometimes Hudson's libido was driven not even by the basal homoeroticism a man has for a woman, but the banal curiosity that the sexuality of the Bantu woman must have held for him. At least one villager, Karang Janneh - as in the radio drama Nfang sung Jamano where there is always the one great intrepid sceptic - found him out. Janneh cautioned his village folk: "This man has come here to steal the secrets of our women. He wants to take them away and write them in a book. This man is someone very wicked. If you see him talking to your wives, you should drive him away immediately." But as Shakespeare's Yorick cried, alas, poor folk! They took no caution. Mark left and Our Grandmothers' Drums came out. He has since published several other books and won a string of awards including the prestigious Somerset Maugham Award. Our Grandmothers' Drums is available at TimBooktoo Bookshop on Garba Jahumpa Rd, Bakau as hard and paperback. (Source: Sheriff Bojang's website) |
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