The African City In Meja Mwangi’s Urban Trilogy

Meja Mwangi is a prolific Kenyan writer with international reputation.He was rewarded the Jomo Kenyatta Prize for Literature in 1974,since then his works have attracted the attention of numerous readers and scholars and have won many international awards.Created in the 1970 s,Mwangi’s urban trilogy Kill Me Quick(1973),Going Down River Road(1976)and The Cockroach Dance(1979)focus on the life of the underprivileged people during this period in Nairobi,the capital of Kenya.Through the detailed description of the miserable life of laborers,vagrants and slum dwellers in the city,Mwangi exposes the urban problems in Nairobi and the profound impact of urbanization on people in post-colonial Kenya.Combining his life experience in Kenya and experience of studying abroad in Europe,Mwangi displays his understanding and keen observation of the city through the creation of the urban trilogy.Based on theories of urban cultural studies,this thesis aims to analyze Mwangi’s urban trilogy by focusing on the urban life scenes in these works.Nairobi was once the center of European colonial rule in the colonial period of Kenya,and it is also a representative of modern African cities.The interweaving of modernity and diversity of Nairobi and the dilemmas and frustrations of African people in the process of urbanization constitute Mwangi’s profound urban writings.This thesis expounds Mwangi’s interrogation of the problems of survival and struggles of the subalterns in the process of urbanization in Kenya from three aspects: the dissimilated urban landscape,the spiritual world of the urban wanderers of underclass and the multiple faces of modernity in Nairobi.Mwangi’s metaphorical description of urban symbols and exploration of individual spirits show the modernity of Nairobi and the pain and confusion that it brings to Kenyan people.The themes of the trilogy evolve from the protagonists’ self-suppression to reflection on the status quo to final rebellion,showing Mwangi’s longing for the realization of the African dream of cultural independence and self-reconstruction.Byexposing the causes of the tragedy of Kenyan people in the post-colonial urbanization,Mwangi’s urban writings disclose his thinking about such issues of self-identity,cultural identity,and the reconstruction of self and culture that Kenyan people have to deal with in the context of hybrid cultures,display his dissatisfaction with the industrial rationality,material desires and colonial legacy in urbanization in Kenya,and express his concern and humanistic care for the people living in the city.