A Wreath for Udomo (Faber Editions) Read online

  A WREATH FOR UDOMO

  Peter Abrahams

  Did we think victory great?

  So it is—But now it seems to me, when it cannot be helped, that defeat is great,

  And that death and dismay are great.

  walt whitman

  Contents

  Title Page

  Epigraph

  Foreword

  Part One: The Dream

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  Part Two: The Reality

  LOIS

  1

  2

  3

  4

  UDOMO

  ONE

  1

  2

  3

  TWO

  1

  2

  MHENDI LANDWOOD MABI

  ONE

  1

  2

  3

  TWO

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  SELINA ADEBHOY

  1

  2

  About the Authors

  Also in Faber Editions

  Copyright

  FOREWORD

  by Petina Gappah

  ‘Our young men must ceaselessly prepare themselves for the fight. All their strength, all their energy, all their talents must be devoted to preparing themselves for the fight that will result in the liberation of their country and the freedom of their continent. There is no nobler task on earth.’ (p. 9)

  These words, expressed with passion and force by the revolutionary thinker Charles Lanwood, provide inspiration for the young doctorate student Michael Udomo to take up the struggle for the independence of his country Panafrica from the colonial yoke of Britain. When the novel begins, Udomo is in the centre of empire, freezing in an inadequate coat in a cold and largely inhospitable London, attending conferences and spontaneous parties where he and other freedom fighters debate questions such as whether outright revolution, or, as some of their white allies suggest, ‘more diplomacy and less anger’, will be the path that leads to the independence of their colonised countries.

  Udomo’s first meeting with Lanwood confirms for him that the struggle is his birthright, and through Lanwood, he meets other young revolutionaries, among them, his countryman Paul Mabi and David Mhendi of Pluralia, a colonised, racially segregated country. They form admiring satellites around the charismatic Lanwood, finding in his talk of revolution a glimmer of possibility. As students educated in the West, they no longer belong to the ‘past of their own people’ and at the same time, have no place in the world of London. There is therefore only one path left to them: to remake themselves and their countries by fashioning a free Africa into being through ‘an act of will’. Inspired by Lanwood, Udomo and Mhendi have elected to live for a cause: the liberation of their countries, Panafrica and Pluralia.

  After Udomo betrays his English girlfriend, Lois, with a brutal and callous act that fractures their friendship circle, he leaves London for Queensland, the capital of Panafrica. The novel moves then from the first part, ‘The Dream’, to the second, ‘The Reality’, following Udomo as his country becomes independent.

  It is this rich material that makes up A Wreath for Udomo. Abrahams could have chosen to present Udomo in the way that the early generation of African leaders preferred to present themselves: as idealistic and self-sacrificing, all for Mother Africa. But with prescient knowledge, Abrahams gives the reader an Udomo who transitions swiftly from an idealistic freedom fighter into yet another incarnation of repression. The novel thus becomes one that is about more than just a man and his path to power, littered with betrayals, big and small; it becomes a moving and imaginative meditation on how even the most idealistic of causes can be tainted by the flaws of the men leading them.

  Peter Abrahams was born in South Africa in 1919. This republishing of one of his most important novels – his sixth, first published in 1956 – is welcome. Critics in his native South Africa have long lamented that he has been overlooked, especially in comparison to his better-known compatriots Es’kia Mphahlele and Alan Paton. Abrahams died at the age of ninety-seven in 2017, in his adopted home of Jamaica, never having returned to live in South Africa. It was a decision that had less to do with the fractious and occasionally disappointing politics of majority-ruled South Africa than it was that, as a pan-Africanist, Abrahams found himself a home elsewhere. Speaking in a documentary made near the end of his life, Abrahams said: ‘When I came to Jamaica, when I found this place, I knew, my search was over. You see, until I came here, I was the expatriate. The migrant, and you know, they live with suitcase packed, ready to go home. But when I travelled to this island … this was the first time in my life I didn’t have to be against anything, I could be for something.’

  In many ways, the writer’s personal journey and his political beliefs are both reflected and foreshadowed in A Wreath for Udomo. After leaving South Africa as a young man, and before settling in Jamaica in his later life, Abrahams spent much of his early years in the United Kingdom as part of a group of expatriates that included Jomo Kenyatta and Kwame Nkrumah, the founding fathers of Kenya and Ghana, and George Padmore, the Trinidadian thinker. The kaleidoscopic view of the struggle for African independence that these friendships and encounters gave him influenced his political thought, particularly his pan-Africanism. Throughout his time in London, Abrahams participated in various ‘state of Africa’ conferences such as the Manchester Conference of Pan-African Leaders held in Manchester in 1945, where he acted as publicist. The conference that Udomo, Lanwood, Mhendi and their group attend in London is narrated by Abrahams with such great relish and humour that it could be a verbatim transcript of such a gathering.

  It was his pan-Africanist thinking that inspired Abrahams to portray the interlinked struggles in two separate African countries, and that compelled him to look beyond the borders of just one nation to address the question of freedom on a continental level. In the process, Abrahams demonstrates that the question of African independence goes beyond the shaking off of the colonial yoke. Abrahams could have ended his novel with an Udomo triumphantly returning home, in a ‘happy-ever-after’ moment for the revolutionary; instead he foreshadows the scale of the problems that came with colonialism and the difficulties African leaders would face when they returned home. In the new country he has helped to bring into being, Udomo finds that the conquered colonial power is by no means the only enemy to be vanquished; he also has to contend with the deep poverty left in colonialism’s wake, with the re-education of a people whose traditions and cultural beliefs he considers backwards and abhorrent, and the distrust he engenders in his own people.

  More than that, Udomo has to contend with his own flawed self. He may have left London, but in Africa he is still Udomo, still willing to sacrifice the individual to what he considers the greater good, still willing to subordinate the personal to what he considers the larger political end. We see in close detail the cost of such beliefs and their effect, particularly on the richly drawn women in Udomo’s life, both abroad and at home, and how this sets him on a path that ultimately leads to his destruction as his betrayals finally catch up with him.

  Revolutions, even those fired by idealism, Abrahams suggests, are inherently flawed, not because of the ideas underpinning them, but because revolutions are led by human Udomos. Indeed, it is the nature of every revolution in human history – whether American, Chinese, French or Russian – that it is as flawed as the men who lead it. Guns and glory make for great myths in nation building, but they alone are not enough to build a nation; no revolution is greater than its ideals – it is either unfinished or it is hijacked.

  A Wreath for Udomo is by no means a perfect novel. Some of its dialogue can sound leaden to modern ears, and it is occasionally didactic in its tone, with an over-reliance on representative, occasionally stock characters. But the novel’s great strength is in its insistence that Africa’s struggle for self-governance and economic self-determination, both its glories and limitations, cannot be understood without understanding that early generation of angry, young African men, its political leaders.

  Ultimately, Abrahams suggests, the story of Africa cannot be told without telling the story of the flawed, all-too-human leaders who, through an act of will, imagined a free continent into being, giving their all to independence, and ultimately, as in the case of Udomo, their own lives.

  A WREATH FOR UDOMO

  Part One

  THE DREAM

  1

  Lois would not have noticed him if it had not been for his eyes. She did not want to notice anybody. That was why she had come to the pub. She wanted a drink and to be alone with her thoughts and the quiet loneliness that took hold of her at ever-decreasing intervals these days.

  You’ll end up a desperately lonely old woman, Lois. She was not afraid of the thought, did not try to stifle it. Instead, she examined it calmly, with cold clarity. Yes, she would end up like that. She would have to prepare herself for that. She would have to begin now to find the things that would make supportable that ultimate reality of being alone. Better fix that shack up in the mountains and fill it with all the books you’d always wanted to read. There would be time later. Lots of time. That damned war made sure of it. John would still have been with her but for that damned war … You’re lying, Lois. You’re indulging in sloppy thinking …
She smiled at having caught herself out. And then she knew those eyes had seen her smile, had probably misread it. Damn him with his sullen, haunted eyes!

  She raised her glass, touched it to her lips, then looked across the length of the bar counter. All right, haunted eyes! She stared at him. She’d outstared brassy men before now. But there was nothing brassy about the eyes that looked at her. It was not the look of someone trying to make a pass. Just haunted and lonely.

  They stared at each other for a few seconds, then he turned his eyes back to his companion, a tubby little Englishman who seemed vaguely familiar to Lois. The tubby little man talked earnestly. The man with the haunted eyes only half listened though he nodded often. At regular intervals he looked across the bar counter briefly to assure himself that she was still there.

  I’ll wait, Lois told herself. I’ll wait and see. She ordered another drink and waited, freed of thinking about loneliness and John for the present, watching the man whose eyes she thought of as “haunted” though she knew the word was inadequate for the smouldering, caged restlessness she sensed rather than saw.

  At last the tubby man stopped talking and turned to the door. The other shook his head and his lips said words that might have been “No, I’ll stay on for a while longer”. Then the tubby man left.

  The man looked at Lois, then away, quickly. He seemed to shrink now, to grow into a lost little boy in a frightening, hostile world. Lois sighed, straightened her back and got off the bar stool. Probably the first time he’s in a pub on his own, and he wouldn’t have the guts to come to her. She walked round the people clustered at the bar and stopped beside him. She sensed some of the people watching, especially those at the table by the fire. Smutty-minded fools. She turned her head quickly and looked at the table. Of course they would pretend not to be looking. She grinned, and there was wicked malice in her eyes. Fools! Then she looked at the man again.

  “Good evening.”

  “Good evening,” he said.

  His voice was deep and soft. It had that special rusty richness they all had. And he was handsome in a sulkily sullen, brooding way. Height about five-seven or -eight, she decided, and strappingly made. He’d probably look godlike in his native cloth. Instead, he wore a suit he had outgrown and which made him look stocky. Mouth without laughter-lines, turned down at the corners.

  “My name’s Lois Barlow,” she said; then, as she saw the misunderstanding in his eyes, “You’re wrong. This isn’t a pick-up. I’m not in search of a man.”

  The hint of a shame-faced, caught-out smile touched his lips and was gone.

  “I did not think that.”

  What now, Lois thought.

  “I told you I’m Lois Barlow.”

  “Sorry … I’m Michael Udomo.”

  “You’re new here …” It was a statement.

  “How do you know?”

  “Oh, I don’t mean in this pub, though I expect it’s your first time here too. I mean in Hampstead … I know most of the Africans here and I haven’t seen you before.”

  “I’ve only just arrived.”

  “Africa?”

  “No. The Continent. Canada before that.”

  “And your home?”

  “Panafrica … You interested in Africa?”

  “More in people and the sun, really. A countryman of yours is a great friend of mine. Know Tom Lanwood …?”

  “Lanwood! Mr. Thomas Lanwood?”

  He had come out of his shell now. His excitement was tangible. He gripped her arm.

  “Did you say Thomas Lanwood?” he said again.

  “Yes, I did say Thomas Lanwood,” she said quietly.

  He pulled his hand away quickly.

  “Sorry … Please, when can I meet him? I must meet him!”

  Lois laughed. He was out of his cage now. The haunted loneliness was gone from his eyes. But even as she watched, it came back.

  “Any time you like,” she said.

  “Tonight? Now?”

  “As desperate as that!”

  “You don’t understand …”

  “Never mind. Let’s have a drink and then go and find Tom.”

  “I don’t really drink. I only came here because …”

  “Mind if I have one before we go?”

  “No—” The boyish, shame-faced smile flitted across his face again. “Sorry I can’t pay. I’m broke.”

  “I’m not. Have one with me, unless you object to women paying.”

  “I don’t. But I really don’t drink.”

  “Not at all?”

  “A little when I have to.”

  “Like with your tubby friend?”

  “Yes. But he’s not a friend. He lectures at the university. My tutor on the Continent said he might help and gave me an introduction.”

  Lois caught the barmaid’s eye and ordered her drink.

  “And did he?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  He wasn’t really interested in this. His mind was on Lanwood.

  “Did he help?”

  “Oh yes. Yes. He helped me to find a room.”

  Lois felt the force of the man’s impatience as she paid the barmaid and sipped her drink. Strange man, this Michael Udomo, strange and enclosed. And breath-taking when he burst out as he did over Lanwood. Odd, too.

  Michael Udomo watched the woman sip her drink. He’d looked across at her because she was alone and because he was bored with that fellow. Not young but not bad to look at. She must be well over thirty, probably over forty. Hard to tell with these Englishwomen. Maybe he had looked at her hopefully—hell, what of it! A man’s lonely sometimes in a strange land. But he hadn’t thought about it. You’ve got to get to know these people before you can do things like that. Anyway, you never know where the enemy is. God, Lanwood! He’d see him tonight. Lanwood! The greatest political writer and fighter Panafrica had produced. Nearly ten years now since Lanwood wrote him that letter. In order to be free we must marshal our forces and husband our resources for the coming struggle. Our young men must ceaselessly prepare themselves for the fight. All their strength, all their energy, all their talents must be devoted to preparing themselves for the fight that will result in the liberation of their country and the freedom of their continent. There is no nobler task on earth. Those were the key words of that letter Lanwood had written him nearly ten years ago. And now this Lois Barlow would bring them together. It was a sign, this, a great sign.

  “Still thinking of Tom?” Lois said.

  “Lanwood—yes. You know him well?”

  “For fifteen years. Met him when I was twenty-one. That should tell you my age.”

  “That’s a long time. And you two are …”

  “Just friends, Michael Udomo.”

  “He’s a great man. Is he very old?”

  “Heavens, no! … But I suppose he must be getting on. He hasn’t changed in all the time I’ve known him. He must be between fifty and sixty though … Come, let’s go.”

  “I’m very glad I met you,” Udomo said.

  “Because it’s leading you to Tom?”

  “Yes.”

  “Quite a hero of yours, isn’t he?”

  “He’s a great patriot.”

  Lois felt impatient suddenly.

  “You men and your patriotism!”

  He smiled. There was a hint of superiority to it.

  “You don’t understand …” he murmured.

  “Of course not. How could I? I’m the primitive backward woman. Let’s go.”

  She turned her back on him. She pushed past people to the door, sensing him behind her. Really, it was stupid to be angry with him. It’s old age creeping up on you. Watch out, woman. She waited for him at the door and smiled sweetly to make up for the rush of impatience.

  The cold night air struck them as they went through the door. The sky was clear. The moon was in the first quarter. The stars were coldly bright. A sharp wind travelled across the earth. They turned up their collars and lowered their heads against the bite of the wind. The wind sang softly about their ears.

  “This way,” Lois said.

  They crossed the broad road, walked some distance up, then turned into a narrow street leading up a steep hill. The cold air rushed at them more fiercely.