What I like about Purple Hibiscus is that the protagonist Kambili is just like any other teenager whose life is circumscribed within her family wall. She has to deal with her abusive and oppressive father as well as her caring mother, navigating her way through life while trying to follow the rules her father has set for her.She is often confused with the kind of feeling she has for her father.Since her father is a well respected man in the community , she is proud of him .Yet he is so abusive that she cannot help but hate him.
Kambili and her brother Jaja do taste the freedom,when their father leaves them with their aunt,due to the political unrest spreading in Nigeria.Even while they are there ,every time the phone rang,Kambili shook with the fear,fear of her father.
Then suddenly, all around them,Nigeria begins to disintegrate and the same begins to happen in the family. A violent coup causes her aunt to go to America.The unrest shakes the family and aggravates the feeling of violence.Kambili, Jaja and mother learn to live without papa.They have freedom but a questionable one.She begins to realise that the bad part of her father were more of his personality that she may have previously understood.
The title of the book is Purple Hibiscus just to show that, the freedom and happiness Kambili looked for ,are fragile like the flower,as compared to the harsh world.
1 comments:
Nice of you to take up a book that very few might have come across- the curiosity factor always works.
And the writing style is simple - reviews always appeal when one understands them in one go :)
But,dear Gullible- that was what Purple Hibiscus is about, granted.One does get to know a bit about the story,yes.
But this was a review.
A summary is a mere part of a review .
Apart from the one line about how you liked it because it talks about an ordinary teenager placed in extraordinary circumstances, there is hardly anything that tells us about your own opinion on the subject,writing style,theme etc .
The question of WHY one should/should'nt read this book remains unanswered.
Maybe you could tell us more on that?
Post a Comment