A lugubrious woman

  
Mema is the story of a very stubborn Gabonese woman who married into a different village for reason of love.  Her troublesome nature did not, however, allow her to be obedient to her man and to the entire village as stipulated by the law of the land.  In as much as the people tried to make her soft-pedal on her hard stance on certain issues in the land, the woman named, Ntsame Minlame remained adamant, headstrong and unapproachable.
Daniel Mengara, the author of the book is a Gabonese scholar who took his time to tell the story in a first person narrative.  His concern primarily is to use this singular case to examine the marriage institution as it obtains in various cultures in Gabon.  The book insists that traditional marriage until the time when the white man arrived to disrupt it, was a very important institution contracted between families, involving the villages where the man and the woman came from.
It is indeed the tale of a woman struggling against the constraints of her community.  Yet the story, in a very dramatic way, proves to be a multi-layered novel exploring and deepening a culture that is in transition.  Since Mema means Mama, (mother), we could see the woman in a lugubrious form, imploring the people to let her be.
In the beginning, she could not have children on time and so they began to brand her a witch; a barren woman made into the form she was to torment her people.
Mengara takes the story layer by layer, exploring the depth of womanhood, depicting Mema as not only tough, but difficult to handle.  His exploits as a novelist could be seen from the way he takes the character away from the people, then pits her against the centrifugal forces of the community.  She is made to pay the prize of her sins.
“People would know for certain, who Ntsame Minlame is, when things happened the right way”, the author wrote.  In other words, the woman seemed unpredictable; she often found solace and consolation in her cutlass, which she used to keep perceived enemies away from her.  When her man died after a protracted illness, Mema was terribly hit that the people began to insinuate that she had a hand in it.
Together, with the death of her two daughters, Minlame decided to toughen herself the more.  “But then, my father’s family blamed my mother for the crimes.  It was not as she said, they argued.  They had nothing to do with it.  Had they not warned their brother that this woman was full of witch craft?,”  Mengara wrote on page 63.
Deploring the images of flashbacks and moonlight tale, the author gives a complete glimpse into the old traditions of the African people.  In sequence, he tries to make the world realise that marriage pattern in Gabon and most other African communities were almost the same.  He shows in very clear ways that marriage was used to cement love, curry for communal favour and relationship in those days.  Now, what can be done to ameliorate the situation?
But then what has Western contradiction done to it?  Mema is used to look at the past and then bridge the gap with the future.
Published by Heinemann Africa, it is a book to read to acquaint one with the true values of womanhood in Africa.