A Bend in the River

by V. S. Naipaul

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Critical Evaluation

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A Bend in the River is based on V. S. Naipaul’s observations during a 1975 visit to Zaire, a new African nation that had formerly been the Belgian Congo. In Zaire, Naipaul encountered several worlds at once: the Congo of Joseph Conrad, a writer whose clear insights into that country and into human character had fascinated Naipaul since childhood; the Africa of the bush, seemingly eternal and indomitable, despite Arab and Belgian attempts to civilize it; and the new Africa, the so-called authentic Africa of Joseph Mobutu. Naipaul quickly saw through the rhetoric and propaganda of the new government and of the ostentatious façades of Zaire’s new art and architecture, and he exposed Mobutu’s kingship as a temporary reign of self-aggrandizement, greed, and terror. In creating his novel, A Bend in the River, Naipaul combined his experiences in Zaire (which he documented in his critical essay on Mobutu, “A New King for the Congo: Mobutu and the Nihilism of Africa,” 1975) with his personal preoccupation with such themes as the mingling of different cultures and the deterioration of dreams, sexuality, and personal and cultural security.

The hero of the novel, Salim, comes from a coastal Muslim family that in its customs is closer to the Hindus of northwest India, from which it had come centuries earlier. As the narrator, he is established both as an African and as an outsider, for, as he points out, the coast is not truly African but rather an area settled by Arabs, Indians, Persians, and Portuguese. This cultural background helps to explain Salim’s growing sense of dislocation and alienation as he attempts to come to grips with the bush (represented by Zabeth), the “new” Africa of Big Man, the philosophy of his friend, Indar, and his sexual and cultural fantasies that center upon Yvette.

Corruption pervades the novel. Big Man ruthlessly asserts his control over the “new” Africa by fear and violence. He commands respect because of his wealth and power, and he undermines the ancient culture of the African bush by his campaigns of terror. Despite the trappings of a new cultural identity and “authenticity,” Big Man and his followers are no better than the cultures they have nationalized in the name of African unity. The sensitive and intelligent Ferdinand represents the bright young African who emerges from the bush and is seduced by the promises of Big Man, who promises a radicalized Africa. By the end of the novel, however, Ferdinand has become totally disillusioned by the movement’s hypocrisy and use of terror. The novel ends with an impending revolution that may again bring about massive killings and, perhaps, even the destruction of Big Man himself. Ferdinand, filled with rage that all he has studied and worked for has come to nothing, warns Salim to flee the country.

None of the characters in this novel succeeds in finding his or her identity in this violent country. Indar flees to London, where he becomes a failure at his work and turns to living in a past he can never reassume. Yvette and Raymond, whom Big Man uses to advance his policies, are discarded once their usefulness is over. Father Huismans, another European, is murdered, despite his dedication to the religious culture of Africa. Ferdinand has lost his ideals and hope yet cannot return to the bush from which he had come.

Salim and Nazruddin come close to attaining a degree of independence and self-fulfillment, Nazruddin by exchanging his African past for a life in London, and Salim by seeking refuge in England from the social and psychic disorder of his fractured and...

(This entire section contains 736 words.)

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radicalized homeland. Salim opens his story with words of wisdom that he achieves only after his painful experiences in the interior of Africa: “The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing, have no place in it.” The idea of going home, the idea of the other place, is a fiction that comforts only to destroy those who believe in it. There are no places to escape in this changing, dangerous, and disillusioning world, and this is especially true of people like Salim. He discovers that he must live in the world as it is, and that even his passage to England and his relationship with Nazruddin and his daughter will offer no more than a temporary respite from the relentless disorder that has shaped him.

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