Memory and Swahili Aesthetics in Abdulrazak Gurnah’s By The Sea

Abstract

Abdulrazak Gurnah’s novel By the Sea (2001) is a remarkable work of art wrought out of a diasporic location on the old East African Coast; particularly Zanzibar, an island in the Indian Ocean that is part of the United Republic of Tanzania. It depicts the capricious societies at the outset of British colonialism here, as well as the aporias of a multicultural society in transition. The Swahili proverb, ‘hapo panapokumbukwa mengi, mengi husahauka,’ [where much is remembered, much is forgotten] informs this paper. This paper attempts an analysis of the famous author’s use of memory as aesthetics to inspect his narrative designs and how they craftily replicate the processes of remembering and forgetting through the actions of the lead characters. It is argued that memory is both a mnemonic exercise as well as a structural device in this text. By exploring this proverb from the Swahili society, which deals with aspects of memory and forgetfulness, this paper depends on an interpretation that is forged theoretically from the literary aesthetics of Gurnah’s primary location of narrative culture — the Swahili Coast of East Africa.