‘A grain of wheat’ By Ngugi Wa Thiongo

The novel ‘A grain of wheat’ is Ngugi wa Thiongo’s third novel. The novel has Marxist and Fanonian militant attitude. A Grain of Wheat is about the events that lead up to Kenyan independence, or Uhuru. It's set in the background of Mau Mau rebellion. The setting is a Kenyan village. When the characters Gikonyo and Mumbi get married, in love and just starting their lives, Gikonyo is sent to detention.

The title of the novel is taken from the New Testament, and refers to a passage from Paul’s first letter to Corinthians which is placed as an epicgarph at the very beginning. The action of the novel focuses on the hero’s memory of the incidents of the ‘Mau Mau revolt, the movement began in 1946 Mau Mau rebellion an anti – colonial movement which historians says revolt an independence for the African nation. 

The novel stats into a small village and it give us detail about the physical, psychological and political impact of the revolt on small village people. The novel can be summarized as a “Collective act of recalling and reflecting on the past” that is a narration of nation.  We can also compare this novel with European and Latin American style – especially historical novel is a vehicle to construct a national conscience.

     Uhuru movement in the Novel:

The meaning of uhuru is the central question in this novel; it is quite far from being obvious: so much so that Ngugi clarifies what Uhuru should be only in the 1986 version of the novel, when the former “mau mau”.

“What’s this thing called Mau Mau?”

“Mau Mau rebellion” has been known in Africa and worldwide as an anticolonial movement, it has been recorded in the British memory and history as an atavistic and fanatic movement which resisted western modernity and civilization.

‘A grain of wheat’ chronological the events leading up to Kenyan independence, or Uruhu, in a Kenyan village. Gikonyo and Mumbi are newlyweds in love when Gikonyo is sent to detention. When he comes back six years later,Mumbi has carried and given birth to his rival’s child. Instead of talking about their trials, a wall of anger separates them. Mumbi’s brother Kihika , a local hero, is captured and hanged and his comrades search for the betrayer. Mugo becomes a hero through leading a hunger strike in detention, and to town wants him to become a political leader. Mugo, though, struggles with guilt and ultimately confesses that he betrayed Kihika. So the whole novel shows the darker image of the African nation that how people and woman were get tortured by someone and how rivalry takes place into the unwanted relationships.

So, A Grain of Wheat is the third and best known novel written by Ngugi wa Thiong'o from Kenya. It weaves several stories together during the state of emergency in Kenya's struggle for independence (1952–1959), focusing on the quiet Mugo, whose life is ruled by a dark secret. The plot revolves around his home village's preparations for Kenya's Independence Day celebration (Uhuru day). Former resistance fighters General R and Koinandu plan on publically executing the traitor who betrayed Kihika (a heroic resistance fighter hailing from the village) on that day. This book is very different from its predecessor. There is no one main character, but several. Though they interact, they each have their own issues and deal with them in different ways. And, though the African/British divide is still there, it is not a key. Rather the key theme, which is certainly suggested in his two previous novels, is how the past affects the main characters and how they can move on to a new future. It is clearly a much superior novel to its rather simple predecessors and has become a classic of African Literature.