I have grown from loathing VS Naipaul to adoring the asshole. Of all brown intellectuals, Naipaul is easily the most deserving of the Nobel Prize in literature. I would argue that awarding him the prize with all the attendant controversies had the effect of investing stature in the prize. There is no getting around the quality and profundity of his body of work, no.
I don't like Naipaul as a person, I think that his intelligence has been devoted to self-loathing, to berating those who through no fault of their own are hapless pawns in the grand design of a narcissistic deity. It is a particular type of savagery, a culture of privilege in which some think they bought their brains from a nearby grocery store, while the rest of us scooped up ours, used, from yard sales.
Yes, Naipaul was a child who woke up to the hell that the maker inserted him into. And with the maker's gifts he rejected himself, the hell, and the maker. In making a caricature of himself, Naipaul has made a caricature of a most narcissistic deity - and of us. We did not ask to be born. It is what it is.
I have come around to admire Naipaul because to be honest, Naipaul is the most colorful embodiment of the brown intellectual, raised and educated to afford white wine over palm wine. Naipaul is honest, the rest of us are dishonest and self-serving, we say the right things, but agonize over the fittings of our tweed jackets. Naipaul lives in every one of us.
Of course Naipaul is dead wrong on women writers. Literature, especially African literature is alive precisely because of the muscular and elegant prose-poetry of women writer. Virginia Woolf and Buchi Emecheta strode out of the shadows decades ago and we are the better for it. So what? So goddamn what? How has that empowered us to be compassionate to our Africa? Slurp your latte and shut up. Drink your red wine and go to bed, Naipaul.
Yes, Naipaul was a child who woke up to the hell that the maker inserted him into. And with the maker's gifts he rejected himself, the hell, and the maker. In making a caricature of himself, Naipaul has made a caricature of a most narcissistic deity - and of us. We did not ask to be born. It is what it is.
I have come around to admire Naipaul because to be honest, Naipaul is the most colorful embodiment of the brown intellectual, raised and educated to afford white wine over palm wine. Naipaul is honest, the rest of us are dishonest and self-serving, we say the right things, but agonize over the fittings of our tweed jackets. Naipaul lives in every one of us.
Of course Naipaul is dead wrong on women writers. Literature, especially African literature is alive precisely because of the muscular and elegant prose-poetry of women writer. Virginia Woolf and Buchi Emecheta strode out of the shadows decades ago and we are the better for it. So what? So goddamn what? How has that empowered us to be compassionate to our Africa? Slurp your latte and shut up. Drink your red wine and go to bed, Naipaul.
I have more to say about the Naipaul in us. Here...
- Ikhide
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