African Identity Today in the Writings of John Maxwell Coetzee and Ben Silver Okri

African Identity Today in the Writings of John Maxwell Coetzee and Ben Silver Okri is a comparative study of the literary works of the South African author John Maxwell Coetzee and the Nigerian author Ben Silver Okri. This study examines the thematic and technical presentation of cultural identity in the literary output of both authors, with particular emphasis on their respective trilogies: Coetzee’s Scenes from Provincial Life and Okri’s The Famished Road. Through an examination of these texts, this book explores the challenges encountered by numerous contemporary authors while addressing issues pertaining to the construction of cultural identity in a postcolonial context. An analysis of Coetzee’s and Okri’s texts from a postcolonial perspective reveals how their disparate writings exhibit a range of commonalities. The book provides a concise overview of Coetzee’s and Okri’s approaches to cultural identity, referencing relevant critical and theoretical frameworks. Furthermore, the book investigates political and cross-cultural tendencies in the writings of both authors, and examines how they utilize their literary works as a means of asserting their cultural identity.

Heba Mohamed Abdelaziz is assistant professor of English and comparative literature at the College of Language and Communication in The Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport, Cairo.