Ben Okri

The Famished Road

 

This novel is about the experience of a young boy living in a large African city (likely Lagos, Nigeria, as Okri is Nigerian-born). The narrative is wandering, recursive, hallucinogenic—a deliberate stylistic choice. Okri contrasts the modern with the ancient, the real with the magical, the world of the living with the spirit world, gritty city life with primeval forest, the African with the European colonial. The novel grapples with Africa’s colonial legacy and the tensions between Yoruba traditions and modern urban existence. The Famished Road is the first book in a trilogy.