REVIEW of "Echoes of Her Voice"

Echoes of Her Voice comprises eight short stories of varying length, all linked by one strong theme: concern about the condition and predicament of the Uganda woman and girl-child. Each story is delicately woven around the fortunes, and more frequently, the misfortunes of a woman in the violently “macho” and male chauvinistic societies of Western Uganda. This includes the last story in the Anthology, Katuregye, titled after a famous male diviner. The story is really about a widow and her children who nearly perish at the diviner’s shrine in the desperate search for a way out of their miserable lives.

The author, a Makerere honors graduate in Literature and Social Sciences, with a specialization in Creative Writing, handles a wide variety of topics, including some which are often hushed up in our hypocritically “decent” society. Thus, rape and defilement crop up in the stories. In Secret Path, Kengeiga, the village beauty, is raped by one of the brutes, who lust after her. In a sad irony, her father tries to kill her and her baby girl, a product of the rape, to whom she gives birth just as in-laws arrive for a feast. Longtime Nightmare is a starkly realistic description of child defilement.

The insidious violence inherent in macho societies is delicately treated in Echoes of Her Voice, and in Leodina. Echoes of Her Voice is supposed to be about a wedding, yet the crudeness and harshness with which the “bride,” Twaahwa (we are finished!) is treated by all, seriously leaves the reader in no doubt that marriage is a sell-out in this society, because the girl is not given a chance to decide her fate. As if to underscore this, Leodina is a grim account of a plucky lovely little woman, who is, literally, killed by her husband in a trail of domestic violence.

In Lost in Darkness, a young woman, Bafokuzaara, is driven from home by ill-treatment only to find herself trapped in a nightmare of urban domestic slavery, and eventually on the street. Yet all is not doom and gloom in these stories. Some of them, like Her Decision, and Welcome Home!, have promising positive and progressive characters representing the new liberated and empowered woman. Keti, in Her Decision, does not only assert herself by building her own house, but also by bringing to book the (male chauvinistic) agents of backwardness. Welcome Home! poignantly contrasts two sisters: one who has remained trapped in the nets of backwardness, and the other who is emancipated through education.

However, even in the sad stories, the women display a touching and moving streak of courage, which signals their potential for the liberation struggle. Kengeiga, the raped girl, with her naked baby, walks resolutely down her secret path to the roaring river, Ekyambu. Whether she crosses it or drowns herself in it, it will be her decision.“Thank Rugaba, the girl is alive,” comments one of the characters.The loveliest aspects of this Anthology is the narrative style. It is simple and direct, yet rich and vigorous, revealing situation and feeling with startling originality.

The author immerses us in the richness of local color, often using actual Runyankole/Rukiga expressions, and snatches of song.But this is no hindrance to the uninitiated reader, for, in a reader-friendly gesture, the author provides a comprehensive glossary, and ample footnotes about indigenous items.The book should be absorbing reading for young adults, especially in secondary and tertiary institutions[1], although older readers, too, should find it deeply touching.

[1] Makerere University, the author’s first alma mater, uses Echoes of Her Voice as part of the prescribed literature courses in the Department of Literature.

*Review by Austin Bukenya, Senior Lecturer, Makerere University