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Introduction
Part 1 of Matigari is titled Ngarũro wa Kĩrĩro / Wiping Your Tears Away. It is structurally patterned as a rhythmic journey, divided into brief thirteen sub-chapters that trace the protagonist’s episodic quest across an indeterminate post-colonial landscape. Thematically, the section explores the idealistic transition from armed struggle to pacifism as Matigari buries his weapons and dons a “belt of peace” to search for his scattered “family.” Throughout this search, the narrative juxtaposes the extreme destitution of the working masses with the extravagant wealth of the neo-colonial elite to sharply critique the betrayal of African independence. This opening section establishes the novel’s foundational style of blending Marxist philosophy with biblical allegory to emphasise the necessity of collective worker solidarity.
Summary of Part 1 of Matigari
The novel opens early in the morning with a middle-aged, tall, and well-built man walking through a foggy landscape. He is dressed in patched boots, corduroy trousers, a leopard-skin coat, and a wide-brimmed hat decorated with beads. Holding an AK47 rifle in his right hand, he watches a riderless horse gallop past, which triggers memories of the past when Settler Williams and his friends would shed blood while hunting foxes. He reflects on his many years of fighting in the mountains and forests and hopes that the last of the country’s colonial problems have ended with Settler Williams’s death.
The man makes his way to the bank of a river where he finds a massive mũgumo (fig) tree. Deciding that his time of fighting is over, he digs a hole near the tree’s central root. He carefully wraps his AK47 in a plastic sheet, washes his sword in the river, and places both weapons in the hole. He then removes his cartridge belt and pistol, counts the bullets, and buries them alongside the rifle and sword. He meticulously covers the hole with soil and dry leaves to hide any trace of his actions.
After burying his weapons, he bends down to wash his face and hands in the river. The freezing water reminds him of the cold nights of the past and the initiation ceremonies where young boys shed blood to become patriots ready for the armed struggle.
Looking at the burial spot, he murmurs that it is good he has finally laid down his arms. He tears a strip of bark from a tree to wear around his waist, declaring, “Instead, I have now girded myself with a belt of peace. I shall go back to my house and rebuild my home.” Having made this peaceful resolve, he crosses the river and leaves the forest behind.
Matigari journeys toward the heart of the country. He treks across various hills, mountains, valleys, and plains. The sun shines intensely, and the oppressive heat and dust cause him to sweat heavily. Though he can clearly visualise his home on the hill and knows it is just one final climb away, his feet grow heavy. He decides to take off his coat and rest in the shade of a tree, where he soon dozes off.
As he sleeps, his thoughts take flight. He questions how he can possibly return and cross the threshold of his house all alone. He comes to the realisation that a true home is made up of “the men, women and children – the entire family.” He resolves that he must travel to public places and blow the horn of patriotic victory to call his people together. He believes they must all gather, return, and rebuild their home as one. He remembers an old song about sharing great love and even a single bean among the people.
Upon waking up, Matigari is gripped by an irresistible urge to simply go and peek at his house, but he fights the temptation. He firmly makes up his mind to first search for his family to discover where they live, what they eat, and what they wear. He gathers his coat and hat to continue his search.
Matigari’s journey brings him across a field and through a cluster of young wattle trees until he reaches a tarmac road. Parked on the opposite side of the road is a black Mercedes-Benz from which a radio broadcast from the state-run “Voice of Truth” can be clearly heard.
The propagandistic news bulletin introduces the oppressive reality of the post-colonial nation Matigari has returned to. It announces a decree by His Excellency Ole Excellence that bans all gatherings of more than five people, a measure specifically taken to stop university students from demonstrating against Western military and economic aid to the South African apartheid regime. The broadcast also reveals the government’s heavy reliance on foreign powers, with expressed gratitude to the British government for helping to suppress a recent mutiny by the national soldiers and for leaving British troops behind to provide training.
Furthermore, the radio bulletin quotes the Minister for Truth and Justice, who hypocritically declares that the regime is a “workers’ government” while simultaneously condemning workers who are disrupting industrial peace by demanding wage increases. The broadcast concludes by announcing that the government has officially banned the Opposition Party, with the absurd claim that “the people do not want opposition parties” because they only cause disorder.
As Matigari continues his journey, he walks past the parked black Mercedes-Benz where a black man and woman are drinking. Hearing fragments of international news from their radio about the US, Soviet Union, and the space race, Matigari wonders why the whole world cannot simply gird itself with a belt of peace to end all conflicts. Seeing the black couple in the car prompts him to reflect on how much times have changed; he remembers his past as Settler Williams’s chauffeur and is amazed that Africans are now driving their own cars. He hopes they will soon manufacture them as well.
He passes a police station and then catches up with two policemen walking an Alsatian dog. As he approaches a hill with a railway tunnel, he is suddenly overwhelmed by traumatic memories of the colonial era. He shivers as he recalls the horrific construction of the railway: the explosions, the screams of workers buried alive when walls caved in, and the groans of men flattened by heavy rollers. He bitterly reflects that this railway, built with the blood of the people, was only used to transport and swallow up the tea, coffee, cotton, and wheat that Settler Williams and other colonialists had stolen.
Standing on the hill and looking down at the vastly expanded town, Matigari hears a distant factory siren signalling a ten o’clock break. The sound makes him think of the generations of workers whose bodies and minds were battered by physical labour. He questions whether anything has genuinely improved under the new “People’s government,” and realises he will not know until he finds his people.
He figures that since a factory brings together workers from all over the country, it is the perfect meeting place to begin his search. He heads towards its gates. Along the way, the black Mercedes drives past him again. He also notices the same two policemen and their dog hiding behind a cluster of wild bushes near the factory.
Matigari approaches the gates of the factory, which bears a billboard for the “Anglo-American Leather and Plastic Works” declaring the area as “Private Property.” He notices a guard roasting sweet potatoes and considers asking him if he knows where to find his people among the factory workers. However, he is suddenly distracted by the screams of a battalion of children running down the road, chasing a red tractor carting trailers of rubbish. Believing these might be his children, Matigari abandons his plan to speak to the guard and excitedly follows them, eager to tell them he has returned to take them home.
The children race the tractor to a huge, barbed-wire-fenced garbage yard surrounded by vultures, hawks, and stray dogs. To Matigari’s absolute shock, he watches two men organise the children into a queue, forcing each child to pay an entrance fee just for the right to enter the yard. Once inside, the children desperately scramble alongside the dogs and vermin for discarded scraps, such as pieces of string, shoe soles, and rotten tomatoes.
Watching the frenzy, Matigari sees a larger boy knock down and violently strangle a smaller boy over a bundle of shoelaces. Forgetting his peaceful resolve for a moment, Matigari grabs a stick and runs toward them to scare the bully away. The smaller boy is initially grateful but takes to his heels when he sees Matigari holding the stick.
Standing outside the yard, Matigari then spots a disturbing scene behind a nearby bush. The two policemen with the dog, the tractor driver, and the two men who collected the entrance fees are huddled together. They are secretly dividing the money they had just extorted from the destitute children. Appalled that a handful of corrupt individuals are still profiting from the suffering of the majority, Matigari pushes aside his burning urge to simply go to his house and hurries after the children, determined to find his people first.
Matigari catches up with the smaller boy he has just saved from the bully. To reassure the frightened child, Matigari throws away the stick he is holding. As they walk together, the boy explains that the scraps he is carrying are his “gains” from the garbage yard. The boy tells him that adults frequently steal the best items the children find. He further explains the corrupt system exploiting the orphans: the two men at the gate extort a “tax” from the children just to enter the garbage yard, and the police actively collaborate with them, harassing the children as “vagrants” or “thieves” if they cannot pay.
When Matigari explains that he is searching for his scattered children, the boy shares that his own father was killed fighting for independence, a revelation that deeply moves Matigari and makes him view the boy as the child of a martyred patriot.
The boy then leads Matigari past the affluent, modern shopping centre to show him where the orphans live. They arrive at a literal “vehicle cemetery” filled with the wrecked, rusted frames of cars, which the destitute children use as shelters. The boy proudly claims the frame of a wrecked Mercedes-Benz as his own “house.” Matigari is so overcome with sorrow and a powerful vision of collective unity that he imagines rescuing all the children from this squalor and bringing them back to the sprawling house he built.
The little boy warns Matigari that visitors are not allowed past the boundary. However, he ignores the warning and walks toward the children’s village to share his glad tidings. Unfortunately, the bully boy incites the others by claiming Matigari is coming to steal their garbage. The children ruthlessly pelt Matigari with stones. Affluent onlookers in cars and shopkeepers watch the spectacle for entertainment, assuming Matigari is a lunatic. He is struck by multiple stones which made him bleed profusely from his face and ears. As a result, he collapses into unconsciousness.
The children finally stop their assault and retreat to their village as a stream of factory workers pours out for their lunch break. The little boy, who had momentarily hidden among the crowd, brings one of the workers over to help the unconscious Matigari. As the worker wipes the blood from his face, Matigari opens his eyes and expresses his profound gratitude to the little boy for not forsaking him.
Following the stoning incident, Matigari asks the name of the worker who wiped the blood from his face. He learns that he is Ngarũro wa Kĩrĩro. The little boy also introduces himself as Mũriũki, but expresses fear of returning to the vehicle cemetery because the older bully will beat him and the other children will punish him for bringing a stranger across their boundary. Hearing this, Matigari suddenly springs to his feet with miraculous youthful strength. He declares that he will take them both to his own house.
When Ngarũro asks for his name, he reveals he is “Matigari ma Njirũũngi,” which Ngarũro explains to Mũriũki means the patriots who survived the bullets of the liberation war. Matigari then captivates his two companions with the story of his decades-long struggle. He explains that he cleared the bush, tilled the land, worked the industries, and built a house with his own hands, but the colonialist Settler Williams greedily reaped all the profits and harvests. When Matigari finally stood up to demand his house and wealth back, the settler’s black servant, John Boy, jumped on his back to protect the colonial master. This forces Matigari to escape into the forest. He proudly proclaims that just yesterday, he finally defeated Settler Williams and has now emerged to gather his scattered family so they can enter the house and rebuild their home together.
The trio arrives at the Mataha Hotel, Bar and Restaurant, but Ngarũro declines to go inside. He explains that the workers are gathering outside the factory to stage a strike at two o’clock. Matigari asks Ngarũro to spread his message to the workers: that Settler Williams and John Boy are dead, and the family must now go home to rebuild. Ngarũro points out a troubling detail: the current directors of the company are actually named Robert Williams and John Boy. Matigari notes that a name can have more than one claimant, and an invigorated Ngarũro promises to pass on the hint to the striking workers. As Ngarũro disappears into the crowd of workers, the two o’clock siren wails, and Matigari and Mũriũki enter the bar.
Matigari and the young boy, Mũriũki, enter the bar of the Mataha Hotel. The bar is staffed by women who are discussing the impending workers’ strike over the loud music of a jukebox. While waiting for their food and drinks, Matigari asks Mũriũki about his parents. Mũriũki reveals a tragic history: he is an orphan whose mother was burned to death when their landlord deliberately set their rented hut on fire because she could not afford to pay her rent. Matigari is touched by the boy’s heartbreaking story; he wonders if the day will ever come when the orphans of the land can wipe away their tears.
One of the barmaids turns off the jukebox to tune the radio to the “Voice of Truth” for a housewives’ programme. The broadcast features a speech by the wife of the Minister for Truth and Justice, who hypocritically lectures women to avoid adultery and drunkenness. She asserts that women are the corner-stones of the home.
Hearing this broadcast triggers a sudden epiphany for Matigari. He realises that he has been going about his quest all wrong; instead of randomly searching for his children, he should have started by looking for the women of his family. He reasons that because women are the “corner-stones” who uphold the continuity of the homestead, they would naturally know where the scattered children can be found.
Just as Matigari makes this realisation, a beautiful young woman named Gũthera rushes into the bar, greeted warmly by the barmaids. Gũthera announces that she has come inside to hide from a policeman who has been relentlessly pursuing and harassing her in the street.
Gũthera explains to the barmaids that she is hiding from a policeman who has been persistently following and harassing her. When the women ask why she doesn’t like him since “money is money,” Gũthera declares her deep hatred for the police. She adds that their money “stinks of blood.” She would rather beg from a total stranger. She walks over to sit on Matigari’s lap, putting her arms around his neck and playfully asking him to buy her a beer. She reiterates her vow never to have anything to do with policemen and asks Matigari for his name, but before he can answer, she spots the two policemen with their dog through the window and hurriedly leaves the bar.
Shortly after, a dog’s blood-curdling growl and a woman’s terrifying screams erupt from outside the bar. Matigari and Mũriũki rush out to find the policemen maliciously setting their dog on a kneeling, terrified Gũthera, while a crowd of bystanders passively watches the spectacle, with some even laughing.
Angered by the public’s cowardice, Matigari instinctively reaches for his waist where he used to carry a gun, but remembers his belt of peace. Instead, he rebukes the crowd for hiding behind a “cloak of silence” and letting themselves be ruled by fear. He reminds them that “too much fear breeds misery in the land.” He then fearlessly parts the crowd and confronts the officers, accusing them of harassing the defenceless woman simply because she refused their sexual advances.
When one of the policemen threatens to set the dog on him, Matigari boldly dares him to try. Unsettled by his profound confidence and fearing he might actually be an eminent person disguised in plain clothes, the policemen call him a madman and retreat from the scene. Matigari gently helps the traumatised Gũthera to her feet, leaving the dispersed crowd whispering and wondering who this mysterious man truly is.
Following the dramatic confrontation outside, Matigari and Mũriũki return to their table inside the bar, where the barmaids are buzzing about the unprecedented incident. Shortly after, Gũthera returns, having washed and changed her clothes. She frees herself from the embraces of the other women, approaches Matigari with profound humility, and begs for his forgiveness for her earlier insults. She vows that she will never forget what he did to save her life. Matigari invites her to sit down and order a cool drink.
When Matigari asks her about her conflict with the police, Gũthera reveals her tragic past. She explains that she grew up as a devout, born-again Christian, raised by a loving father who was a church elder but also a secret patriot. During the war for independence, her father was arrested and faced a death sentence for hiding bullets inside his Bible. The police superintendent offered to spare her father’s life if she traded her virginity to him. Torn between saving her father and keeping her purity, she sought guidance from her local priest, who merely read her the Ten Commandments and emphasised the rule against adultery. She ultimately refused the superintendent’s offer, and her father was executed.
Following her father’s death, the colonial government confiscated their land. A destitute Gũthera was left responsible for feeding her starving younger siblings. Unfortunately, she was shunned by the church community as a “terrorist’s child.” As a result, she was forced to turn to sex work to afford food and clothing for her family. However, out of deep hatred for the men who murdered her father, she swore an “eleventh commandment” to never sleep with a policeman, no matter how much they offered to pay.
Hearing her story, Matigari observes that society is distinctly divided into two types of people: the patriots who serve the country, like her father, and the traitors who sell it out. When Gũthera asks who he is, he reveals his name is Matigari ma Njirũũngi and explains that he has just returned from the forest. He shares his own history, detailing how he spent decades fighting Settler Williams and his servant, John Boy, for the sprawling house and wealth he had built with his own hands. Having finally defeated Settler Williams the day before, Matigari explains that he is now searching for his scattered family so they can return home and enjoy the fruits of their labour.
Gũthera, doubting his sanity at first, points out that the women of the land are likely slaving away as casual labourers on the tea, coffee, and sisal plantations. Eager to repay him for saving her from the police dog, she volunteers to guide him to the nearest plantation and help him gather information from the women there. Matigari agrees, and the trio prepares to leave the bar together before dark, with Matigari taking his untouched food and beer with him.
As the afternoon progresses and the oppressive heat continues to wilt the landscape, Matigari, Gũthera, and Mũriũki watch a convoy of army trucks and police Land-Rovers pass by. The security forces are heavily armed with machine guns, riot shields, and tear gas. When Matigari asks where they are going, Gũthera explains that they are heading to the Anglo-American factory to confront the workers’ strike. Mũriũki adds that it is common for the police to brutally beat the workers and break their limbs.
Gũthera urges the group to hurry before the women finish their shifts, and they soon arrive at the edge of a massive, perfectly trimmed tea plantation that stretches endlessly to the horizon. Gũthera notes that the fertile land is owned by foreign companies. The trio walks for miles between the rows of tea bushes searching for the female workers, but they are nowhere to be found. Mũriũki becomes physically exhausted and aches all over. He looks at Matigari in absolute wonder, as the old man has not eaten or drunk anything yet shows no signs of fatigue.
Realising the women have likely left for the day, they try to find their way out of the seemingly endless green monotony of the plantation as the sun begins to set. Walking west directly into the setting sun, they are suddenly captivated by the sight of two horses galloping in the distance.
Following the trail of the horses, Matigari suddenly stops in his tracks, his whole body trembling with excitement. He points to a distant hill and dramatically exclaims that he has found it—standing on the hill overlooking the entire country is a massive, sprawling house. Overjoyed, Matigari confirms to a doubtful Gũthera that it is indeed the very house he built and spent years fighting Settler Williams for. He recognises the surrounding plantation as his own and eagerly urges his companions to finally go home with him. As he beholds his house, a miraculous physical transformation overcomes him once again: the creases vanish from his face, and his youthful strength returns.
At the gate of the massive house on the hill, two men sit on horseback. One man is white and the other is black, but they are identical in their brown clothing, their silky brown horses, and their posture. As they prepare to leave for a party, Matigari approaches the gate. Gũthera and Mũriũki hide safely behind a cluster of bushes to watch the encounter.
The black man rudely dismisses Matigari, assuming he is a vagrant trying to reach the servants’ quarters, but Matigari calmly demands the keys to his house. Amused by this, the white man tells his companion to treat the situation like a “comic theatre” and question the old man. Matigari introduces himself as Matigari ma Njirũũngi and begins to explain his history. He details how he cleared the land, built the house, and worked the industries with his own hands.
When Matigari recounts his decades-long war against the colonialist Settler Williams and his treacherous black servant, John Boy, the black man on horseback becomes enraged. He viciously whips Matigari, dropping him to the ground, and reveals his identity: he is John Boy Junior, and his companion is Robert Williams, the son of Settler Williams.
Enduring the pain of the whip because he has girded himself with the “belt of peace,” Matigari realises he is speaking to the very boy whose overseas education was funded by the collective contributions of the people. The masses had sacrificed to send him abroad, hoping he would return to deliver them from slavery. Instead, John Boy Junior angrily lectures Matigari on the superiority of the “individual,” calling the masses “idiots” and declaring that he will not share his wealth with anyone.
Robert Williams mocks Matigari by asking to see the “title-deed” to the house. Matigari delivers a powerful retort: “My hands are the surest title-deed there ever was. What other deed do you need that is greater than the blood that I shed?” John Boy Junior reveals that Robert Williams is now a powerful director of several multinational corporations, and that Williams legally sold the house to him. Matigari is disgusted that the educated son of the land has allied with the “clans of the white parasites.”
As Robert Williams rides away, John Boy Junior sarcastically challenges Matigari to prove the house is his. Gripped by an irresistible urge to claim his home, Matigari steps forward with intense authority and loudly calls upon his people to gather and enter the house to share the wealth together.
Just as he is about to open the gate, a police Land-Rover arrives. The officers are the same policemen Matigari humiliated earlier that day to save Gũthera. Declaring him a madman, they violently grab Matigari and fling him into the back of the Land-Rover “like a log” while their police dog growls. As the elites head to their party and the police drive away, Gũthera and Mũriũki silently emerge from their hiding place.
Matigari is violently flung into a small, pitch-black cell packed with ten other prisoners. The tension in the dark cell initially centres around a drunkard who urinates and vomits on the floor, jokingly claiming he is “helping God” make it rain to end the country’s severe drought.
As the inmates settle down, they begin to share the reasons for their arrests. Their revelations show the extreme injustices of the neo-colonial state. The peasant farmer was arrested for selling milk without a permit. The starving man was arrested for stealing food from a restaurant. The worker was arrested because killed a wealthy landowner in a rage after the owner refused to pay his wages. The student was detained for asking the Provincial Commissioner why he wears colonial uniforms and questioning the lack of democracy. The teacher was arrested for teaching the history of Marxism and the political systems of socialist countries like the Soviet Union and China. The factory worker who, despite opposing strikes his whole life, was arrested simply because he ran away when riot police fired tear-gas at striking workers.
When the inmates complain about starvation, Matigari remembers he still has his untouched packed food and bottle of beer, which miraculously had not been confiscated by the police. The peasant lights two candles he had on him, and Matigari divides the food and pours the beer to share among the men. Moved by this act of solidarity, the drunkard leaps up and recites a subversive version of the Last Supper, declaring: “This is my body, which I give to you… Do this to one another until our kingdom comes, through the will of the people!”
Amazed, the inmates ask Matigari who he is. Matigari shares his story. He explains how he built his house and industries with his own hands, only to have them stolen by Settler Williams and John Boy, and how he has now returned to find the house occupied by their sons. Hearing this, the factory worker realises Matigari is the man who saved the woman from the police dog earlier that day. The worker excitedly tells Matigari that Ngarũro wa Kĩrĩro used his name to inspire the workers’ strike that led to the workers burning effigies of Robert Williams and John Boy.
When Matigari questions where truth and justice can be found, the inmates laugh, and the drunkard baptises him the “Seeker of Truth and Justice.” Matigari reveals that he had buried his weapons under a mũgumo tree to wear a “belt of peace,” but seeing the state of the country, he realises peace is ineffective. He declares he will remove his belt of peace, take up his AK47, and lead the masses so that “the producer must have the power over his produce!” He boldly invites all the inmates to a feast at his reclaimed house the day after tomorrow.
The others are sceptical, with the drunkard claiming that “only Gabriel the angel of God can get you out of here.” Just as he finishes his sentence, they hear the jingling of keys, and the locked door mysteriously creaks open in the dark. A faint, unseen voice tells them to come out quietly and not look back. The prisoners creep out past an empty reception desk and escape into the night. Following this baffling, seemingly miraculous prison break, Matigari’s fame spreads across the country like wildfire. For most people, he becomes a legend.
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Analysis of Part 1 of Matigari
The novel opens with Matigari physically and symbolically transitioning from a guerrilla fighter to a man of peace. Believing that his decades-long war against the colonialist Settler Williams is finally over, he buries his AK47, pistol, and sword under the sacred mũgumo (fig) tree. He replaces his weapons with a “belt of peace” as a reflection of his idealistic belief that the post-independence era will be won and maintained through peaceful reconciliation. However, this act is premature. The entire first part of the novel serves to systematically dismantle his belief that the war is over. It demonstrates that laying down arms before the systemic structures of oppression are destroyed only leaves the patriots vulnerable to a new breed of oppressors.
As Matigari journeys to find his “family” and reclaim his home, he discovers that the nation has simply traded white colonial rule for a corrupt, Black neo-colonial regime. The state is ruled by “His Excellency Ole Excellence,” who uses the propagandistic “Voice of Truth” radio station to ban strikes, student protests, and political opposition. The nation’s independence is a facade; the government heavily relies on Western military and economic aid; it effectively keeps the country subjugated to foreign interests.
This systemic corruption is starkly illustrated by the garbage yard scene. Matigari expects to find his children thriving, but instead finds destitute orphans living in wrecked cars and fighting vultures and dogs for scraps of trash. The most horrifying aspect of this poverty is that it is actively exploited by the state: policemen and corrupt men extort an “entrance fee” from the starving children just to access the garbage. They divide the blood money amongst themselves afterwards.
The central driving force of the novel is Matigari’s quest to reclaim his “house.” This house is a powerful Marxist metaphor for the nation’s wealth and the means of production. Matigari cleared the land, built the house, and worked the factories with his own hands, yet the colonialist Settler Williams and his servant John Boy reaped all the profits while Matigari slept outside.
When Matigari finally arrives at his house, he finds it occupied by Robert Williams and John Boy Junior, the sons of his former oppressors. This encounter highlights the perpetuation of class division: the white imperialist and the local Black elite work in seamless partnership to exploit the working class. When asked for his legal “title-deed,” Matigari firmly asserts the Marxist principle of alienated labour: “My hands are the surest title-deed there ever was. What other deed do you need that is greater than the blood that I shed?” John Boy Junior, representing the highly educated, Westernised elite, dismisses the collective sacrifices of the masses and, espouses instead an ethos of extreme individualism and greed.
In addition, when Matigari realises that a true home requires a family, he seeks out representatives of the dispossessed masses to cross the threshold with him. He organically forms a vanguard consisting of three key demographics, what can be alternatively termed the trinity of the oppressed masses. The first part of this trinity are the youth/orphans, represented by Mũriũki, whose father was martyred for independence and whose mother was burned to death by a greedy landlord. He represents the future generation that has been betrayed and abandoned by the state. The second part of this trinity are the workers, represented by Ngarũro wa Kĩrĩro, who is leading a factory strike. He represents the politically conscious proletariat beginning to demand the fruits of their labour. The completive part of the trinity are the women, represented by Gũthera, whose story reveals the profound exploitation of women. After the police murdered her patriot father, she was forced into sex work to feed her siblings. Her “eleventh commandment” is her personal, albeit limited, form of political resistance against the state.
This part of the novel mixes Christian imagery with revolutionary politics. When Matigari is unjustly whipped and thrown into a crowded, foul-smelling prison cell, he encounters a cross-section of the oppressed—a student, a teacher, a peasant, and a worker—all arrested for trivial or fabricated crimes. Here, Matigari shares his meagre food and beer in a scene deliberately echoing the Last Supper. A drunkard in the cell parodies the sacrament and transforms it into a call for socialist unity.
Part 1 of Matigari concludes with a mysterious, seemingly miraculous event: the locked prison doors open on their own, allowing the men to escape into the night. This escape acts as the catalyst for Matigari’s mythic status. It immediately sparks nationwide rumours that the Angel Gabriel or Jesus Christ has returned to earth. It elevates Matigari from a historical freedom fighter to a legendary, messianic figure of liberation in the collective consciousness of the people.
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