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The narrative devices used by Ayi Kwei Armah in The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born include scatological imagery, symbolism, allegorical characterisation, stream of consciousness, internal monologue, situational irony, cyclical narrative structure, and juxtaposition. We shall look into these highlighted narrative devices.
Scatological Imagery
Scatological imagery is the deliberate use of bodily waste, excrement, and related biological functions in descriptions to convey deeper thematic meanings, such as moral putrefaction and societal decay. In the novel for instance, the environment is suffocatingly saturated with filth. The protagonist’s physical journey is routinely interrupted by grotesque sights and smells, from a passenger’s vomit at the train station to the overwhelming stench of public latrines. The latrine walls are heavily smeared with an “organic brown” and bear cynical graffiti like “Money Sweet Pass All,” physically linking the nation’s obsession with wealth to human waste.
This imagery reaches its climax through the corrupt Minister Koomson. After he is stripped of his arrogant power, Koomson is reduced to his own foul biology; his breath reeks of “rotten menstrual blood,” his belly rumbles with farts of “corrupt thunder,” and he is forced to escape a military coup by diving headfirst through the faeces-crusted hole of a public latrine.
Symbolism
Symbolism is the use of concrete objects, creatures, or images to represent abstract ideas. Armah employs several potent symbols to map the moral landscape of the newly independent Ghana. One is the “gleam”, which represents the blinding, seductive allure of corrupt wealth, power, and materialism. It is embodied by the towering white structure of the Atlantic-Caprice hotel and the luxurious lifestyles of the political elite. It constantly tempts honest men to take a “bold, corrupt leap” to escape their poverty.
Another symbol is the staircase banister which is located at the Railway Block. The filthy banister symbolises the inevitable victory of systemic rot over any individual attempts at purification or cleanliness. Then, there is the symbol of chichidodo. This proverbial bird hates excrement with all its soul, yet it feeds exclusively on the maggots that grow best inside the lavatory. It is used by Oyo to symbolise the protagonist’s moral dilemma: he hates the corruption of society, but must survive on the fruits of that same corrupt system.
The old manchild is another unignorable symbol in the text. He is a picture of a freak that completes a full life cycle from birth to a decayed, gray old age in just seven years. This is an obvious metaphor for the rapid, unnatural decay of the nation, which rushed from the hopeful birth of independence straight into complete corruption.
Finally, the symbol of the painted flower is definitely not unnoticeable. The solitary, beautiful flower painted alongside the misspelled words “The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born” on the back of a green bus symbolises an untainted purity and the lingering hope that a truly uncorrupted generation may someday arrive.
Allegorical Characterisation
Allegorical characterisation occurs when characters are constructed primarily to represent broader concepts, social classes, or moral stances rather than functioning merely as realistic individuals. This device is judiciously used in the novel. Let’s start with the man. The unnamed protagonist functions as an everyman. He represents the isolated, upright citizen struggling to maintain his moral integrity while being crushed by the normalised corruption of his society. Then, there is Teacher, the man’s naked, isolated friend. He embodies the complete disillusionment and cynical withdrawal of the nation’s intellectuals.
On the other side of the divide is Koomson. His Excellency Joseph Koomson represents the greedy new political elite. He is once a rough dock worker before he transforms into a fat, perfumed “socialist” Minister with the “ancestral softness of chiefs who have sold their people.” He is a perfect embodiment of the betrayal of African independence.
An examination of the use of allegorical characterisation in the novel would be incomplete without a mention of Maanan. She is an allegory for the nation itself. Her striking beauty is pushed into drug use and madness to serve as a microcosm of the beautiful promise of independence that has been betrayed, destroyed, and driven insane by the hopelessness of its condition.
Stream of Consciousness
Stream of consciousness is a narrative mode that seeks to portray an individual’s point of view by giving the written equivalent of the character’s thought processes. Armah frequently blurs the line between third-person objective narration and the protagonist’s direct mental experience.
As the man walks through his physical environment, his sensory perceptions trigger philosophical digressions without formal transitions. For example, during a bus ride through the city, the man’s awareness of the external environment—the hot dusty wind over the loco yard, the smell of decaying oil, the fish frying near the public lavatory—flows seamlessly into a mental meditation on the doomed attempts of people to purify themselves and the “caked shit” of the society around them.
Similarly, his walk into the dark night transitions fluidly into a sprawling mental reflection on his deceased friend, Rama Krishna, and his unnatural attempts to escape the inevitable decay of life through yoga and celibacy.
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Internal Monologue
Internal monologue is the presentation of a character’s unspoken thoughts, internal debates, and emotional struggles, usually structured more coherently than stream of consciousness to reveal their psychological state. The unnamed protagonist is deeply isolated, and much of his character development occurs through silent internal monologues where he processes his guilt and alienation.
When he returns home to the silent, accusing eyes of his family, he engages in a painful internal debate about the “reproach of loved ones”. He questions what the point is in maintaining his honesty when it only brings suffering to those he cares about.
The narrative also features the internal, extended reflections of Teacher, who wrestles with the shattered hopes of post-colonial independence. He silently examines the “dizzying speed” with which the nation’s leaders decayed from saviours into fat, cynical men who only wanted to step into the shoes of the white colonial masters.
Situational Irony
Situational irony is a literary technique where the actual outcome of a situation is drastically different from, or the direct opposite of, what is expected or intended. Ayi Kwei Armah relies on situational irony to expose the hypocrisy of the society. The most prominent irony can be found in the novel’s climax. The upright protagonist, who has spent the entire narrative resisting the “gleam” of corruption, becomes the sole instrument of escape for the corrupt Minister Koomson, the very embodiment of the rot the man detests.
In addition, situational irony manifests through the character of Koomson. For the larger part of the text, Koomson is a wealthy, arrogant man who previously could not even stomach the smell of the protagonist’s public latrine and had to retreat from it. He is eventually forced to save his own life by diving headfirst into the faeces-crusted hole of that exact same latrine.
Another vivid example of situational irony in the setting is the “Keep Your Country Clean” waste receptacle, a government initiative that is entirely buried under an overflowing, rotting heap of garbage and offal.
Cyclical Narrative Structure
This is a storytelling framework in which the narrative ends in the same place or manner that it began. It is used to emphasise themes of entrapment, futility, or the inescapable repetition of history. The novel is meticulously structured as a closed loop to hammer the inescapable, unchanging nature of Ghanaian corruption. The story opens in the dim light of dawn on a passenger bus, focusing on a corrupt conductor who accepts a bribe and greedily inhales the “marvelous rottenness” of a stolen cedi note.
After the sweeping events of the novel, which include of course a military coup d’état that supposedly overthrows the corrupt government, the story concludes with a mirroring event. The protagonist walks back into town and observes a new policeman casually extorting a bribe from the driver of a small green bus.
This cyclical framing confirms the man’s cynical realisation that the coup is merely a “change of embezzlers”. It leaves him exactly where he started. He returns to the same miserable job and family, burdened with the knowledge that nothing has truly changed.
Juxtaposition
Juxtaposition is a literary device where two starkly contrasting elements, settings, characters, or ideas are placed side by side or presented closely together to highlight their dramatic differences and deepen the underlying themes of a work. It is used in the novel to map the extreme social inequality and moral contradictions of post-colonial Ghana. The author primarily uses it by contrasting the grueling, grimy poverty of the masses with the extravagant, unearned “gleam” of the new political elite.
The protagonist’s daily reality is suffocated by physical rot in direct contrast to luxurious mansions where the corrupt “Party men” enjoy foreign drinks and live exactly like the departed white colonial masters.
Armah also uses juxtaposition to highlight the inverted moral landscape of the society. The protagonist’s unwavering honesty is starkly juxtaposed against a world that has normalised bribery. While the honest man is mocked by his family and alienated as a fool, corrupt figures like Minister Koomson and brazen thieves like Zacharias Lagos and Abednego Yamoah are praised by society as good, successful, and generous men. This painful moral paradox is perfectly captured in the metaphor of the chichidodo.
Related:
- Plot Summary and Setting of The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born by Ayi Kwei Armah
- Characters in The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born by Ayi Kwei Armah
- Themes in The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born by Ayi Kwei Armah
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