The novel shows the trajectory of women and the normative system of patriarchy, and how it shapes women's lives. It is the story of a woman – and more importantly, we can say a woman in the prime of her life – who, against all odds, tries to build a future in a patriarchal society, where women are seen as commodities that can be exchanged for a few favors for the benefit of the family.
E.M. Forster begins his book, Aspects of the Novel, with an illustration of what a novel means to different people. He chose the last person he recognises as himself and for him: “Yes, oh, of course it does, the novel tells a story. That is the fundamental aspect without which it could not exist.” This pattern of definition may seem simple, but storytelling is often not as simple as we think. Storytelling is about coherence, a journey into different minds and souls, and the movement of events. I like to think of Dr. Prince Nduka Alum’s Behind the Doors of Fate as the movement of a story, and more importantly, in a terrain that I think is still evolving in Nigerian literature: male authors dealing with female protagonists, often shown kneeling.
The novel shows the trajectory of women and the normative system of patriarchy, and how it shapes women’s lives. It is the story of a woman—and more importantly, we can say that it is a woman in the prime of her life—who, against all odds, tries to build a future in a patriarchal society, where women are seen as commodities to be exchanged for a few favors for the benefit of the family. Adaeze, a fifteen-year-old girl, is to be given in marriage against her will and that of her mother. But since things are in a phallocentric system where power resides in the man, no one could oppose the father’s decision: “Dad was the man you should obey” (2). Adaeze’s mother, and also her mother before her, married at a young age, and a similar pattern applies to Adaeze, whose father did not give in despite the young girl’s pleas. When her mother, named Mamao, sat her down, the narrator notes that:
The vicious cycle of giving girls away in marriage because of their poverty seemed to have become a family curse that was about to reach its third generation. She recalled the story of her mother, who was unable to go to school, and how her father believed that missionaries had come to their village to desecrate the land. What’s more, they built the mission school on a crookedly carved piece of land in the evil forest against the will of the then high priest, who had cursed anyone who set foot in that forest. She recounted how her mother ended up betrothed at the age of twelve to a man who already had three wives and children older than her.
Three generations went through the pain of being married off at a young age due to poverty, but what is interesting about the perspective taken in Behind the Doors of Fate is that it does not follow the poverty porn of Western gender pedagogy, which lacks the dialectic of gender and class, thus making third-world culture the basis of patriarchy. Our protagonist notes, “I used to hear people say that poverty is a curse, but I didn’t know it could reach this level.” The novel includes the issue of the class binary and how it affects and influences gender. All three generations of women mentioned are from the lower class, and this gives a proper perspective on how class is a major factor of gender bias. Adaeze remembers Promise, her mother’s friend who works in the city and is married to an “important man” because she went to school while Mamao, from a poor background, could not achieve anything that her friend achieved. Adaeze tells us: “If her parents had allowed her to attend school, my mother believed that she too could have reached the same level as Aunt Promise and would never have ended up in my father's house” (2).
The novel is a coming-of-age novel that charts Adaeze’s progress after marrying Eddy in what she calls “this bargaining marriage,” setting out even on the unfamiliar street of Lagos to become the kind of woman she always wanted to be. It is a bumpy ride because she was going into a world of uncertainties. To make matters worse, she has not resolved the pain and conflict of marrying against her will, but the first thing she introduces to Eddy is that he is a playboy, with women in both Onitsha and Lagos. Adaeze is greeted in Onitsha with a fight from someone older than her. When they get to the hotel where they are to spend the night, “a lady out of nowhere pounced on him and snatched (the key) from his hands. “Is this the wild animal meat you went to the village to buy? Eddy, you are a shameless idiot. Isn’t he underage?” Look at her” (22). This is followed by another call from someone in Lagos who claims to be pregnant with Eddy's child.
Despite these challenges, Adaeze knows that she cannot return to her village. She is determined to find a way to get ahead in her life, but she is in for another surprise when she learns that Eddy is not as rich as her father was led to believe. The boy’s apartment and the cockroaches that roam the room upon her arrival send a signal, but she sets her mind on the future. What makes the story more interesting is that, as Adaeze learns, when fate speaks into the void of uncertainty, a path unfolds. Eddy becomes the rhythm of fate’s voice. He offers Adaeze the kind of life she always wanted, and the novel promotes this philosophy: the journey of a human being’s life is ultimately dependent on fate. Alum’s novel is a testament to victory and how, in the face of life’s challenges, laughter and light find us in the end.
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Oko Owoicho is an award-winning poet and critic. He is the founder of the Benue Poetry Troupe and team leader of Afrika-Writes.