#weep not

“Comfort, comfort my people, says your God” (Isaiah 40:1).

When you shed tears, you touch the heart of God.

Your broken heart breaks the heart of the great Yahweh.

Certain prayers experience delayed answers. God does not do it intentionally; He prepares you beforehand. He trains you to trust Him and to have faith in Him.

𝖂𝖊𝖊𝖕 𝖓𝖔𝖙, 𝖌𝖍𝖔𝖘𝖙- 𝕱𝖔𝖗 𝖞𝖔𝖚 𝖆𝖗𝖊 𝖇𝖊𝖙𝖙𝖊𝖗 𝖔𝖋𝖋 𝖆𝖑𝖔𝖓𝖊

𝖎𝖓 𝖆𝖓𝖔𝖙𝖍𝖊𝖗 𝖗𝖊𝖆𝖑𝖒 𝖜𝖍𝖊𝖗𝖊 𝖞𝖔𝖚 𝖈𝖆𝖓 𝖉𝖎𝖘𝖆𝖕𝖕𝖊𝖆𝖗

𝕱𝖆𝖗 𝖋𝖗𝖔𝖒 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖗𝖔𝖙 𝖔𝖋 𝖙𝖍𝖎𝖘 𝖛𝖊𝖘𝖘𝖊𝖑, 𝖉𝖊𝖆𝖗

"Weep not, child/Weep not, my darling/With these kisses let me remove your tears These ravening clouds shall not long be victorious/They shall not long possess the sky..."

impact of colonialism on African society- tension between tradition and colonialism, and all through the eyes of a child

after reading Dreams in a Time of War (the first volume of his autobiography), some similarities between this novel and his real life; his half brother (Kabae) coming back from the war, getting education, the white man taking over his land and displacing them

Ben Okri's introduction is really worth the read: "The literature of Africa is fed by three great rivers..."). I really like that he pointed out the "undercurrent of Kikuyu language" in the book through its cadence, even if it was written in English. (Highly relevant when Ngugi advocated for keeping African languages alive and developing them for expressing profound thought- like Pushkin did for written Russian).

Note the backdrop: during the Mau Mau insurgency in Kenya, 1950-60s.

Njoroge's initial belief that he will do something big, become the savior of the family through his education- contrasted with the ending of the novel, when he's a shadow of himself

he was able to endure difficult days because he had the dream of a better life to come. When reality hits and he realized the problem is vaster than he imagined, he's depressed and powerless. I think the author really honed in on that feeling, I felt it through the page.

the ending is ambiguous- he tries to kill himself, which is a bleak turn to the novel, but the important part, I think, is that he fails in his attempt. He keeps on living. And as long as he's alive, anything can happen.