Farah, Nuruddin

London. 1980. Heinemann. Reprinted African Writers Series Edition. Very Good in Wrappers. 0435901842. African Writers Series. 181 pages. paperback. AWS184. Cover photograph by George Hallett. keywords: Literature Africa Somalia. FROM THE PUBLISHER - Koschin has idly, far away and two long years ago, agreed with Nancy, that they should get married if they have not found anybody else in the meantime. It had been easy to give such a promise to her in London before he returned to teach in Mogadiscio. Now he receives a telegram to say that Nancy is coming to share his life in Somalia in a society she does not know. He views the prospect apprehensively. It means almost certain rupture with his family. He meets one friend whose marriage to a European girl is in a mess and another whose marriage is a success. This sensitive novel shows the unwilling growth in Koschin of a more genuine feeling. The book uses a subtle counterpoint to show the regrowth of a relationship against the background of a city full of excitement over 'the revolution'. 'And here, though the deft construction is brilliantly original, Joyce's influence is indeed clear. Like Ulysses, it is confined to a single day and to one city, Mogadishu, and its central consciousness, that of a man named Koschin, must remind us at times of Joyce's Stephen Dedalus. Like Stephen, Koschin is learned; like Stephen, he broods. Though he is very much committed to his own country, his thoughts and his conversation reflect his wide reading, the impact of foreign cultures upon him.' The Scotsman. NURUDDIN FARAH'S first novel From a Crooked Rib (AWS 80) was described by Books Abroad as 'one of the most complete pictures of a woman we have seen in African fiction'. His powerful political thriller Sweet and Sour Milk (AWS 226) has recently been published. Nuruddin Farah was born in 1945 in Baidoa, in what is now the Somali Republic. He worked in the Ministry of Education before leaving for India to study philosophy and literature at the University of Chandigarh. He taught at the University of Mogadiscio and has recently been at the Universities of London and Essex. inventory #45808 ISBN: 0435901842.