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Discuss the men and women characters in Ngugi wa Thiongo's Petals of Blood

      

Discuss the men and women characters in Ngugi wa Thiongo's Petals of Blood

  

Answers


Faith
Women Characters in Petals of Blood
In Petals of Blood, Ngugi gives some women characters roles that make them strong.
Nyakinyua is an old woman whose husband had died struggling for freedom. She is
strong and resistant. At one time she shits outside teacher Munira's house because she
doesn't accept strangers. She educates the youthful characters about the values of culture.
She teaches them how to brew 'Thengeta' a brew that was better than the ones that were
being brewed then. It is through Nyakinyua that we learn about tradition. When the
government sends tractors to build a road in Ilmorog she is opposed to the destruction of
a shrine. She dies before it is destroyed. Her death is symbolic of rebellion against
change.
Another woman character is Wanja who becomes a prostitute after dropping from class
seven when she is impregnated by Kimeria and her parents cannot understand her. She
becomes a strong character and is in the great journey from Ilmorog to Nairobi. She tries
to get a child but no man gets her pregnant until she gets pregnant by Abdulla a freedom
fighter.
Akinyi is another strong female character. She supports Karega in the workers strike
against Thengeta factory employers owned by some Kenyans and overseas friends.
We have weak women characters like Munira's mother and wife. They are Christians who follow religion blindly.
Karega's mother Miriam refuses to be seduced by Ezekiel Waweru her employer.
Munira's sister commits suicide because her father Ezekiel Waweru will not allow a
relationship between his daughter and the son of his worker. She rebels by committing
suicide because she cannot be convinced to leave what she feels is right.

Men Characters
Karega is a strong character. He leads a strike for factory workers to arouse awareness in
them about the oppression and exploitation of the employers. He stands for truth. Abdulla
is strong. He fights in the Mau Mau warfare and looses his leg. He hates collaborators. The weak male characters are like Munira Ezekiel's son. He is an escapist who cannot face life. He goes to Ilmorog as a teacher to escape from his problems but
they follow him. Another weak character is Chui who starts as a student in Siriana
mission. At first he can reason and he leads a strike in school. When later he comes back
as the head of the same school he is different and starts advocating for the same things he
had led the strike for. Money blinds Chui.
Another weak character is Kimeria. He impregnated Wanja and left her so that she turned
to prostitution. He became a collaborator and got rich from ferrying dead bodies of Mau
Mau fighters.
Titany answered the question on November 11, 2021 at 08:43


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