A Grain of Wheat

by

Ngugi wa Thiong’o

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A Grain of Wheat: Chapter 14 Summary & Analysis

Summary
Analysis
On the night of December 12, 1963, Kenya reclaims its independence. In the village, the people dance in the streets and sing songs that are hybrids of Christmas hymns and traditional initiation rites. The villagers swarm Mugo’s hut for over an hour, singing songs about he and Kihika’s heroism together, but he never emerges. Even so, the celebration continues into the night, through a heavy downpour, and everywhere there is a sense of waiting, as if something magnificent but unknown is about to occur.
Once again, the novel’s mixture of Christian practices with traditional rites demonstrates that the Gikuyu, in spite of British efforts, have managed to preserve their own cultural identity and ancestral beliefs even while adopting aspects of Christianity. This refusal to lose their own culture and beliefs to Christian orthodoxy represents a victory against colonialism.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
Christianity Theme Icon
The next morning, on the day of the ceremony, people from Thabai, Rung’ei, and even some from Githima gather in a wide open field. The celebrations start with children’s races and a 3-mile community race, open to anyone. Mwaura convinces Karanja—who is hoping to impress Mumbi—to run against him, and Gikonyo has elected to run with Warui. The racers set off, many such as Warui dropping out quickly as they tire. Mumbi sees Gikonyo and Karanja once again racing each other and is embarrassed, wishing she had not come at all. She wonders why Karanja did not heed the warning she sent.
The community race is an explicit parallel to Gikonyo and Karanja’s prior race to the train, in which Karanja won the race but lost Mumbi, and Gikonyo vice versa. The race itself, and particularly Gikonyo and Karanja’s competition between each other, lends the entire Uhuru ceremony a rather childish air, indicating that in some ways, Thabai is not ready or mature enough to handle what they will soon learn.
Themes
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
The night before, Mumbi discovered that Mugo is Kihika’s real betrayer. However, she had seen such pain in his eyes then that she cannot bring herself to tell anyone else what she has discovered. As soon as she had ceased fighting Mugo, he collapsed in his own misery and Mumbi knew for sure that it was he who betrayed her brother. Now she is faced with a decision: Let Karanja take the blame or expose Mugo. Mumbi does not want any more bloodshed, so both options seem wrong to her. She finds herself wishing she could ask Gikonyo for his help in the matter.
Once again, Mumbi’s compassion makes her unique among the other characters, especially the men. Although Mugo has robbed her of her brother and briefly attacks her, Mumbi is still overwhelmed by compassion for him. This is a marked contrast to Karanja or Gikonyo, or even Mugo, who react with violence or fantasies of violence whenever they are wronged. This again reinforces the differing strengths of character between the men and women depicted in the book (and also what kinds of strength their society encourages in their respective genders).
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
Gender and Power Theme Icon
Gikonyo runs his race and tries to think about Uhuru, what it will mean for African businessmen and leaders. He thinks of his long-lost father and wonders if he is still alive. He thinks about Mumbi and the contemptible power she has had over his life. Bitterly, Gikonyo realizes that he and Karanja once again race as rivals, though this time it seems there is no prize beyond the vindication of his own hatred. Half-way through the race, Mwaura leads, with Karanja two places ahead of Gikonyo.
The race functions as more than a race, but a point of reflection for several major characters to consider what the last decades of struggle for independence have cost each person individually. For Gikonyo, his time in detention—which he initially accepted proudly—has cost him his dignity, his relationship with Mumbi, and his own integrity, making independence seem to him a bitter bargain.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
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While he runs, Karanja thinks about the day that he beat Gikonyo to the train platform and realized his rival had fooled him, taking his chance to be alone with Mumbi. He reflects upon the fact that he sold his soul to white power to remain close to Mumbi, rather than be taken to detention, and all the power that gave him as well. He remembers Mumbi’s constant rejection of him and the day he took advantage of her, the shame and humiliation he felt after the act. Yet her note of warning gives him a glimmer of hope that maybe she would still have him, someday.
Essentially, Karanja traded his integrity for the chance to be with Mumbi, not realizing that such a lack of integrity would push her away from him forever. In Karanja’s dismal outcome, the story offers a warning against abandoning one’s community and betraying one’s integrity for the sake of a personal, individual gain, since what is lost will almost certainly be more than what is gained.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
As the race enters its final third, Mumbi cheers General R. and Koina, anxiously watching Gikonyo and hoping both that he will win and he will lose. General R. runs and remembers his childhood and his father who savagely beat his mother, often sending her fleeing in fear. On the day he was circumcised, General R. had faced his father, fighting for his mother’s life, but he underestimated “a slave’s treachery” and his mother cast him out of her house for facing his father. Later, when General R. saw Kenyans “proudly defend their slavery” to the British, he understood his mother’s prison.
The parallel between an abusive marital relationship and colonialism is interesting. It depicts the colonizers as abusers in no uncertain terms, reflecting the author’s own opinion of the British Empire in spite of their moralistic claims. The parallel also suggests that for many, siding with the oppressor is less a choice of free will and more one of fear—the abused party is afraid to step out on their own, out of the shadow of power, which can even be comforting in an unhealthy way.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
The race continues and Koina thinks of his own past. After being fired from several jobs for demanding better treatment, Koina worked for Dr. Lynd as her houseboy. She treated him well enough and he got along well with her dog, but one day Koina realized that the dog was given enough steaks to feed a family, pampered with the equivalent of ten Kenyan’s wages, and lived in a better home than Koina and his family. When he joined the Freedom Fighters, Koina was determined to “enter the forest in triumph over Dr. Lynd.” So he gathered some men, robbed Dr. Lynd of her guns, and butchered her dog. He had forgotten all this until he saw Dr. Lynd two days past in Githima with even more property and another dog. To Koina, this casts a shadow over Uhuru and causes him to wonder if anything will truly change.
Koina’s account of Dr. Lynd’s trauma—the most unnerving depiction of violence in the name of Uhuru—casts the event in a different light. To Koina, the killing of her dog was not about sadism or savagery, as Dr. Lynd believed, but about correcting the gross injustice of watching a dog be pampered while Kenyans live in poverty. This highlights not only the unreliability of a single person’s perception of an event, but also the blindness that the colonizers have to the pain their presence causes, demonstrated by the fact that Dr. Lynd never once suspected that her lavish treatment of her dog seemed unjust.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
Gikonyo and Karanja pull to the lead in the final stretch of the race, but Gikonyo trips on a tuft of grass and brings down Karanja as well. Mumbi runs over and holds Gikonyo’s head in her hands to see if he has hurt himself, but leaves as soon as she realizes he is okay, ashamed of their “estrangement.” Karanja begins to pick himself up, but as soon as he sees Gikonyo’s head in Mumbi’s hands, he faints. The crowd disperses, Gikonyo is taken to the hospital—where he discovers his arm is broken—and the morning session of the Uhuru celebration ends.
Gikonyo’s broken arm sets the tone for the rest of the book, particularly the celebration of independence. Rather than a triumphant moment, as many expect—or as Gikonyo hopes for in the race—independence is, at best, bittersweet, and rather less uplifting or exhilarating than many hope. Since the author builds the entire story from personal experiences, it is possible that this is the same sentiment he himself felt.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
In the afternoon, the villagers set up a platform in Rung’ei market and people come from all over to commemorate the dead and see Mugo, who is now a legendary figure. Rumors have spread of his mystical might, his ability to withstand bullets, the many Freedom Fighters he freed from prison, and even that he smuggled letters from the detention camps to members of the English Parliament. As people sing, dance, and prepare, the same feeling of expectation hangs in the air, though “it [is] not exactly a happy feeling; it [is] more a sense of inevitable doom.”
The mythologizing of Mugo seems to make him an even greater figure than Kihika, increasing the irony of his true self. The “inevitable doom” seems likely even if Mugo were not to confess, since it’s impossible for any person to live up to the expectations now placed on Mugo. This seems to be a subtle warning against placing such messianic expectations on any single individual.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
A representative of the Party stands in Gikonyo’s absence and a preacher from the Kikuyu (Gikuyu) Greek Orthodox Church leads the congregation in prayer to open the ceremony, commemorating the blood that has been spilt by the villagers. Songs are sung, speeches are made about the oppression of the British and the heroism of the Freedom Fighters. Everyone is waiting for Mugo, but he is not there. When the speaker announces that General R. will speak in Mugo’s place, the crowd is furious. The elders promise that they will send two more delegates to appeal to Mugo, but in the meantime General R. will continue.
The legend that has grown up around Mugo is now so great—even absurdly so—that even General R., a true hero of the Freedom Fighters, is considered an unsatisfactory replacement.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
Christianity Theme Icon
General R. begins, but finds it difficult to speak. He thinks of all the African traitors: Karanja, Rev. Jackson—who preached against the Mau Mau at the behest of DO Robson and was warned three times to cease before they were forced to kill him. He thinks of the fact that it is not Freedom Fighters marching through the streets of Nairobi, but those Kenyan soldiers who served as the British colonial force. General R. is haunted by Koina’s fear that Uhuru will not bring change. Nevertheless, General R. continues through his speech, speaking of the need to spill blood to resist the British empire and protest their wealth in the face of African poverty.
Once again, a shadow is cast over the joy of independence. Koina and General R.’s fear that a free and independent Kenya will not truly be any different carries with it a grim implication—that all the struggle, pain, and violence have been for naught. Again, the author’s depiction of the moment of independence is more tragic than anything, seeming to reflect his own reservations about what was lost and what was gained. While the novel never suggests that independence was not worth fighting for (quite the opposite), it does casts its final achievement as a moment more bitter than sweet.
Themes
Colonialism Theme Icon
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon
Christianity Theme Icon
Quotes
General R. declares that the new Kenya must be “built on the heroic tradition of resistance of our people,” meaning they must celebrate heroes and “punish traitors.” General R. announces that Kihika’s betrayer is in their midst and asks him to reveal himself, letting the tension build. At that moment, Mugo arrives, takes the microphone, and speaks clearly: “You asked for Judas […] That man stands before you now.” Mugo explains his crime. The crowd goes utterly silent and parts as he walks through them and away from the gathering. The only person to move is Githua, who follows behind Mugo mocking him. As Githua’s voice fades, the crowd disperses.
It is notable that Githua is the first person to salute Mugo as Chief in “the name of blackman’s freedom” and is now the only person to mock Mugo in his climactic moment of defeat. Since Githua himself lied about his own heroism, and thus committed essentially the same crime to a lesser extent, he is depicted as a rather despicable character. However, for Mugo, this is both the climax of his character arc and the climax of the story, the moment in which the hero finally finds courage to speak the truth.
Themes
The Individual vs. the Community Theme Icon
Guilt and Redemption Theme Icon