Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in A Grain of Wheat, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Colonialism
The Individual vs. the Community
Guilt and Redemption
Christianity
Gender and Power
Summary
Analysis
It seems as if everyone is a part of the Movement, though none can recall exactly when it began. It is assumed that it started with the arrival of the “whiteman,” when Christian missionaries arrive and are allowed to set up temporary shelters for themselves. The missionaries preach from the Bible and speak of a woman across the sea who will soon stretch “the shadow of her authority and benevolence” over Kenya. The Gikuyu laugh at the missionaries, though the concept of women ruling resonates with them, since they themselves were once ruled by powerful warrior women who were only overthrown when the men schemed to impregnate them all at the same time, and thus overpowered them while they were physically weakened.
This section establishes three major themes at once: colonialism, Christianity, and gender and power. Colonialism and Christianity are linked from the moment that the new religion arrives in Kenya, which creates the tension between Christianity as colonial device and as a source of meaning and hope. It is also significant that the first mention of women as a group portrays them as powerful warrior rulers, indicating the author’s own perception of gender and power. The men are unable to overthrow the women through strength, and must use treachery instead, which contradicts common notions of men as naturally more powerful than women.
Themes
The missionaries convert a few Kenyans, who then begin treading on sacred lands to prove that their new god has made them untouchable. Quietly, the missionaries gather more land for themselves and build permanent structures. By the time the village elders protest, other strangers have arrived carrying “not the Bible, but the sword.” The “iron snake” that was foretold in visions stretches itself across the ground, “wriggling towards Nairobi for a thorough exploitation of the hinterlands.” A rebellion is staged by Kenyan warrior-leaders, but is crushed, and the power and influence of the missionaries continues to grow.
Christianity, as used by the “whiteman,” is both a deceptive colonial tool granting Europeans easier access into foreign territories as well as a motivator for Kenyans to abandon their ancestral beliefs and adopt a Western mode of thinking. Both of these Western uses of Christianity paint it as a particularly dark and villainous tool of colonialism, a tool of oppression rather than salvation.
Themes
A Kenyan leader named Harry Thuku emerges, carrying a message from God that he must free his people from the British like Moses freed the Israelites from Pharaoh. Under Harry Thuku’s leadership, the Movement blossoms. When he is captured by the whiteman, tribesmen from all over the country come down from the ridges, gather in Nairobi, and stage peaceful marches in protest. The police are waiting for them with bayonets and bullets, opening fire on the crowds of unarmed protesters. The Movement is dismayed for a time, until the Burning Spear rises, who would be known all over the world.
Harry Thuku’s utilization of the liberating message of Christianity to combat the British colonial use of Christianity exemplifies the complex role of the religion in Kenya. Christianity plays a central role in both sides of the same war, though to opposite effect. This demonstrates how powerfully the usage of Christianity can affect the message that it communicates. The Burning Spear refers to Jomo Kenyatta.
Themes
Mugo once attended a meeting of the Movement, where he saw Kihika, a fellow villager a few years his junior, call for revolution and bloodshed to end their exploitation at the hands of the British. Although Kihika condemns the use of Christianity to exploit his brethren, he also weaves Christian imagery into his own revolutionary speech. Mugo hates him for his bravery, and for speaking of sacrifice when he is so young and certainly inexperienced. However, Kihika goes on to “[live] the words of sacrifice he had spoken to the multitude.” When Jomo Kenyatta and other Kenyan leaders are arrested in 1952, Kihika leaves Thabai to lead the Freedom Fighters in the forest. After he captures a famous police station, Kihika becomes known as “the terror of the whiteman.”
Like Harry Thuku, Kihika uses Christian imagery to call for violent revolution against a colonial system that also uses its own Christian principles, again demonstrating how the same religion can be put to different, even oppositional uses. Curiously, despite Christianity’s primarily nonviolent message, both the British and the Gikuyu use it as a justification for violence and warfare, as have many before them. By contrast, Gandhi, whom Kihika will often mention as a great inspiration, internalized the tactic of nonviolence.
Themes
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A bounty is put on Kihika’s head. He is captured a year later, tortured, and executed publicly. The homeguard (the colonial security force) forces the local people in the area to go see Kihika’s body, but the Movement is only strengthened by his sacrifice.
Kihika is here established as a Christ-figure within the story’s narrative, a selfless and symbolic sacrifice. This demonstrates Christianity’s ability to lend meaning to events, since without the Christ-narrative to give significance to Kihika’s death, its symbolic power for the Movement would not be as strong.
Themes
