An Interview with Afabwaje Kurian, author of Before the Mango Ripens

September 19, 2024 | blog, interviews, news

---

Nalbandian: Before The Mango Ripens takes place in 1970s Nigeria. What is the importance and significance of writing this book now?

Kurian: Though my novel takes place in the 1970s, the issues addressed in Before the Mango Ripens remain relevant to our times. I believe the central themes of the novel—faith, racial and cultural tensions, authority and power, disillusionment, and the search for belonging—are enduring. We still live in polarized societies where certain voices are silenced and imbalances of power exist. Religion and matters of faith remain controversial. Racism continues to cast its shadow across personal, communal, and political spaces. Human beings still traverse the globe and cross borders, as we have since the beginning of time. We venture into other cultural spaces with a diversity of motives: Whether disclosed or undisclosed, these can be religious, political, academic, anthropological, humanitarian, or more insidious. In highlighting the issues arising among Nigerian locals and white American missionaries, my novel invites the reader to wrestle with flawed characters on all sides trying to find their place and identity in a new postcolonial nation.

That being said, I can’t be fully aware of the significance of writing this book now. Like many authors, this is something I might know in a few years’ (or decades’) time, meaning that significance is sometimes what you glean in understanding only retrospectively, and what you may not always be able to qualify as you’re putting a book out into the world.

Nalbandian: This book explores dynamics of religion and spirituality, family values, culture, gender, and authority. Do you want these dynamics working together so that this book may be read as part of the historical fiction genre?

Kurian: These dynamics cut across genre, but it was important to consider how these dynamics were working in time and place as it relates to historical fiction. Some questions that captivated me: In the time period that the novel takes place—in a post-colonial decade—how were Nigerians decolonizing a religion that was at times weaponized by Western oppressors? What does it mean for Tebeya, the lone Nigerian female doctor in the mission clinic, to usurp the authority of her supervising American doctor? What cultural clashes are inevitable between the American missionaries and the citizens of Rabata? How are these clashes fueled by the cultural context of those missionaries, coming as they are from a nation on the heels of Jim Crow-era segregation, and Nigerian locals, who are just becoming acclimated to independence from British rule?

Nalbandian: As you were born in Nigeria, did any of the story lines in this book have inspiration rooted in personal or familial experiences?

Kurian: Missionaries came to my grandparents’ towns in the early 1900s. My paternal great-grandfather was the first convert to Christianity in his village. While interviewing my relatives, I heard a couple of stories that became fictionalized accounts in the novel. For example, I spoke with my paternal uncle, and he told me the story of how a relative of ours would go on trips with one of the American or Canadian missionaries who came to their town, and whenever the missionary was tired from walking, my relative carried the missionary on his back. This story bothered me deeply, and I decided to write into it and turn the image on its head a little, to have Zanya carry Reverend Jim to save his life after a robbery. At one point, this image of Zanya walking into Rabata with Reverend Jim opened the novel and served as a prologue for quite a few drafts.

Nalbandian: Did you always intend for religion and spirituality to be such a large component of Before the Mango Ripens?

Kurian: Not in the initial short story that sparked the idea for this novel. The short story eventually morphed into a novel where I was writing two parallel narratives, one that took place in the 1990s and the other that took place in the 1970s. The 1970s story was more compelling to me, and Zanya was a central character in that narrative. He was disillusioned with the American missionaries who had come to his town, and he felt like his body had been used only for physical labor, with his intelligence overlooked. He had also been dismissed by an American reverend, who evolved into the Illinois native and Presbyterian minister, Reverend Jim. From there, the story grew legs, and once I had the voice of Katherine Parson, the matriarch of the Parson family, the novel solidified. I knew I wanted it to be a novel that would interweave the perspectives of the missionaries and the locals, but centering the latter, thereby illuminating the racial, cultural, and religious tensions unfolding in Rabata.

As the novel progressed, I was certain that I wanted religion and spirituality to play an essential role. Christianity is frequently depicted as being forced upon Africans and never willingly received, or if it is willingly received, the African is depicted as naïve and in thrall to his oppressor, or as a zealous convert who turns his back on his culture and people completely. I was interested in portraying the complicatedness of the Christian faith in an African cultural context, and in showing a people that were not passive bystanders or savage, hostile subjects. I wanted to tell a story of those that rejected Western customs and culture, yet authentically accepted Christianity and made it a faith of their own. A story of a people who would not view Christianity solely as an instrument of oppression, though they could acknowledge the colonial devastation enacted by Westerners on their culture. This is a narrative that’s often overlooked, in favor of the two extremes.

Nalbandian: I was interested in how both American missionaries, as well as important Nigerian locals in Rabata fell short of expectations that their own communities had of them. In the Nigerian desire for a truly autonomous Rabata driven by ethics, what is the importance of readers seeing imperfections in their community when it seems that the reader is meant to root for them?

Kurian: Imperfection is the human condition. To see our community or culture as whole or perfect or flawless is not to see our community at all. I was less interested in telling a story that depicted the people of Rabata as saints, and I was more interested in writing a novel that showed that very little is black and white. This allows readers to see themselves in the people of Rabata, and also in the American missionaries. We tend to root for characters we see ourselves in, and we often see ourselves mirrored in imperfect or flawed people. We’re all walking contradictions. We are broken and hopeful, struggling and succeeding, liars and truth-tellers. I wanted to depict characters who illustrate that claiming to be an adherent of a particular religion does not mean one is without fault or need of growth, devoid of personal struggle and temptations.

Nalbandian: I really enjoyed the rich storylines all unfolding within the larger story being told in this book. How, Americans from the mission station, and Nigerian locals living and working in tandem with them on their own land, seem to be positively connected, but with time and circumstance, develop hostile disparity. As a Nigerian raised in the United States, how did your background shape how you developed such diverse and independent characters?

Kurian: As an immigrant, you’re often searching for belonging. You also feel a tension between two cultures and may not be fully accepted by either one. My experiences have led me to be more understanding of what it means for others to enter a culture different than their own, and the difficulties that come with adaptation or assimilation. I understand Katherine’s struggle to live in a country not her own. I also know what it’s like to be judged or underestimated because of your appearance, accent, beliefs, or customs by others who do not share them, which is what Zanya and the people of Rabata experience under Reverend Jim’s leadership. I was also able to tap into the diversity of voices because of the various settings to which I’ve been exposed. I have inhabited both white evangelical, Black American, and Nigerian religious spaces. I’ve also inhabited both conservative and liberal spaces and lived in different geographic regions in the U.S. and abroad. All of these experiences have served to lend authenticity to my characters.

Nalbandian What did your writing journey look like ahead of the very first time you were published? Do you have any advice for new writers?

Kurian: My writing journey was non-linear. I had a full-time position in another field, though I wrote consistently. In 2016, I quit my job to pursue an MFA—but only after four years of attending creative writing courses and workshops, including at Wesleyan, Callaloo, and the summer program at Iowa, and after receiving acceptance to an MFA program. An MFA is not for everyone, but I found it invaluable for the time and community it offered me. 

My advice for new writers is to establish a writing community. Create your own if you have to. Being around like-minded people is a motivating force. My other advice is to read as well as you can, not just as much as you can. Reading as much as you can may lead new writers to rush to read the next thing and the next thing and the next—like cramming down food, which doesn’t make for a truly satisfying meal. As a result, you may read without full comprehension or reflection. I would advise that new writers read for depth and meaning, not simply for quantity. Take the time to break down the structure of a book, understand the plot and why it works, study the imagery, and pay attention to its characterization. In doing so, you strengthen your skills and your craft.

Nalbandian: Are there any projects you are currently working on that we can look forward to?

Kurian: I’m at work on my sophomore project, which is in a contemporary setting and follows a has-been artist coming to terms with her identity as a mother. I look forward to seeing where it takes me.