The Expedition to The Baobab Tree

Hello Gentle Reader

A baobab tree is as quintessential to Africa and its image of its landscape, as that of a poplar tree to Canada, or the maple tree. The baobab tree trunk is bloated, thick and wide – while in some cases the tree itself towers like a green topped skyscraper. The thought of these surreal trees populating the expansive, and blood soaked tortured history of Africa; in their solitary rooted existence, are as much African in the stereotypical sense. Much like rooibos tea; scrub brush from the karoo; and wild animals of the most exotic breed roaming the plains, and hiding in the jungles.

Wilma Stockenström is a poet and a playwright. With her novel “The Expedition to The Baobab Tree,” her talent in language, is clearly showcased. In Afrikaans language, and its subsequent literature; Stockenström is one of its greatest practitioner. She has enriched the language, and its literature, with her satirical and at times obstinate; but always compassionate voice. She has been a radio announcer; as well as an actress. Yet in the end, Stockenström first loves and her first writings; was for the theatre. Her two act plays: “Babblers,” and “Passing Through,” were published in two literary magazines of the time. Two more plays followed. However, despite these dramatic, inclinations; and the four previous published plays: “Babblers,” “Passing Through,” “Dawid the Fat Dumb Cat,” and “Three Penny’s Worth of Batata,” – she was not taken seriously as a dramatic writer until her play: “Last Meal at Midday,” that recognition became more apparent. In regards to Stockenström’s poetry, it came to her as something to do with fun. Yet her poetry soon began to appear in local literary magazines amongst, other great poets. When approached in regards to publishing her poetry, Stockenström only had twelve poems ready for publication; and came up with the idea of publishing the poems on beautiful stationary, and typesetting the font of the poems in large print. Her humour came through when she suggested titling the poetry collection as: “For the Near-sighted Reader.” Her poetic oeuvre, Stockenström had done away with poetic forms of sensibility. No affectionate adornments, nor rhythm or rhyme; and the musicality is left for the previous generations. Her work is sober in its language; and has an ironic sense to it. This alone makes her work appealing.

Personally I was attracted to “The Expedition to The Baobab Tree,” because of the author’s experiments and foray into poetry. As by personal opinion, I’ve always thought that at times poets often make the best prose writers. They have an understanding of language. An understanding that many prose writers, often overlook when writing a novel. Poets have an understanding about what to say; and what to leave out. Their syntax is odd, and yet makes the reader, think and re-read, until comprehension is gained. Their works are compressed, because they understand, that in order to gain the greatest momentum and effect from a reader in regards to literary craft; they need to be quick and offer a small explosion of text and image, in order to make their point. Personally any novelist, who writes a novel of five-hundred to a thousand pages, leaves me to wonder: if anyone needs to write that much in order to say something; it’s not worth saying. With Stockenström language, and the fact that her novel clocked up to one hundred and twenty-nine pages, it certainly appeared to be a book, which would be worth the read.

The intensity of the lyricism of the language of the novel in itself is astounding. The syntax may appear odd or strange, to some, but one must remember, the point of view of this novel; is that it is told from the point of view of an escaped slave woman. That should often be kept in mind while reading this fable. For that is what this book is. Is it is a poetically evocative fable. It’s a tale of, being taken away from one’s own landscape, and thrust into another world. A world of hard manual labour. From working in the spice merchants, backyard, toiling in the heat; under the threat of having ones tongue cut out; and under the watchful eyes of his shrew of a wife. To being bought, simply for human objective purposes – in the sexual sense. Then the other kind of human objective purposes: to benefit from the owner; the kind of man who adorns, and collects, and showcases one off; like they would a rifle, or a piece of jewelry or art work. The entire novel flows back and forth through time. Yet time is not fluid. Time changes its own course, and routine; much like our narrator tries to change and hide behind her green and black beads, to escape times claw; to escape its deteriorating grasp and its corrugating effects.

“A gulp of water, baked bulbs, and I am ready to resume my struggle against time. We fight in an endless round about circle. I do not manage to divide him up and segment him, so as to form a pattern and control him, in spite of my ingenuity with beads. I sometimes get confused and forget when I linked what to what. Green and black mixed up in accordance with my mood. I cannot shake time off me. He squats continually before my tree.”

Still the novel is not deprived of its realistic situation either. The unnamed narrator, the escaped slave women, discusses using a ostrich shell as her scoop for water; a clay pot for cooking; the gifts of food, from surrounding natives, who take the fruits of the baobab tree; the leather apron and hide outfit she wears. Nor does the novel move away from the atrocities of the past either. Children taken away from their mothers, once they are weaned. The poor narrator even tries to think, could she recognize her own children now? Will she see herself in their faces, in their hands, limbs? Would she show at all in their lives; and would she ever come across their midns, as they do to her? It must be painful knowledge, knowing that somewhere out there is your child; taken from you, and thrust into the world; without a motherly hand guiding them. Where could they have ended up, is a though that is entertained. Another city? Perhaps another country. In the end their absences are felt more close to the heart, then any crack of the whip, or any threat of losing one’s tongue. The pain of losing what is rightfully one’s own, and being left with nothing from them, is far worst then any physical repercussion, I am sure. The pain throbs close to the heart. It does not bleed, but can continually be felt weeping. It cannot be nursed slowly; and then one can go on back to their life. It is an endless suffering pain, that the said individual will suffer over and over again; until their heart stops beating.

One of my favourite passages from the book is the following:

“Every time I step out from the protecting interior of the tree I am once again a human being and powerful, and I gaze far over the landscape with all its flourishes of vegetal growth and troops of animals and the purple patches of hills that try to hedge it on the horizon. Reborn every time from the belly of the baobab, I stand full of myself. The sun defines my shadow. The wind clothes me. I point to the air and say: air makes me live. And when the scrub warbler calls, the calls in my name. I am all there is, he calls.”

I enjoy the passage of how the narrator, says, that once she has left the baobab tree she is once again a human being. Once again she is free. She is defined as such: a person. She is not a slave; not someone else’s belonging. She is once again a human being.

The novel is an interesting and fascinating fable. I love for its length, and lyricism. I love the book because it was to poetic, and elusive at times in its language, and its metaphors were simply beautifully crafted, as was the language in its use. It’s not a harrowing political or historical account of one slave turn free human being; and the trials and tribulations of their life. Rather it’s a lyrical account and poetically licensed, novel that details the suffering of one, against time, and against the past, with a future left completely uncertain. It’s a great novel. One that can be read, and re-read in how time becomes less linear, and shifts and bends like light. How time casts unfavourable shadows. Yet there is a great deal of dignity in this novel. What it means to be a human being. Yet it is not a sentimental book either.

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
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And As Always
Stay Well Read
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M. Mary