Prezzzzziiii

Man, I only now learned about this, so decided to step back on doing the layout and presentation, but there is definitely some cool stuff you can do with this...

Alrighty, here ya go :)

Prezzziii

There Will Be Blood

So, finally, after 15 chapters, the praised, fearless, passionate, calculating Bakayoko makes his return, into the midst of the conflict.
Overall, I think he is my favorite character. He is imperfectly good, and able to bring progress, in conflict, while showing no emotional attachment at all. In total, he just seems to be extremely necessary. It was interesting to see the calm, quiet beginning to his appearance, leading into a display of the power and the passion fueling his ideas and actions, during the negotiations. Displayed too, are some of his flaws of character, principally his arrogance and his lack of self control.
In short, Bakayoko is portrayed as both savior and trigger, in simple terms someone able and determined to make things better but, because of his passion and his temper, unable to help making things worse.
Hero, anti-hero, and neutral force to be reckoned with. 

The march of the women seemed to be a sort of temporary climax to the influence that the women are holding in the story, yet filled with tragedy.There are the deaths of Penda and Samba, both of which are viewed by those on the march as martyrdoms. Yet, they are the latest in a series of deaths that begins in chapter two with the accidental death of Maimouna's unnamed second twin and that continues with the deaths of Hiakoro, Houdia M'Baye and even Sounkare. The thematic and narrative suggestion here is that there is no price too high to pay for freedom, and as such I can't help but think of the futility of the entire situation.

It appears as if death will be the victor, regardless of any outcome.

Quick shameless plug

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Running Wild

Still, I am surprised by the book, in a positive way. Here is to hoping that there are no more let-downs.
The entire episode of the apprentices was of high note to me. While this was also a large part of the discussion in class, the importance of the destruction of modern inventions/man made things stood out to me while reading. Since we covered this to a large extent, I won't repeat the arguments, but I do believe that the main intent here was to display the fragility of modern rule, and especially the french rule in africa. (I would not necessary think this was supposed to be applied universally.) 

The next chapter I found equally as interesting, mainly because it displayed what can be considered one of the pivotal aspects of cultural interaction. Especially in this context, when reality was brutal domination, it is fairly interesting to see attempts, or at least thoughts, of peaceful interaction. The specific part of the narration that interested me here was the reaction that ensued after Pierrot expresses his wishes. The extreme disdain towards so much as the idea of this, that is expressed from the guests is one thing, but the reaction that caught my attention more was that of Leblanc. While we are not given much detail of his interactions, only the rejection he received, it still displays an interesting aspect to the brutal nature of colonization, which is explored so often in this novel. It raises a question of whether or not the brutal domination is necessary to accomplish this process of cultural merging. However, this is a much larger question.

Overall, still looking forward to the development of the story, interested to see which arc they continue next.