The Book of Not

The Book of Not is a novel by Zimbabwean author Tsitsi Dangarembga, published in 2006. The novel is semi-autobiographical, set in colonial Rhodesia. The story is told from the perspective of Tambudzai as she attends a convent boarding school in Rhodesia. In The Book of Not, Tambu's story continues from when it previously left off in the prequel, Nervous Conditions (1988). In May 2018, the BBC named Nervous Conditions as one of the top 100 books that have shaped the world, listing the novel at number 66.

Background

A sequel to Nervous Conditions, this is a powerful and engaging story about one young woman's quest to redefine the personal and political forces that threaten to engulf her. As its title suggests, this is also a book about denial and unfulfilled expectations and about the theft of the self that remains one of colonialism's most pernicious legacies. The novel disrupts any comfortable sense of closure to the dilemmas of colonial modernity explored in Nervous Conditions and as such is a fitting sequel.^[1]

A distinguishing feature of The Book of Not is its radical positioning in underscoring the paradoxes and complexities in the transition from colonialism to globalisation. Tambu's search for self-knowledge reveals that the process of decolonisation might have started; but it is far from finished.