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Fiction Begets Facts: an Exploration of Trauma of Biafran War in Chukwuemeka Ike’S Sunset at Dawn

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Fiction Begets Facts: an Exploration of Trauma of Biafran War in Chukwuemeka Ike’S Sunset at Dawn Fiction Begets Facts: An Exploration of Trauma of Biafran War in Chukwuemeka Ike’s Sunset at Dawn Nasiru Yahaya & Amina Bello, Department of Languages, Niger State Polytechnic, Zungeru John Olorunshola Kehinde, Newgate College of Health Technology, Minna Abstract War, a phenomenon of mass death, destruction, injury and loss has remained a veritable source of inspiration and materials for literary creativity. The period of Nigerian Civil War, popularly called Biafran War was the most thriving epoch in the development of literature in Nigeria. The period has preoccupied creative writers in all genres of literature leading to the production of a corpus of fictions and non-fictions chronicling the events of the period. The agitation for and discussion on Biafra has refused to cease. There is therefore the need for a continuous discourse on the war. This work is aimed at exploring the portrayal of the Nigerian-Biafran War in Chukwuemeka Ike’s Sunset at Dawn. The study adopts New Historicism reading as a fruitful theoretical tool for the analysis of the events in the text. The study argues that the Biafran novels are a blend of fact and fiction. The work depicts that the principal cause of the Nigerian Biafran War and even the current re-agitation for Biafra is the bitterness borne out of misunderstanding of one another. The study reveals that a study of the Nigerian war novels furnishes readers with sufficient information to make sense out of the current events and situation in Nigeria so as to avoid a repeat of the ugly situation. Introduction The Nigerian Civil War popularly known as the Biafra War is often said to be the most fecund period in the literary history of Nigeria as it gives literary inspiration more than any other historical event in the country. The period brought about a long list of fictional, non-fictional and autobiographical works all chronicling the experiences of the period. Major actors in the war and creative writers were furnished with ample materials to produce their accounts of the war in different genres. The body of works that emanated from the war—mostly the novel genre—has come to be known as Nigerian war literature. Nigerian war novels, though fictions, are historical novels that are based on facts. Immediately after the war, there was a curiosity to write and comment on the war. That possibly explained the large number of works that flooded the market in the first quarter after the war. The Nigeria Civil War constitutes an aspect of the history of Nigeria where every prominent writer in the country has written partly or even wholly about. This is indicative of the fact that the war is an important aspect of the development of Nigeria as a nation. This study is based on Chukwuemeka Ike’s Sunset at Dawn. Ike, the Anambra state writer did not only live the war time, he also participated in the war; the more reason his fiction Sunset at Dawn begets a lot of facts. 132 Over the years there have been renewed calls by some Nigerians of the Igbo extraction to be specific, demanding for the state of Biafra. The struggle has found favour among many Igbo youths so much that nasty and hate comments are usually exchanged on the slightest provocation between people of the eastern region and other regions when discussing issues of national concerns, especially on the social media. This has shown that the scores of Biafra have not yet been settled amicably. It reveals how bitter the Igbo ethnic group is with Nigeria. This poses a big challenge to the existence of Nigeria. This act is often perpetrated by youths who were not born or too young to have experienced the trauma of the civil war. Amidst the unending calls for secession amongst the easterners, there is a need to study the evils that underlie the Nigerian tragic thirty-month battle with her citizenry. The Nigerian Civil War is laden with gruesome experiences which provided and still provide materials for writers for a body of works that form the Nigerian war novels/literature. These novels chronicle and recount personal and fictionalised experiences of the bloody encounters and the untold hardships and miseries suffered by Nigerians, especially the innocent victims on the Biafra side. These stories are intended to teach and warn Nigerians about the dangers and the aftermaths of war on all strata of the society—the children and women, the poor, the rich, the intellectuals, and of course the soldiers in the battle field. However, it appears as if lessons have not been learnt from these records as Nigerians are still engaged in, tribalism, hate speeches, and religious bigotries; the very reasons that led to the war in the first place. Going back to war now might be more deadly considering the technological advancement in warfare and the proliferation of small arms in the society. This work attempts to explore the tragic experiences and discourses on the war. A study of the Nigeria-Biafra War novels is necessary, more so as the events of the Nigeria-Biafra War have continued to generate attention from literary artists, activists, historians, social and political analysts. Nigerians do not seem to have learned enough from Biafra War. Many Nigerians living today, especially youths, know little or nothing about Biafra War. Therefore, more studies should be carried out on writings concerning this war. This will enrich many Nigerians who wish to know about that unfortunate civil war with necessary information of what the experience of the war was like. This agrees with Udeze Edozie (27), who asserts that “war literatures, both fictions and non-fictions, should be studied regularly to know the kind of political and economic situations being addressed by these works. They will help the country to know what to avoid in order not to fight again” (The Nation Newspaper). War literature has been a neglected aspect in the study of literature in Nigeria. It is not taught in Nigerian universities even in the departments of English and Literary Studies. The war which was fought to checkmate the secessionist bid of the people of the Eastern part of Nigeria resulted in wanton loss of lives and destruction of properties, therefore, the renewed struggle to actualise Biafra by the people of the Igbo extraction calls for concern. Theoretical Context As a theory, new historicism is the skeletal upon which the interpretive analysis of this text is based. The main aim of this theory is to understand intellectual history through literature, and literature through its cultural context. The theory holds that the truth of the history of an event is a matter of interpretation on both the part of the writer and the reader. This belief is hinged on the fact that the losers’ history is hardly heard. It is assumed that it is the powerful that possess the resources to record story. This played out in Iraqi when it was invaded by the US as well as in Libyan. All that was heard of is the story handed to people by the US because they own the most powerful media and the publishing houses. However, the Nigeria-Biafra story 133 has established that the history of the loser can also be heard, even more than the history of the dominant or the winner. Readers are more interested in the story of the defeated than the story of the winner because it helps the readers to understand the conflict better and perhaps why there is the reoccurring agitation for Biafra. Though, they may not have published their stories as official documents, or textbooks, they may have circulated them in the form of other discourses. In the case of the Nigerian-Biafran War, Republic of Biafra (the supposed loser) has chronicled the events of the war more than the Federal Government of Nigeria (the perceived winner). The voice of the losers has been more audible than the voice of the winners. Although the Federal Government declared a situation of “no victor, no vanquished” at the end of the war, it is apparent that the war was won and lost. The new historicists would want to hear all the stories and recognise all the voices from both the winners and the losers. According to new historicists, there never was, and there never is, a single history or a single worldview. Instead, many discourses come together in a complete cultural interaction. Some new historicists charge that the very notion of a standardised culture is a false one that has been imposed by powerful institutions and classes as a way of maintaining their own interests. Aware that no single discourse can explain the complexities of any event or artifact, new historicists search out sources that were overlooked in the past because of emphasis on finding an overall explanation of a period’s practices and products. Their investigations have led to an interest in the narratives of marginalised people as well as to some criticism for importance they give to non-mainstream materials. The quest of the new historicists is important because it is through the stories people tell about themselves that they come to know who they are. To hear only the narratives of the dominant groups would mean ignoring others that have helped shape people and would provide only a partial understanding of what and how ideologies operated and interacted to form personal and group identities. The Nigeria-Biafra War and Literature As earlier mentioned, the Nigerian-Biafran War remains the most recreated historical phenomenon in postcolonial Nigerian literature. The reason for this is not farfetched. Events of wars have always been instrumental in producing literature and literary documents and discourses.
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