DAMBUDZO MARECHERA:
A PSYCHOBIOGRAPHICAL STUDY
Kudakwashe C. Muchena
210106646
Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of
Magister Artium (Psychology)
Faculty of Health Sciences
Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University
November 2013
Supervisor: Professor Greg Howcroft
Co-Supervisor Professor Louise Stroud
i
PHOTOGRAPH OF DAMBUDZO MARECHERA
ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to extend my most sincere gratitude to the following people for their encouragement and support throughout this process:
Firstly, to both my supervisor Prof. Greg Howcroft and my co-supervisor Prof. Louise
Stroud for their commitment, patience, guidance, tenacious support and faith in me.
To my late mother who was the driving force regarding my studies as far back as I
can remember. Although she did not understand what I was doing she still supported
me unconditionally. Without her constant encouragement, motivation and strength I
would not have made it this far. She has been a source of inspiration throughout my
career.
To my patient family and friends for their unwavering support.
iii
DECLARATION
I, Kudakwashe C Muchena, hereby declare that the dissertation for Magister Artium
(Psychology) is my own work and that it has not previously been submitted for assessment or completion of any postgraduate qualification to another University or for another qualification.
Kudakwashe C. Muchena
Signature______
Date______
iv
ABSTRACT
Marechera the Zimbabwean writer, poet and novelist emerged in the late 1970s as a new voice in African literature, but his writing career lasted less than a decade. It was his iconoclastic, dense style that expressed the psychological disintegration prevalent in Africa during this period and challenged the central beliefs of both the nationalist and post- independence eras. Defying the limitations of nationality, race and culture, Marechera’s writing explores universal issues, particularly urban existence in the late twentieth century.
Marechera’s life and work were closely linked. His outspoken views and unorthodox lifestyle brought him into frequent conflict with the authorities and contributed to him being perceived as a cult figure. Through his work and personality he became a major inspiration and role model for the younger generation of writers in Zimbabwe and other African countries.
The present study is a psychobiographical case study with the primary aim being to explore and describe the personality development of Dambudzo Marechera (1952-1987) using Alfred Adler’s theory of Individual Psychology. It was through the use of a theory of psychological development that a better understanding of Marechera’s personality, based on his cultural and historical background was achieved and a new interpretation and explanation was reported. The findings of the study can be generalised to the theory of individual psychology through the process of analytical generalization.
Key words, Alfred Adler, Dambudzo Marechera, Individual Psychology, Psychobiography
v
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PHOTOGRAPH OF DAMBUDZO MARECHERA ...... ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... iii
DECLARATION ...... iv
ABSTRACT ...... v
TABLE OF CONTENTS ...... vi
CHAPTER 1 ...... 1
INTRODUCTION ...... 1
1.1. Chapter preview ...... 1
1.2. General orientation of the research study ...... 1
1.2.1. Contextualisation...... 1
1.2.2. Aim of the study...... 2
1.2.3. Overview of psychobiographical research...... 3
1.2.4. Overview of the theoretical framework...... 4
1.2.5. Brief description of the research subject...... 5
1.3. Problem statement ...... 9
1.4. Justification of the study ...... 10
1.5. The researcher’s personal passage ...... 12
1.6. Overview of the study...... 13
CHAPTER 2 ...... 15
PSYCHOBIOGRAPHICAL RESEARCH ...... 15
2.1. Chapter preview ...... 15
vi
2.2. Origins of psychobiography ...... 15
2.3. Psychobiography and psychoanalysis ...... 16
2.4. Overview of psychobiography research ...... 17
2.4.1. History of psychobiographical inquiry ...... 17
2.4.2. Trends in the development of psychobiography ...... 19
2.5. Psychobiography and case study ...... 21
2.6. Life history research ...... 23
2.7. Definition of psychobiographical research ...... 24
2.8. Psychobiography and related concepts ...... 25
2.8.1. Psychobiography ...... 25
2.8.2. Biography, life stories and narratives ...... 26
2.9. The value of psychobiographical research ...... 26
2.9.1. The uniqueness of the individual case within the whole ...... 26
2.9.2. The socio-historical context ...... 28
2.9.3. Process and pattern over time ...... 28
2.9.4. Subjective reality ...... 29
2.9.5. Theory testing and development ...... 29
2.10. Criticism of psychobiographical studies...... 30
2.10.1. Psychobiographer’s relationship with the subject ...... 31
2.10.2. Psychobiography as cross cultural research ...... 31
2.10.3. Use of psychological theory...... 32
vii
2.10.4. Analysing an absent subject ...... 33
2.11. The growth of psychobiography in South Africa ...... 34
2.12. Practicing reflexivity ...... 35
2.13. Conclusion ...... 35
CHAPTER 3 ...... 37
ALFRED ADLER’S INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGY ...... 37
3.1. Chapter preview ...... 37
3.2. Introduction to Adlerian Theory ...... 37
3.3. The view of human nature...... 38
3.4. The Structure and development of personality ...... 40
3.4.1. Constitutional attributes ...... 41
3.4.1.1. Inferiority feelings and compensation...... 42
3.4.1.1.1. Organ inferiority...... 42
3.4.1.1.2. Psychological inferiorities...... 43
3.4.1.1.3. Inferiority complex...... 44
3.4.1.2. Superiority complex...... 45
3.4.2. Creative self ...... 45
3.4.3. Social environment...... 46
3.4.4. Social interest ...... 47
3.4.5. Birth order ...... 48
3.4.5.1. The first-born child ...... 48
viii
3.4.5.2. The second born child...... 49
3.4.5.3. The youngest child ...... 49
3.4.5.3. The only child...... 50
3.4.6. Striving for perfection or superiority ...... 50
3.4.6.1. Fictional finalism...... 51
3.4.7. The style of life ...... 52
3.4.7.1. Psychological types ...... 54
3.4.7.1.1. Ruling type ...... 54
3.4.7.1.2. Leaning type...... 54
3.4.7.1.3. Avoiding type ...... 54
3.4.7.1.4. Socially useful type...... 55
3.5. Mental health development...... 55
3.5.1. Safeguarding tendencies...... 57
3.6. Optimal development...... 58
3.7. Evaluation of individual psychology...... 60
3.8. Application to psychobiography ...... 61
3.9. Conclusion ...... 62
CHAPTER 4 ...... 63
THE LIFE OF DAMBUDZO MARECHERA ...... 63
4.1. Chapter preview ...... 63
4.2. Brief history of Zimbabwe...... 63
ix
4.3. The family and childhood...... 66
4.4. The ‘Wretched’ youth (Veit-Wild, 2004)...... 69
4.4.1. St Augustine Mission ...... 69
4.4.2. University of Rhodesia...... 72
4.4.2.1. Marechera at Manfred Hadson hall...... 73
4.4.2.2. The political individualist...... 73
4.4.2.3. Marechera’s academic performance...... 74
4.4.2.4. Expulsion from university...... 75
4.5. Oxford University ...... 78
4.5.1. New College...... 78
4.5.1.1. Expulsion from Oxford...... 80
4.5.2. Writing and acceptance of The House of Hunger...... 81
4.6. Independent Zimbabwe ...... 84
4.6.1. The Black Sunlight...... 84
4.6.2. The return to Harare...... 85
4.6.3. Marechera’s social life...... 87
4.6.4. Love life...... 88
4.7. Marechera’s life after death...... 89
4.7.1. The Marechera cult perception ...... 89
4.7.2. Marechera the writer and poet ...... 91
4.7.2.1. Psychological influence in Marechera’s writing ...... 94
x
4.8. Conclusion ...... 96
CHAPTER 5 ...... 97
RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY...... 97
5.1. Chapter preview ...... 97
5.2. The research aim ...... 97
5.3. The research design ...... 98
5.4. The psychobiographical subject ...... 99
5.5. The research methodology...... 100
5.5.1. Methodological considerations...... 100
5.5.1.1. Research bias...... 100
5.5.1.2. Reductionism...... 101
5.5.1.3. Cross-cultural differences...... 102
5.5.1.4. Analysing an absent subject...... 102
5.5.2. Data collection...... 103
5.5.3. Data analysis and interpretation...... 103
5.5.3.1. Uniqueness...... 104
5.5.3.2. Frequency...... 104
5.5.3.3. Primacy...... 105
5.5.3.4. Negation...... 105
5.5.3.5. Emphasis...... 106
5.5.3.6. Error or distortion...... 107
xi
5.5.3.7. Isolation...... 107
5.5.3.8. Omission...... 108
5.5.3.9. Incompletion...... 108
5.5.4. Elitism and easy genre...... 109
5.5.5. Inflated expectations...... 109
5.5.6. Ethical considerations...... 110
5.5.7. Reflexivity...... 110
5.6. Conclusion...... 112
CHAPTER 6 ...... 113
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ...... 113
6.1. Chapter preview ...... 113
6.2. The view of human nature...... 113
6.3. The structure and development of personality...... 119
6.3.1. Constitutional attributes ...... 121
6.3.1.1. Inferiority feelings and compensation...... 122
6.3.1.1.1. Organ inferiority...... 123
6.3.1.1.2. Psychological inferiorities...... 124
6.3.1.1.3. Inferiority complex...... 125
6.3.2. Creative self...... 126
6.3.3. Social environment...... 128
6.3.4. Social interest...... 129
xii
6.3.4.1. Origins of social interest...... 130
6.3.4.2. Importance of social interest...... 131
6.3.5. Striving for perfection or superiority...... 134
6.3.6.1. Fictional finalism...... 135
6.3.7. The style of life...... 137
6.3.7.1. Psychological types...... 141
6.3.7.1.1. Ruling type...... 142
6.3.7.1.2. Avoiding type...... 142
6.5. Optimal development...... 143
6.8. Conclusion ...... 147
CHAPTER 7 ...... 148
CONCLUSION, LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS ...... 148
7.1. Chapter preview ...... 148
7.2. Revisiting the purpose of the study ...... 148
7.3. Individual psychology in the life of Marechera ...... 149
7.4. The values of the study ...... 151
7.3.1. The theoretical model of individual psychology...... 151
7.3.2. The psychobiographical case study method...... 152
7.3.3. The research subject...... 153
7.4. Limitations of the study...... 155
7.4.1. The theoretical framework...... 155
xiii
7.4.2. The psychobiographical case study method...... 155
7.4.3. The psychobiographical subject...... 156
7.5. Recommendations for future research...... 156
7.6. Conclusion...... 157
REFERENCES ...... 158
APPENDIX A: CHRONOLOGY OF MARECHERA’S LIFE ...... 164
xiv
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
1.1. Chapter preview
This chapter gives the general orientation to the research study where the contextualisation, aim of the study, overview of the psychobiographical approach, the theoretical framework and the description of the subject are summarised. The problem statement, justification of the study and the reflection of the researcher’s personal passage are also provided. In conclusion, an overview of the chapters in the study is given.
1.2. General orientation of the research study
1.2.1. Contextualisation. Psychobiography has been described in several ways during its conceptual development. Shared by most definitions is an acknowledgement of both a psychological analysis of an individual’s life and a biographical depiction of an individual’s life history and achievements (Carlson, 1988; Elms, 1994; Runyan, 1982). The aim of a psychobiographical study is to gain more understanding of the individual’s personality development. In terms of the definition offered by McAdams (2006), a psychobiography is understood to be the methodical use of a psychological theory to transform a life into a clarifying and logical narrative.
In building the narrative it is necessary to contextualise the socio-political and historical period in which the individual lived. Such contextualisation facilitates the interpretation and understanding of a person’s life story within the hermeneutic approach. The present study explores and describes Dambudzo Charles William Marechera (1952-1987) personality development using Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology. The Zimbabwean novelist and poet emerged in the late 1970s as a new voice in African literature. This was a
1 period when Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) was going through a period of political transformation after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) by the Rhodesian government in 1965, resulting in pressure from the international community led by Britain, to impose sanctions as they refused to recognise the new government. Marechera’s writing career lasted less than a decade. It was his radical, dense writing style that expressed the psychological fragmentation prevalent in Africa during this period and challenged the fundamental beliefs of both the nationalist and post-independence eras. Marechera defied the limitations of nationality, race and culture as his writing explores universal issues, particularly urban existence in the late twentieth century. His life and work were closely related. It was his outspoken views and unorthodox lifestyle that brought him into frequent conflict with the authorities and made him perceived as cult figure (Pattison, 2001a; Shaw,
2006).
1.2.2. Aim of the study. The primary aim of the research was to understand the genius, mystery and psychological decline of one of Africa’s finest post-colonial writers to emerge in the 1970s. The dynamic concepts of Adler’s (1929) individual psychology were used to provide a more comprehensive idiographic interpretation of Marechera as an individual.
The idiographic stance employed in the study allowed for personality development to be conceptualized holistically. Thus, the aim of the study was not to prove or disprove
Marechera’s optimal personality functioning. Rather, it was to explore the nature of his holistic personality development throughout the history of his life (Carlson, 1988).
It should further be noted that the aim of the study was not to generalize the research findings to the larger population through statistical generalization. Rather, through the investigation of Marechera’s personality development over time, this study aimed to generalize the results to the theory used, which is known as the construct of analytical generalization (Yin, 2009).
2
1.2.3. Overview of psychobiographical research. The concept of psychobiography is defined as ‘the explicit use of systematic or formal psychology in biography’ (Runyan, 1982, p. 202). Using this definition therefore means that psychobiographers are allowed to extract information from various theories of social, developmental and personality psychology and apply it to a biography (Elms, 1994).
The psychobiographical research approach is aimed at elucidating universal patterns and unique traits in the person being studied. By so doing it provides a psychologically more satisfactory, cohesive understanding of the subject’s life (Carlson, 1988). Psychobiographical research can then be viewed as one approach to psychological research, as it is through the in-depth study of an individual over the entire lifespan that understanding is advanced. The subject of the psychobiographical research is typically, but not necessarily, an individual of greatness or historical importance (Schultz, 2005a).
As a study that combines biography and psychology, the psychobiography can be viewed as an amphibious creature. During its inception it was defined as ‘applied psychoanalysis,’ however, it has developed a more eclectic and differentiated self-conception, defining itself as biographical studies which make explicit use of any kind of formal or systematic psychology (Carlson, 1988). This psychology is often psychodynamic, but psychobiography may also draw on phenomenological, trait, or social learning theories of personality, as well as from the resources of social, developmental, cognitive, and abnormal psychology (Schultz,
2005a).
Psychobiography has been used by contemporary personality psychologists to collect, analyse, and discern stories about persons’ lives (Elms, 1994; Runyan, 1982; Schultz, 2005a).
A life is thus transformed into a coherent and illuminating narrative (McAdams, 2006).
According to Fouchè and van Niekerk, (2005a) behavioural processes and patterns of human
3 development can be traced with psychobiography over a life continuum. Powerful insights regarding how individuals reshape their past, present, and future, and their social relations are also provided. Their life experiences can be understood in terms of their cultural and structural settings (Roberts, 2002).
In line with Carlson (1988), Edwards (1990), and Roberts (2002), psychobiographical research contributes to the development or refinement of existing psychological theories through the confirmation or refutation of theoretical constructs and assumptions. It is hoped that the present study will contribute to the development of the psychobiographical research method and add to the growing body of such research conducted in South Africa, as well as confirm or refute propositions of Adler’s (1929) individual psychology theory.
1.2.4. Overview of the theoretical framework. Adler’s (1929) individual psychology is holistic and stresses the uniqueness of each person and the unity of personality. Adler contended that individuals can only be understood as integrated and complete beings that strive toward self-determined goals and organise their lives accordingly. He emphasised the importance of childhood social experiences, believing that all individuals experience inferiority from their earliest dependence on adults. This perception of inferiority persists throughout life as a natural source of creativity, the individual development of which constitutes individuality (Adler, 1929; Meyer, Moore & Viljoen, 2008).
Adler recognised that in the first five years of life, children learn to deal with an unpredictable environment by testing various means of coping. It is from this experience that they develop the prototypical life-plan to cope with real or imagined difficulties in life as well as a private logic, which is a subjective apperception about the self, others and the world
(Adler, 1929; Dinkmeyer, Pew & Dinkmeyer, 1979). As both creators and creations of their lives, children develop a fictional image of what it is to be safe, superior and to have a sense
4 of belonging (Meyer, et al., 2008). This fictional goal or guiding self-ideal determines the creative choice of what is accepted as truth, how to behave, and how to interpret events and experiences (Corey, 2009). The actualization of this unconscious fictional goal becomes the unifying central theme of a person’s lifestyle that provides a feeling of belonging and purpose as well as a self-defined superiority (Meyer et al., 2008).
Adler (1958) also recognized the importance of birth order in the family of origin in contributing to a unique consistency in thinking, perceiving, feeling and acting. Adler stated that first-born children are dethroned when siblings come along and typically react with anger or struggle against giving up the powerful position of the only child. It is worth noting that the dynamism of Adlerian theory cannot be staged as the unity of personality requires the integrated influence of various factors on the person at any time. The theory provides a dynamic perspective that enhances psychobiography as opposed to a static psychodiagnostic view of the individual’s pathology.
1.2.5. Brief description of the research subject. Marechera’s lifespan is presented over a historical period of approximately 35 years, from his birth in 1952 to his death in 1987. The dearth of information regarding Marechera’s life is characterised by a level of factual and chronological ambiguity. Not all the historical facts could be triangulated. However, the social constructionist nature of the psychobiographical narrative integrates a multi- dimensional perspective with a relatively consistent chronology of the subject’s development
(Carlson, 1988). It is the present researcher’s contention that the life of an enigmatic individual cannot be ignored because of historical discrepancies, but rather that it further motivates the necessity to make psychological sense of a unique subject.
The roots of the writer are in the overcrowded township of Vengere, Rusape, where he spent his youth and childhood. Marechera was born on 4 June 1952 at Rusape Hospital. He was the third child of Isaac and Musvotwa Venezia (nee Nyamaropa). The family lived in a
5 ghetto, a so called location for blacks attached to the small town of Rusape, about 170 kilometres east of Harare. His father was an unskilled worker who worked in the early 1960s for a groundnut factory as an assistant truck driver. His mother worked as a house maid and then for a longer period as a nanny at a crèche for white children (Veit-Wild, 2004).
There were nine in their family, four boys and five girls born between 1948 and 1964. The family of eleven lived in poverty in a small, overcrowded house in Vengere. Marechera was a quiet and withdrawn child. For a while he was a boy scout. He developed his passion for reading from a very early age. He escaped into the world of books to shut himself from the poverty and violence around him. Marechera collected books from the rubbish dump on the other side of the town where the white people lived. Instead of playing sport with other children in the township, he would read or play ‘office’ with his friends, the twins
Washington and Wattington Makombe (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a).
Many of Zimbabwe’s leading intellectuals and politicians attended St Augustine’s
Mission. It was the first secondary school to accept blacks in the country and was always one of the most prestigious. To attend secondary school was a rare privilege for blacks during
Marechera’s time. The lucky few who managed to get a place found themselves under immense emotional strain, as the system was highly selective and competitive, which was heightened by the great expectations of their families (Pattison, 2001a). The learners also went through the usual process of acculturation through colonial and Christian education which alienated them from their traditional background (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004).
In 1966 when Marechera started his secondary education at St Augustine’s Mission, the nationalist movement began the armed struggle for liberation. Thus he and his fellow learners were mentally colonised by the same system their compatriots were fighting. This conflict and deep anger that elite learners like Marechera felt when they contemplated their limited
6 future was to be an important motivation for the writing of his generation. The non-racial attitude of mission educators offered their learners a relief from the racism around them and for Marechera, St Augustine’s was a temporary refuge from the harsh reality of his existence
(Fraser, 1988; Pattison, 2001a).
On completion of his A levels, Marechera registered as a first year student for the BA
English Honours course at the University of Rhodesia in March 1972. The University of
Rhodesia comprised 510 white, 407 black and 68 Asian full time students. By then the political climate was very heated; the concept of multiracialism had become a facade. For learners from mission schools like St Augustine’s, which taught interracial harmony, this came as a severe shock. It also radicalised their views. Their anger was also fed by the uncertainty of the future of their war torn country. On 7 August 1973 after violent student unrest and demonstrations, Marechera was expelled (Habila, 2006; Veit- Wild, 2004).
At the age of 22 Marechera left behind Rhodesia and the degrading conditions of township life and a war-torn country to resume his studies of English literature at Oxford University.
He took up residence at New College in the Michaelmas term. Sir William Hayter and his wife Iris cared for the Zimbabwean students with as much understanding, humour and common sense as his previous warden at the University of Rhodesia. As Marechera had hardly any belongings, Iris Hayter lent him clothes and took him shopping (Veit- Wild, 2004;
Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
During his stay at Oxford University he had several brushes with authority but the final major crisis occurred in early 1976 when he assaulted students and members of the domestic staff, threatening to murder people and set the college on fire (he started one small fire); he was arrested and fined by the police for one night for being drunk and disorderly. This led to
7 his expulsion during his second year, in March 1976 (Fraser. 1988; Habila, 2006; Pattison,
2001a).
Two myths surround Marechera’s eventual expulsion from Oxford University. One is that he set fire to the college and he disturbed college life through frequent bouts of drunken and rude behaviour. The other, which he personally maintained, was that given a choice between accepting psychiatric treatment and leaving the college he chose to leave: “I had to invite them to expel me” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 159). Marechera’s stay at New College consisted of a series of clashes: he continually overspent his scholarship, borrowed money and accumulated debts with the college and a local bookseller, Blackwells (Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
With his expulsion, Marechera’s life as a homeless wanderer began. His first major published work emanated from that crisis. “With The House of Hunger, my initial impulse was simply one of utter despair. Well, I felt that I had lost everything. There I was in exile, seemingly no future, no nothing. I started asking myself what had happened to my generation. A kind of lost generation feeling” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p.177).
In 1980 Marechera wrote Black Sunlight, which was initially banned in Zimbabwe for obscenity and blasphemy. However, the ban was lifted after an appeal. Marechera’s surrealistic, unstructured, negativistic book drew parallels between the political transformation in Zimbabwe and the transformation of the self. His analysis of the independence process was satirical: his characters eventually are destroyed in their fight.
Explaining once the absence of chronological order in his works, Marechera said that history is rather “a psychological condition in which our senses are constantly bombarded by unresolved or provisional images” (Viet-Wild, 2004, p. 52).
In February 1982 Marechera returned to Zimbabwe after eight years in exile. He returned to take part in a television film based on The House of Hunger. After a quarrel with the film’s
8 director, he stayed on. He soon became known as a relentless and outspoken critic of post- colonial politics and society (Habila, 2006; Veit-Wild, 2004). His third and last published book, Mindblast (1984), became the manifesto of his satiric indictment. Although his writing and personality were a great inspiration for the younger generation of Zimbabweans, particularly university students, he felt alienated in independent Zimbabwe. Homeless in his country, a myth that he is mentally ill developed around his unconventional life style and eccentric behaviour. Brushes with government authorities confirmed his role as the persecuted rebel. Publication institutions such as the Zimbabwe Publishing House (ZPH) and
Mambo Press largely ignored him and he never felt recognised as a writer (Pattison, 2001a;
Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
After two years of homelessness, he found a small flat near the city centre. For about eight months in 1984 he was a part time educator at a private study centre. Apart from that, he had no income other than his meagre royalties and fees for a very few book reviews. He depended on friends for survival. Though he continued to write during the last years of his life, he did not have the inspiration and energy to write a book of the expressive scope, clarity and strength of his previous writings. He died on 18 August 1987 after developing pneumonia. He left behind a number of unpublished manuscripts (Fraser. 1988; Habila, 2006; Pattison,
2001a; Veit-Wild, 2004).
1.3. Problem statement
Despite his brief writing career and untimely death at age thirty-five, Marechera, the
Zimbabwean writer, remains an important figure in African literature and literary studies in general. While critics have tried to unlock the mysteries of his life, from his turbulent childhood in colonial Rhodesia to his dangerous self-exile in England and emotional withdrawal from the land of his birth, the compelling interest in this writer lies in his radical
9 reimagining of African literature in postmodernist terms, away from the classic realism associated with his predecessors (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a).
A skilled and dedicated student of world literatures, Marechera expanded his artistic canvas by drawing on a variety of stylistic influences including surrealism, Dadaism, the carnivalesque, and hybridity to express his growing sense of vulnerability as an artist and the urgent need to awaken the masses to the abuses of power in the wake of Zimbabwe’s independence from Britain (Buuck, 1997). Resolutely internationalist, he relished his outsider status, homeless but at home in his creativity. The House of Hunger (Marechera, 1978), for example, his first major work published two years before Zimbabwe’s independence in 1980, rejects the demand for linearity in the African narrative of nationhood and instead erupts with conflicting emotions held together by dizzying shifts in style and narrative voice. The book’s wrenching images of urban despair, coupled with its menacing heights of language, set the stage for the dark mood prevalent in Marechera’s later fiction writing (Habila, 2006; Pattison,
2001a).
Marechera’s brilliant act of rebellion against oppressive systems of power is also given poetic expression in irritatingly unpredictable ways, ranging from exquisitely crafted lyrics to the avuncular-styled fragments that dominate his poetic norm. Critics generally agree, however, that he had a firm grip on the sonnet form, as illustrated in his ‘Amelia’ poems in
Cemetery of Mind (Marechera, 1992) (Veit-Wild, 2004).
1.4. Justification of the study
The psychobiography is an invaluable approach that emphasises a holistic perspective to understanding an individual personality development (Elms, 1994; Fouchè, 1999). Through the use of Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology a eugraphic and holistic approach to viewing Marechera is envisaged as opposed to the traditional psychodiagnostic view of
10 individual pathology. Furthermore, there has been lack of detail on Marechera’s life and personality development. The understanding of the individual’s personality development is a way to explore the complexity of personality and the motivations in behaviour (Alexander,
1990; Elms, 1994).
The present psychobiographical study is not the first one studying individual life. Many scholars have recognized and advocated for the study of individual lives with the understanding that individual lives are rich in personality, developmental and psychobiographical importance (Alexander, 1988; Carlson, 1988; Elms, 1994; Fouchè, 1999;
McAdams, 2006; Roberts, 2002; Runyan, 1982; Schultz, 2005b). Elms (1994) argued that psychobiography is not merely a way to do biography, but also a way to conduct psychology.
He noted that psychologists have much to learn from studying one whole human being or life at a time. This therefore means that a psychobiographical researcher is allowed to trace human development in ways that are impossible in longitudinal research and provide a high degree of consensual validation beyond traditional clinical case studies (Carlson, 1988).
Psychobiographical research has led to an increased interest as the study of life course and lived experience of the individual. It has become a valuable approach in qualitative research in the past three decades (Bertaux, 1981; Elms, 1994; McAdams & Ochberg, 1988; Roberts,
2002; Runyan, 1982; Schultz, 2005a). However, during this time psychobiography has also been confronted by various challenges, including criticisms about its generalizability and a lack of exposure to its methodology (Roberts, 2002; Runyan, 1982; Stroud, 2004).
There has been a recent increase in the use of this insightful approach to understand and reinterpret individual lives in South Africa (Fouchè, & van Niekerk, 2005a; 2010; Stroud,
2004). It has been argued that previous under-utilization of this method meant that psychologists ignored a proven and effective approach to study personalities who have made
11 extraordinary and often controversial contributions to society (Fouchè, & van Niekerk,
2005a).
The present researcher decided to follow a psychobiographical research approach to the life span personality development of Marechera in response to Elms’ (1994, p. 5) call for psychologists to “take hold of psychobiography” and not neglect the responsibility of maintaining quality standards of work produced as psychobiography. Further challenges that served as motivational factors included: (a) the limited number of institutionalized psychobiographical programmes conducted at academic institutions in South Africa; (b) the necessity to use a dynamic theoretical approach as an alternative to the static psychodynamic and psychodiagnostic stance that predominated early psychobiographical research, and (c) the opportunity to conduct extensive self-exploration through the process of studying the life story of another individual (Elms, 1994; McAdams, 2006; Roberts, 2002; Runyan, 1988a).
The rationale for selecting a particular personality should include, amongst other reasons, the personality’s theoretical significance and interest (Howe, 1997). This means that the findings obtained from the intensive study of one personality should enable a feature of an emerging theory to be confirmed or refuted (McLeod, 1994). The personality under study is most often that of an exemplary, enigmatic, controversial or great figure, but Elms (1994) noted that less known figures also demand attention.
1.5. The researcher’s personal passage
Psychobiography raises numerous complicated methodological issues (Anderson, 1981a;
1981b), not the least of which is the problem of interpreting an individual’s life from a distance. A methodological advantage of the present study emanates from the researcher’s personal interest in the subject, having been born in the same neighbourhood, read some of his works at a tender age and associating with his personality as a cult figure. The researcher makes ample use of the material derived from interviews with former classmates, friends and
12 fellow writers who interacted with him, as well as that drawn from his unusually candid and insightful autobiographical writings.
Initially, the researcher’s intention was to write a scholarly psychological assessment article for a class assignment, a type of writing and study which the researcher was more familiar with. However, as the researcher’s work continued and as respected colleagues read early drafts of the psychological assessment of Marechera, a common reaction was that the researcher ‘should consider writing a thesis on this topic and reach beyond the classroom community.’ The researcher thought about this suggestion for a while and realized that writing a thesis length psychobiography of Marechera would require access to Marechera’s
‘intimates,’ those who knew him very well, as well as access to a full archival base of documents.
With these considerations in mind the researcher set out to have personal contact with a key resource, or one of Marechera’s insiders: Professor Flora Veit-Wild, his internationally renowned biographer and former girlfriend (Veit-Wild; 2004; 2012). After Prof. Veit-Wild had graciously agreed to talk to the researcher at length, on multiple occasions, the researcher knew that he had a story to tell. The researcher would use his qualitative research skills to delve deeply into Marechera’s life story and hopefully provide a comprehensive, in-depth, and balanced psychological profile on the writer, a Guardian Fiction Prize winner in 1979.
1.6. Overview of the study
The study consists of 7 chapters, the first being an introduction. Chapters 2, 3 and 4 are literature review chapters. A theoretical overview of psychobiographical research follows in chapter 2. Chapter 3 provides a concise discussion of Adler’s (1929) individual psychology theory of personality development. In Chapter 4, a comprehensive historical overview of the salient aspects of the life of Marechera are presented and described. In chapter 5 the psychobiographical design and methodology is discussed and in chapter 6 the findings and
13 discussion are presented. Chapter 7 concludes the study and provides a discussion of the value and limitations of the study. Furthermore, it provides recommendations for future research in the fields of psychobiography, personality and positive psychology.
14
CHAPTER 2
PSYCHOBIOGRAPHICAL RESEARCH
2.1. Chapter preview
This chapter introduces psychobiography methodology as a way of doing research. It describes the origins of psychobiography and the relationship between psychobiography and psychoanalysis. It also looks at an overview of psychobiography research, its trends and development. Psychobiography case study, life history research and the value and criticisms of psychobiography research forms part of the latter sections. The growth of psychobiography research in South Africa and reflexivity concludes the chapter.
2.2. Origins of psychobiography
The term psychobiography in its broadest sense defines any approach to biography that emphasizes inner life and psychological development. In a more specific sense it means the use of a formalised psychological theory and concepts in writing biography, receiving its decisive impetus from psychoanalysis (McAdams, 2006). The history of psychobiography goes back at least to Plutarch, but Freud’s (1910) book on Leonardo’s childhood is often seen as one of the first to apply a formalized metapsychology (Elms, 1994).
Although many biographies in the past had dealt with psychological development, the arrival of psychoanalysis in the twentieth century offered a comprehensive psychological theory of early human development that explains the shaping of the life course (Runyan,
1988a). Psychobiography generally focuses on the formative early years of life in an effort to uncover the relational dynamics, traumas, or complexes that might explain later behaviour.
Psychobiography is a major instrument of psychohistory for the study of leading historical figures. The two are however not identical since psychohistory is especially concerned with group behaviour (Watson, 1976).
15
2.3. Psychobiography and psychoanalysis
The focus of psychoanalysis on the first few years of life has led to the sharpest criticisms of psychoanalytic psychobiography. While the most often heard objections centre on the charge of reductionism, there are other criticisms. Firstly, psychobiography is criticised for its focus on psychological factors to the exclusion of cultural, social, economic, and other external factors. Psychoanalytic psychobiography in particular is often accused of reducing the subject’s life to determination by complexes established in the first few years of childhood, for example, fixation on the oral or anal stage or to a failure to successfully pass the oedipal period (Elms, 2005; Schultz, 2005a).
Critics also point out that reliable evidence on early childhood is often almost impossible to obtain. As a result of the absence of data, many psychoanalytic biographers have used theory to project an image of what the subject’s infancy must have been like. This practice resulted in criticism of the psychoanalytic approach since it is accused of inventing facts. A further objection holds that psychoanalytic biography lacks the central tool of psychoanalysis in the clinical setting, namely, free association. Psychoanalytic psychobiographers do not have the benefits of interacting with the client in order to gain more insight. Finally, there is the moral objection that psychoanalytic approaches have often denigrated the memory of great men and women by portraying them in terms of pathology or unresolved infantile conflicts (Elms, 1994; McAdams, 2006).
The more sensible and cautious psychobiographers have avoided reductionistic claims.
The best psychobiographies also avoid over-confident assertions about the existence of childhood events based only on the evidence of adult behaviour. The absence of a living subject’s ‘free association,’ however, is viewed as less of a handicap than critics assert because the psychoanalytic biographer can often draw upon an abundance of diaries, letters, and other writings as well as sound recordings, photographs and films of more recent
16 subjects. Finally, with regard to the objection that psychobiography defames the reputation of exemplary figures; the same objection can be made to any critical biography which explores the determination of character (Runyan, 1988b).
Many of the standard objections to psychoanalytic biography are also mitigated by the application of those psychoanalytic theories which place greater emphasis on ego development. In some versions of ego psychology the personality is said to continue to develop across the life span with the possibility that later experiences can modify processes rooted in early childhood. According to such perspectives there are important psychological stages and tasks to be accomplished beyond the oedipal period, as illustrated in Erik
Erikson’s Gandhi’s Truth, which deals with a crisis in Gandhi’s mature years (McAdams &
Ochberg, 1988). In the early twenty-first century, psychoanalytic theories provide a variety of perspectives that can illuminate all stages of the life span, accounting for psychological health and triumph as well as the persistence of destructive traits fixed in infancy (Runyan, 1988b).
2.4. Overview of psychobiography research
2.4.1. History of psychobiographical inquiry. Work in the psychobiographical inquiry has developed not only within psychology, but also within psychoanalysis, psychiatry, history, political science, literature and an assortment of other fields including religion, history of science, and so on. The field is traditionally defined as having emerged from psychoanalysis when Sigmund Freud used his new methods and ideas to write about
Leonardo da Vinci, Moses and Goethe (Elms 1994; Schultz 2005b). Later, Erik Erikson used his developmental ideas to produce psychological biographies of Mahatma Gandhi and
Martin Luther (McAdams, 2006).
Psychobiography expanded in the 1920s and 1930s in the United States due to the work of two psychologists, Henry Murray and Gordon Allport. Murray is best known as the author of
17 the Thematic Apperception Test (Elms, 1994; Schultz, 2005b), but also insisted that psychology should study the whole life cycle rather than bits and pieces of an individual.
Like Murray, Allport advocated for the study of entire individual lives through his documents
How to Use Personal Documents for Psychology and Letters from Jenny. Both men urged the study of the entire individual personality with other psychoanalytical theories (McAdams,
2006).
After this period of flowering, psychobiography languished, although there were important exceptions in the fields of anthropology and social sciences (Runyan 1983). In the
1980s there was a rebirth of interest, primarily with the publication of Runyan’s (1982) Life
Histories and Psychobiography: Explorations of Theory and Method, which provided a critical review of the case study, idiographic and psychobiographical methods. This discussion of psychobiography analysed issues such as the kinds of evidence needed for psychobiographical interpretation and the critical evaluation of alternative psychobiographical interpretations highlighted (Runyan, 1988a).
Important contributions of psychologists to psychobiography may be illustrated by the number of publications. First, Psychobiography and Life Narratives (McAdams & Ochberg,
1988) includes a diverse array of theoretical perspectives to psychobiography, including the application of Silvan Tomkins’s script theory to the lives of Nathaniel Hawthorne and
Eleanor Marx by Rae Carlson (McAdams, 2006).
Secondly, Personology: Content and Method in Personality Assessment and
Psychobiography (Alexander, 1990) provides original psychobiographical interpretations of
Freud, Jung, and Harry Stack Sullivan and suggests interpretive guidelines for archival or clinical material, useful in both clinical case studies and psychobiography. Thirdly an important book in psychobiography was Alan Elms’ (1994) Uncovering Lives: The Uneasy
18
Alliance of Biography and Psychology, which provides methodological advice for practicing psychobiography and a set of fascinating psychobiographical interpretations of psychologists, science fiction writers, and political figures.
Several of Elms’ (1994) interpretations illustrate the power of psychobiographical interpretation for illuminating the personal side of psychology, literature, and culture. Since then, there has been a consistent and steadily growing interest in the scholarly research of individual lives, most notably evidenced by Schultz’s (2005) publication of the Handbook of
Psychobiography. This overview of psychobiography is concluded by discussing the trends in the development of psychobiography.
2.4.2. Trends in the development of psychobiography. According to Runyan (1988a) the field of psychobiography is traditionally defined as beginning with Freud’s Leonardo da
Vinci and a Memory of his Childhood written in 1910. As a result of this influential work psychology and biography of the time defined its mission as applied psychoanalysis. A number of these earliest psychobiographical studies include analyses of Shakespeare as revealed through Hamlet (Jones, 1910), Richard Wagner (Graf, 1911), and Martin Luther
(Smith, 1913) (Runyan, 1988a).
Before the twentieth century literary biographers rarely employed psychological concepts to interpret the lives of their subjects (McAdams, 2006). According to McAdams, Western biographers had traditionally neglected their subject’s human eccentricities and infirmities and their inner lives of feeling, desire and fantasy. This decidedly ‘unpsychological’ approach to biography can clearly be seen from Plutarch’s (46-120AD) Lives of the Noble Greeks and
Romans, through medieval hagiographies of Christian saints, and included the idealised testimonials of the lives of great men and women written during the Victorian age (McAdams
& Ochberg, 1988).
19
Runyan (1988a) mentioned that the rising tide of psychoanalytic biography during the
1910s and 1920s led to a number of attacks on the method, but the production of psychobiographies continued through the 1930s. In contrast, the 1940s was a relatively slow period for psychological biography, with exceptions such as Guttmacher’s (1941) study of
George III and Langer’s The Mind of Adolf Hitler, originally written in 1943, but only published in 1972 (Runyan, 1988a).
The 1950s were characterised by a slowly renewed production of psychobiographies. The major turning point, however, in terms of more rigorous and methodologically self-conscious psychobiography, was the publication of Erik Erikson’s (1958) Young Man Luther: A Study in Psychoanalysis and History. From the 1960s through to the present there has been an enormous outpouring of psychobiographical analyses of writers, artists, musicians, politicians, religious leaders, scientists, and others (Runyan, 1988a).
Runyan (1988a) posited that only in recent years has psychobiography developed a more eclectic and differentiated self-conception, defining itself as “biographical studies which make explicit use of any kind of formal or systematic psychology” (p. 296). Therefore psychobiography may draw on various theories of personality, as well as from the resources of abnormal, cognitive, developmental and social psychology. According to Gronn (1993) the recent rapid advances in neuropsychology provides the scholar of biography with a more medical paradigm from which to approach the study of great lives, especially those of leaders.
The more current practice of psychobiography is spread across a substantial number of existing disciplines and professions such as psychoanalysis and psychiatry, history, political science, academic psychology, literature and arts, psychohistory, anthropology and religion.
20
This is in part because scholars in each area are often drawn to attempting psychobiographical interpretations of leading figures in their field (McAdams, 2006).
Research by Runyan (1988a) indicated an increase in psychobiographical publications, particularly after the 1970s. This proliferation of publications has been accompanied by a growing institutionalisation of the field, as indicated by the development of professional organisations, conferences, speciality journals and dissertations in the field. However,
Runyan also pointed to the limited amount of psychobiographical work in institutionalised academic psychology. He mentioned that it is relatively unusual to find formal academic training in psychobiography.
2.5. Psychobiography and case study
Given the common assumptions about what constitutes scientific psychology, psychologists have devoted relatively little attention to developing research methods applicable to individual case studies. With little investment in improving such research methods, psychobiography and case history research continue to be seen as unscientific. Most psychologists are content to let this circular ring continue largely undisturbed (Runyan,
1988a).
A few personality psychologists remained interested enough in studying individuals as such as Henry A. Murray, Gordon Allport and Robert White (Runyan, 1982a). The single most influential figure in modern psychobiography was undoubtedly Erik Erikson (1902-
1994), who taught at Harvard University from 1960 to 1970. His studies of Young Man
Luther (1958) and Gandhi’s Truth (1969) had an enormous impact, drawing public attention to psychobiography and psychohistory not only within psychology and psychiatry, but in the culture at large.
21
Freud and Jung may have been less precise in their collection and interpretation of data than the experimental psychologists of their days and current psychobiographers. However, current researchers continue to press beyond standard scientific protocol in reaching their conclusions even though they have learned worthwhile lessons from the errors of Freud and
Jung. The data that psychobiographers deal with, the specific facts of individual lives
(whether observed or self-reported), are no more outside the boundaries of science than an ethnologist’s observations of a specific chimpanzee’s behaviour or a neuroscientist’s collection of perceptual reports from a brain impaired patient (Elms, 2007).
The methodological strategies by which psychological data are collected, organized and interpreted may differ substantially between the psychobiographer and the ethnologist or neuroscientist. The scientific objectives may differ as well, as indicated by Allport’s (1937) differentiation of idiographic research (concerned with unique patterns or outcomes) from nomothetic research (aimed at discovering general laws). Studying a specific individual with the methods best adapted to individual study does not automatically exclude such research from scientific psychology. Nor can it be sharply differentiated from the broader sweep of science that also includes biology, geology and chemistry (Elms, 2007). Elms noted that;
“The proof is in the pudding and a closer examination of psychobiographical research methods shows that the scientific kitchen can reliably produce individual puddings of considerable merit, as well as institutional dishes more suitable to cafeteria dining” (p. 26).
The focus of psychological case study has been on identifying appropriate research strategies, guidelines and broad application that are not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable for every situation. Certain of these research approaches have been borrowed from clinical psychology but most have been developed by researchers concerned with the psychology of specific public figures. Psychobiography is the term most used for such
22 research, though other researchers prefer other names such as, psychohistory and life history studies (Watson, 1976).
2.6. Life history research
Although life history has been utilised as a source of information about the human condition in social scientific research for many years, it has always occupied a marginal role in comparison to such techniques as structured observation, interviewing and testing procedures whose purpose generally are experimentation and hypothesis testing. As an
‘unwanted stepchild,’ life history studies have lacked a consistent point of view defining the objective it ought to serve. Moreover, there has been no agreement regarding a valid frame of reference for actually interpreting life history data as such. Consequently, the results of the research utilizing life history material and other personal documents are difficult to appraise, for their objectives and methods have been almost as diverse as the personalities, interest and motivation of the researchers themselves (Watson, 1976).
The term life history acknowledges not only that, personal, social, temporal and contextual influences facilitate understanding of lives and phenomena being explored, but also that, from conceptualisation through to representation and eventual communication of new understanding of others, any research project is an expression of elements of a researcher’s life history. As in other forms of qualitative research, the life history researcher serves as the central instrument, the prime viewing lens (Cole & Knowels, 2001)
Life history is not centrally about developing a reductionist’s notion of lived experience in order to convey a particular meaning or truth. Rather, it is a representation of human experience that draws in readers to the interpretive process and invites them to make meaning and form judgments based on their own reading of the text as it is viewed through the lenses of their own realities. The potential that life history research has for understanding lives, be it
23 individuals or collective, rest not only in the intentions of individual researchers but also on the fundamental purpose and processes of life history inquiry methods, and the audience or readers as interpreters of life history text (Watson, 1976).
In as much as it is possible life history research is about gaining insight into the broader human condition by coming to know and understand the experiences of other humans. It is about understanding a situation, profession, condition, or institution through coming to know how individuals walk, talk, and work within a particular context. It is about understanding the relationship, the complex interaction, between life and context, self and place. It is about comprehending the complexities of a person’s day to day decision making and ultimate consequences that play out in that life so that insights into broader, collective experience may be achieved (Cole & Knowels, 2001; Watson, 1976).
Pioneers of the life history method such as Allport, (1942) and Watson, (1976), saw individuals and their stories as windows into their psychological conditions and personality development. Taken together with other psychological data, individuals informed the construction of their own case histories. Watson, (1976) is noted for his work that cast life history as a way to understand cultural and social phenomena rather than understanding only the individual lives and personalities.
2.7. Definition of psychobiographical research
Psychobiographical research has been defined in different ways by several writers but a common theme among them is the use of psychological theories in biography. McAdams
(2006) defines psychobiographical research as “the systematic use of psychological
(especially personality) theory to transform a life into a coherent and illuminating story” (p.
432). According to Todd Schultz, the current leading researcher in the field of
24 psychobiography, “It is biography informed by psychological theory and research. And its typical focus is an individual of obvious historical importance” (Schultz, 2005a, p. 5).
Howe (1997) described psychobiography as a way of doing psychological research in which extensive use is made of biographical data in order to examine the growth of original thinking, creativity and productivity in unusual individuals. Runyan (1988a) described psychobiography as the major area in which an in-depth understanding of an individual life is pursued. Carlson (1988) referred to psychobiography as longitudinal life history research into the personality development of exemplary and ‘finished’ lives.
Despite the various descriptions of psychobiography, McAdams (2006) summarised the essence of psychobiography as the study of the entire life, from birth to death, with the aim
“to discern, discover, or formulate the central story of the entire life, a story structured according to psychological theory” (p. 432). A greater clarification of the concept of psychobiography can be attained by comparing the concept with other closely related and possibly even confusing terms.
2.8. Psychobiography and related concepts
2.8.1. Psychobiography is an idiographic research method with specific strategies and a long tradition. It has also been described as life history, narratology, personology or psychological biography. As the word implies, psychobiography uses psychological theories to transform lives into a coherent and illuminating story (McAdams 2006).
Psychobiographies are retrospective narratives that can be defined by method (for example, interviews and observations), by a theoretical vantage point (for example, hermeneutics and phenomenology), or by a disciplinary perspective (Howe, 1997). Because psychobiography is an interdisciplinary method, a decent psychobiographer can be an individual from any field who has disciplined empathy and an interest in collecting solid data (Elms 1994).
25
2.8.2. Biography, life stories and narratives. A psychobiography is a specific form of narrative (Elms 1994; Runyan 1983; Schultz 2005a). Unlike biography, psychobiography focuses primarily on the psychological background and behaviour of a person to make predictions about the individual’s motivations. Unlike life stories, psychobiography can be written about a person who is no longer living by integrating the individual’s published and unpublished documents, written data about the person and material from interviews with friends and colleagues (McAdams, 2006).
Owing to the necessity of the researcher interpreting interviews and texts, the psychobiographical method is situated in both hermeneutical and narrative traditions. As a narrative researcher, the investigator is located in the story as a vulnerable voice who constructs the story with the subject and the reader (Finlay 2004; Hasselkus, 2003). As a hermeneutic researcher, the investigator recognizes his own preconceptions that are projected into the text. At the same time, the researcher understands the context in which the text was written and published, including the time and place where the subject lived (Allport, 1942).
Although one may begin by choosing a subject, the subject often does the choosing (Elms
1994, Schultz, 2005a), demanding so much time and energy that the subject seems to have
‘moved in’. It may be someone liked or disliked, admired or not and who has contradictions, mystery and conflicts that generate great passion. A good start to a psychobiography is to ask a few questions that one would like answered about the subject (Elms, 2005).
2.9. The value of psychobiographical research
2.9.1. The uniqueness of the individual case within the whole. Allport (1942) introduced the nomothetic-versus-idiographic distinction into psychology as a way to advocate the increased study of the uniqueness of the individual. For more than 25 years
Allport preached an idiographic gospel for studying personality development. Idiographic
26 research was to be a science of the totally unique and distinct in contrast to the generalising nomothetic approaches that positivists and statisticians used in psychological research (Elms,
1994).
The critics of Allport’s idiographic approach suggested that his dichotomous classification of the particular (idiographic) and the general (nomothetic) by no means provided a satisfactory explanation for the individuality of the whole person in context (Elms, 1994).
This criticism was illustrated within the context of Murray and Kluckhohn’s (1953, p. 53) classic dictum: “Every man is in certain respects (a) like all other men, (b) like some other men, (c) like no other man.”
Elms (1994) explained that most research in psychology is concentrated on the first two sections of Murray and Kluckhohn’s dictum. This can be included under the methodological rubric nomothetic. In contrast to the general principles studied in the nomothetic approach, the idiographic approach in turn primarily focuses on the third section of the dictum (that is, every man is like no other man).
According to Runyan (1983) the individuality of the person is not to be found in solely one configuration of Murray and Kluckhohn’s dictum. Rather, individuality is an entanglement of all the configurations and therefore grounded within the whole. Allport eventually also realised that he made a strategic error in trying to draw so sharp a contrast between idiographic and nomothetic approaches. Thereafter, Allport replaced the term idiographic with the less extreme term morphogenic, which refers to studying individualised patterning processes and wholes in personality rather than particularist and unique dimensions of personalities (Elms, 1994). Many researchers in the field of life history and psychobiography including Carlson, (1988), Elms, (1994), Gronn, (1993) and Runyan, (1983)
27 also highlight that one of the major advantages of life history research is the unique and holistic description that it provides of the subject under study.
2.9.2. The socio-historical context. Closely related to the advantage of a unique and holistic description of the individual, is the gestalt context. This refers to the understanding of the individual subject within the richness of the everyday historical and social world in which he or she lived (Watson, 1976). Life history research, such as psychobiography, provides the researcher with a larger contextualised background from which the researcher can portray the biographical subject’s socio-historical culture, socialisation processes and family history (Runyan, 1983). The value of life history research in ‘uncovering’ the larger cultural and sub-cultural influences on human development has been researched and emphasised by various scholars in the social science field (Barnouw, 1973; Runyan, 1983;
1988b).
2.9.3. Process and pattern over time. A third major advantage of life history research is related to the provision of a fuller description and understanding of behavioural processes and developmental patterns over time (Runyan, 1983). ‘Finished lives’ studies enable the researcher to trace patterns of human development over a continuum of time, from birth until death (Carlson, 1988; Gronn, 1993). This longitudinal research advantage provides the scholar of life history with an integrated and more comprehensive picture of human development within the context of time (Alexander, 1990). Fiske (1988) suggested that the study of life history and personality over time provides the researcher with an extensive understanding of ‘personality in action’. This implies that the researcher is in a position to trace and document different dimensions and processes in personality functioning at any given time in any particular situation.
28
2.9.4. Subjective reality. Elms, (1994) indicated that life history research provides the researcher with an illuminating description and understanding of the inner experiences, thoughts and feelings of the subject. Watson (1976) emphasised the significance of understanding a subject’s life story as a subjective document. Watson explained this as the hermeneutical and phenomenological perspective for understanding subjective reality. The advantage of understanding the subjective reality of the biographical subject is that it enables the researcher to develop a required level of sympathy and empathy with the subject
(Runyan, 1983). Runyan suggested that this basic level of sympathy and empathy enables the researcher to convey to the reader of the biography a vivid, evocative and emotionally compelling life story.
2.9.5. Theory testing and development. Life history materials constitute an ideal laboratory for testing and developing various theories of human development (Carlson,
1988). ‘Finished lives’ studies enable the psychobiographer to trace human development in ways that are impossible in even the best of clinical case studies. The judicious choice of materials permits the psychologist to consider various socio-historical contexts and to achieve a high level of consensual validation.
Yin (2009) emphasised the fact that theory plays an important role in case study research, such as life history research. Yin indicated that theory plays an essential role in both data collection and generalisation. In the case of data collection, the theory guides the researcher with the identification of the objectives and design of the case. The theory furthermore assists the researcher to conceptualise and operationalize case data within the context of theoretical constructs and categories. The theory thus acts as a template against which to compare and analyse the collected data.
29
In turn the theory also plays a role in generalising from case study to theory. The role of theory in generalisation has been characterised as analytic generalisation and has been contrasted with statistical generalisation (Yin, 2009). According to Yin, a fatal flaw in doing case study research (like psychobiography) is to regard statistical generalisation as a method of generalising the results of the case. This is because cases are not sampling units and should not be chosen for this reason. Rather, the individual case should be selected as a laboratory investigator selects the topic of a new experiment.
Under this circumstance the method of generalisation is analytic generalisation, in which a previously developed theory is used as a template with which to compare the empirical results of the study. In contrast to statistical generalisation, where an inference is made about a population on the basis of the data collected from a sample, analytic generalisation aims at comparing case data with a previously developed theory so as to test, extend and develop it even further (Yin, 2009).
Life history research, especially psychobiography, has proven to be of value in the informal testing and developing of theories of gerontology and aging, career development, and even the emergence of genetic predispositions in leaders as reflected in their health development (Anderson, 1988; Bujold, 1990; McAdams & Ochberg, 1988).
2.10. Criticism of psychobiographical studies
Like any other methodology, psychobiography has also been heavily criticised (Anderson,
1981b). But those who champion psychobiogragraphy have admitted that the bulk of the criticisms are richly deserved. Studies in this area regularly transgress the standards of either psychology or history or of both these disciplines (Elms, 1994, Schultz, 2005a).
Psychologists who do quantitative research are aware that their conclusions can be no better than the data on which they are based. Discussions of psychobiographical methodology
30 rarely focus on the research itself. But research may be even more critical in psychobiographical studies than in quantitative studies because of the subtlety of the interpretations which rest on this research (Anderson, 1981b). What follows is an overview of the psychobiographical criticisms and how they were dealt with by the researcher.
2.10.1. Psychobiographer’s relationship with the subject. As the literature on psychobiographical methodology recognizes, one of the most perilous pitfalls in the field is the tendency to denigrate or idealize the biographical subject (Anderson, 1981b, Erikson,
1968). After spending much time reading about the subject every psychobiographer will have a complicated and intense personal reaction to his subject and the first step is to admit openly, to himself at least, that he is emotionally involved. What follows then is a constant examining and re-examining of his relationship with his subject. He can attempt to determine the extent to which his reactions stem from his own concerns and conflicts and the extent to which they offer insights into his subject’s personality (Anderson, 1981b).
Anderson (1981b) suggested that another possibility would entail the psychobiography asking individuals who are intimately acquainted with his personality, for example, a research supervisor or scholars who specialize in the study of the same figure to read the manuscript and to comment specifically on his relationship with the subject. The supervisor who knows the psychobiographer well would be able to recognize where his personal preoccupations might be colouring his interpretations, while the biographer who specializes in the study of the same subject would be able to point to areas where he might be providing a distorted picture of the subject.
2.10.2. Psychobiography as cross cultural research. Psychobiography is a form of cross cultural research, unless if the subject lived in contemporary society. If not then, the subject lived in a culture significantly different from the psychobiographer’s culture. Often behaviour
31 of the subject will not have had the same meaning in the subject’s era as it does in the present era. Yet psychobiographers often make interpretations on the basis of the 21st century values and standards (Elms, 2007).
If it is important with behaviour to consider the cultural context, it is even more important with ideas, since they gain their meaning from their relationship to larger currents of thoughts. All of an individual’s behaviour and ideas are deeply embedded in the historical period in which he lives. The psychobiographer’s interpretations are likely to be mistaken if he is not careful to determine what his material would have meant from his subject’s point of view (Anderson, 1981b).
A specific strategy for dealing with cross-cultural differences would involve three steps.
First, the psychobiographer would make an explicit effort to reconstruct the subject’s way of seeing his experience. Secondly, he will determine precisely where the subject’s understanding, even in the subject’s own opinion, was inadequate. Thirdly, the psychobiographer will build on his subject’s own way of conceptualizing his experience and would attempt to make sense of what was inexplicable to his subject. Using such a strategy, the psychobiographer not only shows his respect for his subject’s view point but also takes advantage of psychological perspectives which can deepen the understanding of his subject’s experience (Elms, 1994).
There is another more novel strategy which the psychobiographer sensitive to cross- cultural difficulties could employ. He could search for living individuals who largely share his subject’s cultural values and could conduct a series of interviews with them (Anderson,
1981b).
2.10.3. Use of psychological theory. Psychobiographies can be anchored in a single theory, in multiple theories or in no theory in particular. For example, Jones’s (1951) analysis
32 of Paul Morphy and Reuben Fine’s (2008) analysis of Bobby Fischer are exclusively anchored in Freudian psychoanalytic theory (Ponterotto, 2012). By contrast, Schultz’s (2011) recent psychobiography of Truman Capote is anchored in attachment theory and script theory.
Viewing a historical figure within the lens of one theoretical model is potentially very limiting. Jones’s psychoanalytic treatment of Morphy was harshly criticized as well as Fine’s
Freudian analysis of Bobby Fischer (Ponterotto, 2012). In some ways, these psychobiographies fell short on Schultz’s (2005b) final criteria of holding up and maintaining interpretive credibility over time and in the eyes of new scholars. It is the opinion of the present researcher that the limits of the one-theory model diminished the impact and widespread acceptance of the work of Jones and Fine, and perhaps justifiably so.
2.10.4. Analysing an absent subject. Some critics argue that psychobiography is futile from the start (Anderson, 1981a). They concede that a psychotherapist, in the course of many sessions, has an opportunity to uncover his patient’s inner world. Yet in psychobiography the subject is absent and the psychobiographer has to assemble his portrait from written material and is never able to question his subject directly.
Nevertheless, the psychobiographer actually has certain advantages compared to a psychotherapist. This is so because the psychobiographer is able to draw on the testimony of other people who knew his subject, while a psychotherapist rarely has the chance to talk to those who are acquainted with his patient. Secondly, when a psychobiographer studies someone who was an author, he can search the author’s body of written work for self- revealing information for which the psychotherapist has no comparable source.
33
2.11. The growth of psychobiography in South Africa
The first psychobiographical study conducted in South Africa was that of author Cornelis
Jacobus Langenhoven in 1939 by Burgers who wrote a similar study of the poet Louis
Leipoldt, in 1960. Van der Merwe undertook the third of these studies in his examination of the life of Ingrid Jonker, also a poet (Fouché, Smit, Watson & van Niekerk, 2007). After that there was a lapse of a period of 20 years between van der Merwe’s study and Fouché’s subsequent psychobiographical study of the life of General Jan Christiaan Smuts in 1999.
Prior to this, Chabani Manganyi published a biography of Gerard Sekoto, one of South
Africa’s most famous painters (Manganyi, 1996). In this psychobiography Manganyi explores Sekoto’s life from a clinical psychological perspective. Since the publication of
Manganyi’s (1991) work on psychobiography in the book Treachery and Innocence:
Psychology and racial difference in South Africa, a range of completed academic psychobiographical studies have been undertaken in the South African departments of psychology at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Rhodes University, the
University of Johannesburg and the University of the Free State (Fouché & van Niekerk,
2010).
The proliferation of interest in psychobiography has been accompanied by the increase in academic staff at the four universities mentioned above who have supervised a number of postgraduate research students at master’s and doctoral degree level and psychobiographical studies have become a requirement for the fulfilment of their degrees in psychology (Fouché
& van Niekerk, 2010). Another indicator of the growth of psychobiographical work within academia is the number of doctoral dissertations produced, which reflects both the interests of students and the extent to which faculty members are willing to serve as chair or committee persons on dissertations in this area.
34
In spite of the growth of masters and doctoral dissertations in psychobiography and the development of publication outlets, local and international conferences, the academic institutionalization of work in psychobiography seems relatively limited to date with only four universities involved (Fouché & van Niekerk, 2010). It should be noted, however, that it is possible to have substantial intellectual development of a field with little or no penetration of academic institutions (Fouché, et al., 2007). However, it is still relatively unusual to find formal academic training in psychobiography.
2.12. Practicing reflexivity
Throughout the entire process of choosing, reading, analysing and interpreting, the psychobiographer creates a story about the subject. Although it would seem that the story making only occurs with one person, that is, the author/biographer, in actuality the future story is co-constructed because of the researcher’s empathy and reflexivity (Finlay 2004;
Hasselkus, 2003). Therefore, psychobiographers always examine their own motives rigorously. An example of how reflexivity was considered in the present study was thinking about these questions: Does this interpretation come solely from me? Is this how my subject would have spoken or thought? Is this what my subject would want to be revealed? (Finlay
2004).
Reflexivity in the present study was particularly important because of the abundance of negative representations of Marechera: there was a desire by the present author to portray all sides and to avoid attempts to whitewash his life and ‘rescue’ Marechera from these negative representations. These reflexivity filters were maintained throughout the present study.
2.13. Conclusion
This chapter reviewed the contextual foundation and theoretical overview of psychobiographical research as a subject matter. The nature of psychobiographical research
35 and its relationship with psychoanalysis and life history was explored as a foundation for the interpretation of an enigmatic figure. Chapter 3 provides an overview of personality and developmental psychology according to Alfred Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology. The aim of the chapter is to facilitate an understanding of the complex nature of personality and begin the process of guiding the conceptualization of Marechera’s personality development across his entire lifespan.
36
CHAPTER 3
ALFRED ADLER’S INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGY
3.1. Chapter preview
This chapter discusses Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology in order to explore and describe Marechera’s personality development. Adler’s theory of individual psychology provides a dynamic view of the complex development of personality in a social context. An introduction and overview of the holistic view of human nature is first provided to orient the reader to the dynamic nature of the theory. The structure and development of personality is then discussed in order to facilitate the operationalization of the theory across the lifespan.
Finally, the theory is evaluated and its value in psychobiographical research is explored.
3.2. Introduction to Adlerian Theory
Alfred Adler (1929) fashioned a theory that did not depict people as victimized by instincts and conflict and doomed by biological forces and childhood experiences. On the contrary he called his approach individual psychology because it focused on the uniqueness of each person and denied the universality of biological motives and goals as ascribed by
Freud.
Many of the ideas and concepts that comprise current Adlerian psychotherapy can be traced directly to Adler’s views of his early childhood experiences (Corsini & Wedding,
2009). Adler’s earliest memories were of sibling rivalry, jealousy and sickness. Growing up he was known for his competitive spirit toward his older brother Sigmund, whom he viewed as a strong rival. Adler’s early childhood experiences with illnesses and trauma provided the basis for his theory of organ inferiority and inferiority feelings (Meyer, et al., 2008).
In Adler’s opinion, each individual is primarily a social being and personalities are shaped by unique social environments and interactions, not by the individual’s efforts to satisfy
37 biological needs. Although sex was of primary importance to Freud as a determining factor in personality, Adler minimized the role of sex in his system (Mosak & Maniacci, 2009).
According to Adler, the conscious, not the unconscious, was at the core of personality. Rather than being driven by forces one cannot see and control, individuals are actively involved in creating themselves and directing their future (Boeree, 2006; Mosak & Maniacci, 2009).
Although his writings revealed great insight into the depth and complexities of human personality, Adler developed a simple and parsimonious theory. To Adler, people are born with weak, inferior bodies, a condition that leads to feelings of inferiority and a consequent dependence on other people. Therefore, a feeling of unity with others (social interest) is inherent in people as an ultimate standard for psychological health (Adler, 1929; Ansbacher
& Ansbacher, 1956; Meyer et al., 2008).
3.3. The view of human nature.
Adler’s theory of individual psychology provides a hopeful, flattering picture of human nature that is the antithesis of Freud’s dreary, pessimistic view. According to Adler, it is more satisfying to have a sense of self-worth; to consider individuals as capable of consciously shaping their development and destiny rather than being dominated by instinctual forces and childhood experiences over which they have no control (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
Adler’s image of human nature is an optimistic one, simply that people are not driven by unconscious forces. They possess the free will to shape the social forces that influence them and to use the social forces creatively to construct a unique style of life. This uniqueness is another aspect of Adler’s flattering picture (Corsini & Wedding, 2009). He viewed personality as holistic and that it can only be understood as a whole, that is, dividing up individuals into parts or forces was counterproductive because it was mechanistic. This holistic view draws clear distinctions between structural dynamics and developmental concepts (Meyer et al., 2008).
38
Individual psychology adheres to a teleological vantage point in explaining behaviour.
The teleological position is associated with goal directedness which leads to fictional finalism. The idea of goal directedness was strongly influenced by the philosophy of Hans
Vaihinger whose teaching is known as The Philosophy of ‘As If’ (1925) (Meyer et al., 2008).
Although, in Adler’s view, some aspects of human nature are innate, for example, the potential for social interest and striving for perfection, it is experience that determines how these inherited tendencies will be realized. It is Adler’s assertion that childhood influences are important, particularly birth order and interactions with parents, but individuals are not victims of childhood events. Instead, they use them to create a style of life (Corey, 2009;
Meyer et al., 2008).
Adler saw each person as striving to achieve perfection and viewed humanity in similar terms. He was optimistic about social progress; was attracted to socialism and was involved in school guidance clinics and prison reform, expressing his belief in the creative power of the individual (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956; Corey, 2009; Meyer et al., 2008).
In addition to Adler’s more optimistic look at people, several other differences made the relationship between him and Freud quite tenuous (Meyer et al., 2008). While, Freud reduced all motivation to sex and aggression, Adler saw people as being motivated mostly by social influences and by their striving for superiority or success. In contrast, Freud assumed that people have little or no choice in shaping their personality, Adler believed that individuals are largely responsible for who they are. Freud assumed that present behaviour is caused by past experiences, while Adler directly opposed that notion as he believed that present behaviour is shaped by people’s view of the future. Finally, in contrast to Freud who placed heavy emphasis on the unconscious components of behaviour, Adler believed that psychologically healthy people are usually aware of what they are doing and why they are doing it
(Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956; Corey, 2009; Meyer et al., 2008).
39
Adler (1964) viewed man as a social being interacting with nature which is fierce. He viewed man as relatively weak and needs the support of communal living, which means he needs to be interested in the society around him. His capabilities and forms of expression are inseparably linked to the existence of others. Psychologically man has enough energy and courage to meet the problems and difficulties of life as they come along (Meyer et al., 2008).
Social interest becomes the inevitable compensation for all the natural weaknesses of human beings. Adler saw social interest as a way of life; it is an optimistic feeling of confidence in oneself, and a genuine interest in the welfare and well-being of others. The human being is clearly a social being, needing a much longer period of dependence upon others before maturity than any animal. As long as the feeling of inferiority is not too great, a person will always strive to be worthwhile and on the useful side of life because this gives him the feeling of being valuable which originates from contributing to the common welfare
(Barlow & Durand, 2010; Mosak & Maniacci, 2009).
True happiness is inseparable from the feeling of giving; a social person is much closer to happiness than the isolated person striving for superiority (Adler, 1964). Through the theory of individual psychology, Adler clearly pointed out that everyone who is deeply unhappy - the neurotic and the desolate person - stem from among those who were deprived in their younger years of being able to develop the feeling of community, the courage, the optimism, and the self-confidence that comes directly from the sense of belonging. This sense of belonging that cannot be denied anyone can only be won by being involved, by cooperating and experiencing, and by being useful to others. Out of this emerges a lasting, genuine feeling of worthiness (Adler, 1927).
3.4. The Structure and development of personality
Adler does not use structures in explaining human function; he sees personality simply as a whole that moves towards achieving self-determined goals. Individual psychology maintains
40 that the overriding motivation in most people is a striving for what Adler termed superiority, that is, self-realization, completeness, or perfection (Adler, 1929). This striving for superiority may be frustrated by feelings of inferiority, inadequacy, or incompleteness arising from physical defects, low social status, pampering or neglect during childhood, or other causes encountered in the natural course of life. Individuals can compensate for their feelings of inferiority by developing their skills and abilities, or, less healthily, they may develop an inferiority complex, which comes to dominate their behaviour. Each person develops his personality and strives for perfection in his own particular way, in what Adler termed a style of life, or lifestyle (Corsini & Wedding, 2009).
All individuals are ‘pulled’ towards fulfilment, perfection, and self-actualization. And yet some end up terribly unfulfilled, imperfect and far from self-actualized. It is all because of a lack of social interest, or, to put it in the positive form, because individuals are too self- interested (Corsini & Wedding, 2009). According to Adler, a lack of social interest is a matter of being overwhelmed by inferiority. If individuals are moving along, doing well, feeling competent, they can afford to think of others. If they are not, if life is getting the best of them, then their attentions become increasingly focussed on themselves (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
In Adler’s view individuals have certain constitutional attributes and a creative self. These two in interacting with the social environment determine the type of life style an individual develops (Meyer et al., 2008).
3.4.1. Constitutional attributes. Individuals are born with a set of genetically determined attributes although they are not decisive in determining the direction and nature of the individual’s development. They are just potentials which when they interact with the environment and the creative self-play a role in human personality development. An important aspect of the constitutional attribute is the physical and organic weakness that
41 individuals are born with or acquire in early childhood. Individuals compensate for this perceived inferiority through the creative self (Meyer et al., 2008).
3.4.1.1. Inferiority feelings and compensation. Adler’s theory states that all individuals are born with a sense of inferiority as evidenced by how weak and helpless a new born is. By this, Adler was able to explain that inferiority is a crucial part of personality, in the sense that it is the driving force that pushes individuals to strive in order to become superior (Adler,
1929).
As an addition to the inferiority theory of personality, Adler also considered birth order as a major factor in the development of personality. He believed that first born children may feel inferior and may even develop inferiority complex once their younger sibling arrives. The middle born children, on the other hand, are not as pampered as their older or younger sibling, but they have a sense of superiority to dethrone their older sibling in a healthy competition. Thus they have the greatest potential to be successful in life. The youngest children may feel like they have the least power to influence other members of the family.
Because they are often the most pampered, they may develop personality problems of inferiority just like the first born (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956; Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
Adler first identified inferiority with a general feeling of weakness or of femininity, in recognition of the inferior standing of women in the society of his day. He spoke of compensation for this feeling as the masculine protest. The goal of the compensation was a will toward power in which aggression, a supposedly masculine characteristic, played a large part. Later he rejected the idea of equating inferiority feelings with femininity and developed a broader viewpoint in which individuals strive for superiority, or perfection (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956; Corey, 2009; Meyer et al., 2008).
3.4.1.1.1. Organ inferiority. All individuals suffer from inferiority in one form or another
(Meyer et al., 2008). For example, Adler began his theoretical work considering organ
42 inferiority, that is, the fact that each individual has weaker, as well as stronger, parts of their anatomy or physiology. Some are born with heart murmurs, or develop heart problems early in life; some have weak lungs, or kidneys, or early liver problems. Adler noted that many people respond to these organic inferiorities with compensation. They make up for their deficiencies in some way. The inferior organ can be strengthened and even become stronger than it is in others, or the person can psychologically compensate for the organic problem by developing certain skills or even certain personality styles. There are many examples of people who overcame great physical odds to become what those who are better endowed physically would not even dream of (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
3.4.1.1.2. Psychological inferiorities. Some individuals are told that they are dumb, or ugly, or weak. Some come to believe that they are just basically no good. In school, learners are tested over and over and given grades that tell them that some are not as good as others.
In these examples, it is not a matter of true organic inferiority, they are not really retarded or deformed or weak, but they learn to believe that they are. Again, some compensate by becoming good at what they feel inferior about. Others compensate by becoming good at something else, but otherwise retaining their sense of inferiority. And some individuals just never develop any self-esteem at all (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
Adler noted an even more general form of inferiority, the natural inferiority of children
(Adler, 1930). All children are, by nature, smaller, weaker, less socially and intellectually competent than the adults around them. Looking at children’s games, toys, and fantasies, they tend to have one thing in common, the desire to grow up, to be big, and to be an adult. This kind of compensation is identical to striving for perfection. Many children, however, are left with the feeling that other people will always be better than they are (Schultz, & Schultz,
2009).
43
3.4.1.1.3. Inferiority complex. If an individual is overwhelmed by the forces of inferiority whether it is their body hurting, the people around them holding them in contempt, or just the general difficulties of growing up they develop an inferiority complex. Individuals with an inferiority complex have a poor opinion of themselves and feel helpless and unable to cope with the demands of life (Adler, 1964).
An inferiority complex can arise from three sources in childhood; organ inferiority, spoiling, and neglect. The investigation of organic inferiority, Adler’s first major research effort, was carried out while he was still associated with Freud, who approved of the notion
(Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956). Adler concluded that defective parts or organs of the body shape personality through the person’s efforts to compensate for the defect or weakness, just as he had compensated for the physical inferiority of his childhood years (Schultz, & Schultz,
2009).
It is easy to understand how neglected, unwanted and rejected children can develop an inferiority complex. Their infancy and childhood are characterized by a lack of love and security because their parents are indifferent or hostile. As a result these children develop feelings of worthlessness, or even anger, and view others with distrust. Efforts to overcome organic inferiority can result in striking artistic, athletic and social accomplishments, but if these efforts fail, they can lead to an inferiority complex (Corey, 2009, Corsini & Wedding,
2009).
Adler’s work is another example of a conception of personality developed along intuitive lines, drawn from the theorist’s personal experience, and later confirmed by data from patients. Adler’s office in Vienna was like an amusement park, and his patients included circus performers and gymnasts. They possessed extraordinary physical skills that, in many cases, were developed as a result of hard work to overcome childhood disabilities (Corsini &
Wedding, 2009).
44
3.4.1.2. Superiority complex. As a way to respond to inferiority besides compensation and the inferiority complex, people can also develop a superiority complex (Adler, 1964). The superiority complex involves covering up one’s inferiority by pretending to be superior.
Small people always want to feel big by making everyone else feel smaller, for example, bullies, braggarts, and petty dictators. More subtle examples are the people who are given to attention-getting dramatics, the ones who feel powerful when they commit crimes, and the ones who put others down for their gender, race, ethnic origins, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, weight or height. Even more subtle still are the people who hide their feelings of worthlessness in the delusions of power afforded by alcohol and drugs (Corey, 2009, Corsini
& Wedding, 2009).
3.4.2. Creative self. Individuals have the ability to be creative in forming their own life goals and in planning how to achieve these life goals. The ability of an individual to formulate life goals and the methods to achieve these goals is the creative self. It is not a structure of personality but it is rather the capability of the whole person. Goals and means are not automatic outcomes of constitutional and environmental factors (Meyer et al., 2008).
It is the self in the creative aspects that interpret and makes meaningful experience to fulfil the person’s unique style of life. The creative self establishes, maintains and pursues the goals of the individual. Adler believed that human nature is essentially active, creative and purposeful in shaping its response to the environment (Engler, 2009).
Through the concept of the creative self, Adler reinforces the affirmation that individuals make their own personalities from the raw materials of heredity and environment. Adler used the concept of the creative self to restore consciousness at the centre of personality. He believed that individuals are aware of what they do and through self-examination they can understand why they behave in a certain way. The forces they are unaware of are simply not noticed. Adler believed that people become largely aware of their deepest impulse and
45 fictional finalisms, and with conscious intention create their own personality and life styles that will make them achieve superiority. For many individuals, Adler’s optimistic view provided a welcome contrast to the pessimistic and conflict ridden picture of human nature shown by Freud and reinstated hope for the human condition (Engler, 2009).
3.4.3. Social environment. Feelings of inferiority develop because of the child’s first social interaction and they become persistent throughout life as a source of motivation towards success. As a result all growth is an attempt by the individual to compensate for the feeling of inferiority and striving for superiority (Meyer et al., 2008). The societal factors outside the family also shape how individuals develop their views of themselves and the world. Adler recognised that the school is a dominant influence and spent much of his time training teachers and establishing child guidance clinics attached to the schools throughout
Vienna (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
Social discrimination on the basis of poverty, ethnicity, gender, religion, or educational level can also exacerbate inferiority feelings. Adler emphasized that it was not just the objective facts or influences that had an impact on the child, but the interpretation the child gives to them. Children who are discriminated against because of physical deformities or socio-economic status, for example, may find maintaining a positive sense of self difficult.
But doing so is possible if someone provides sufficient contact, understanding and encouragement (Adler, 1964).
Adler recognised the destructive influence of culture’s archaic view of men and women.
He observed that women were typically devalued and this was a major influence in their exaggerated feelings of inferiority. But he also realised that men, too, were adversely affected. The over-valuing of men often leads to extremely high expectations, and when men begin to see that they cannot meet these expectations, their inferiority feelings also increase.
46
Adler felt that the healthiest arrangement is a recognized equality of value between men and women which would then result in a higher level of cooperation between them (Adler 1982).
Early experiences, both inside and outside the family, in combination with hereditary attributes and physiological processes, are used creatively by children to form an impression of themselves and life. A final goal of success, significance, and security is imagined and a style of life is adopted to prepare for that goal. Individuals who are not self-pampering or discouraged hold opinions of themselves and the tasks of life that are reasonably close to what Adler called ‘common sense.’ These individuals feel connected to one another and have developed their ability to cooperate (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
3.4.4. Social interest. Adler believed that getting along with others is the first task individuals encounter in life. An individual’s subsequent level of social adjustment, which is part of the style of life, influences their approach to all of life’s problems. Adler (1929, p. 11) proposed the concept of social interest, which he defined as ‘the individual’s innate potential to cooperate with other people to achieve personal and societal goals.’ Adler’s term for this concept in the original German, Gemeinschaftsgefuhl, is best translated as ‘community feeling’. However, social interest has become the accepted term in English (Schultz, &
Schultz, 2009).
Although individuals are influenced more strongly by social than biological forces, in
Adler’s view, the potential for social interest is innate (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956). In that limited sense, then, Adler’s approach has a biological element. However, the extent to which the innate potential for social interest is realized depends on the early social experiences of an individual. No one can entirely avoid other people or obligations toward them. From earliest times, people have congregated in families, tribes, and nations.
Communities are indispensable to human beings for protection and survival. Thus, it has
47 always been necessary for people to cooperate and to express their social interest. The individual must cooperate with and contribute to society to realize personal and communal goals (Meyer et al., 2008).
Lack of social concern is, for Adler, the very definition of mental ill-health. All failures- neurotics, psychotics, criminals, drunkards, problem children, suicides, perverts, and prostitutes -are failures because they lack social interest. Their goal of success is a goal of personal superiority, and their triumphs have meaning only to themselves (Adler, 1964).
3.4.5. Birth order. One of Adler’s most enduring contributions is the idea that order of birth is a major social influence in childhood, one from which individuals create a style of life. Even though siblings have the same parents and live in the same house, they do not have identical social environments. Being older or younger than one’s siblings and being exposed to differing parental attitudes create different childhood conditions that help determine personality. Adler highlighted four situations; the first-born child, the second-born child, the youngest child, and the only child (Meyer et al., 2008).
3.4.5.1. The first-born child. The first child begins life as an only child, with all the attention on him. Sadly, just when things are getting comfortable, the second child arrives and ‘dethrones’ the first. At first, the child may battle for his lost position. He might try acting like the baby, only to be rebuffed and told to grow up. Some children become disobedient and rebellious, others sullen and withdrawn. Adler believes that first children are more likely than any other to become problem children. More positively, first children are often precocious. They tend to be relatively solitary and more conservative than the other children in the family (Corsini & Wedding, 2009).
Adler believed all first-borns feel the shock of their changed status in the family, but those who have been excessively pampered feel a greater loss. The extent of the loss depends on the first-born’s age at the time the rival appears. In general, the older a first-born child is
48 when the second child arrives, the less dethronement the first-born will experience (Adler,
1929).
Adler observed that first-borns are often oriented toward the past, locked in nostalgia and pessimistic about the future. Having learned the advantages of power at one time, they remain concerned with it throughout life. They can exercise some power over younger siblings but at the same time they are more subject to the power of their parents because more is expected of them (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
3.4.5.2. The second born child. Second-born children, the ones who caused such upheaval in the lives of first-borns, are also in a unique situation. They never experience the powerful position once occupied by the first-borns. Even if another child is brought into the family, second-borns do not suffer the sense of dethronement felt by the first-borns. Furthermore, by the time the second-born arrives parents may have changed their child-rearing attitudes and practices. A second baby is not the novelty the first was; parents may be less concerned and anxious about their own behaviour and may take a more relaxed approach to the second child
(Corsini & Wedding, 2009).
Second-borns are in a very different situation. They have the first child as a sort of ‘pace- setter,’ and tend to become quite competitive, constantly trying to surpass the older child.
They often succeed, but many feel as if the race is never done, and they tend to dream of constant running without getting anywhere. Other ‘middle’ children will tend to be similar to the second child, although each may focus on a different ‘competitor’ (Adler, 1964).
3.4.5.3. The youngest child. Youngest children are likely to be the most pampered in a family with more than one child. After all, they are the only ones who are never dethroned.
The youngest children are the second most likely source of problem children, just behind first children. On the other hand, the youngest may also feel incredible inferiority, with everyone
49 older and ‘therefore’ superior. But, with all those ‘pace-setters’ ahead, the youngest can also be driven to exceed all of them (Adler, 1929).
Driven by the need to surpass older siblings, youngest children often develop at a remarkably fast rate. Last-borns are often high achievers in whatever work they undertake as adults. The opposite can occur, however, if the youngest children are excessively pampered and come to believe they need not learn to do anything for themselves. As they grow older, such children may retain the helplessness and dependency of childhood. Unaccustomed to striving and struggling, used to being cared for, these people find it difficult to adjust to adulthood (Corsini & Wedding, 2009).
3.4.5.3. The only child. Only children never lose the position of primacy and power they hold in the family; they remain the focus and centre of attention. Spending more time in the company of adults than a child with siblings, only children often mature early and manifest adult behaviours and attitudes. Only children are likely to experience difficulties when they find that in areas of life outside the home, such as school, they are not the centre of attention.
Only children have learned neither to share nor to compete. If their abilities do not bring them sufficient recognition and attention, they are likely to feel keenly disappointed (Adler, 1930).
With his ideas about order of birth, Adler was not proposing firm rules of childhood development. A child will not automatically acquire a particular kind of character based solely on their position in the family. What Adler was suggesting was the likelihood that certain styles of life will develop as a function of order of birth combined with one’s early social interactions. The creative self in constructing the style of life uses both influences as individuals strive for superiority (Corsini & Wedding, 2009).
3.4.6. Striving for perfection or superiority. According to Adler striving for superiority is the fundamental goal of life (Adler, 1930). Superiority is the ultimate goal toward which individuals strive for. Adler described striving for superiority not as an attempt to be better
50 than everyone else, nor as an arrogant or domineering tendency or an inflated opinion of individual abilities and accomplishments. What Adler meant was a drive for perfection. Thus, he suggested that individuals strive for superiority in an effort to perfect themselves, to make themselves complete or whole (Meyer et al., 2008).
The drive toward wholeness or completion is oriented toward the future (Adler, 1930;
1964). Adler saw human motivation in terms of expectations for the future. He argued that instincts and primal impulses were insufficient as explanatory principles. Only the ultimate goal of superiority or perfection could explain personality and behaviour. Regardless of the motivation for striving, each individual is guided by a final goal (Adler, 1930; 1964).
3.4.6.1. Fictional finalism. Adler applied the term finalism to the idea that individuals have an ultimate goal, a final state of being, and a need to move towards it (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956). The goals, for which individuals strive, however, are potentialities, not actualities. In other words, individuals strive for ideals that exist subjectively. Adler believed that individual goals are fictional or imagined ideals that cannot be tested against reality.
Individuals live their lives around ideals such as the belief that all people are created equal or that all people are basically good. Adler’s life goal was to conquer death; his way of striving for that goal was to become a physician (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
Adler was influenced by the philosopher Hans Vaihinger, whose book, The Philosophy of the ‘As If’ was first published in 1911. According to Vaihinger, people live by many fictional ideals that have no relationship to reality and that cannot be tested and confirmed. Some examples of such fictionalisms include for example ‘Honesty is the best policy,’ ‘All men are created equal,’ and ‘The end justifies the means.’ Any ideal or an absolute is usually a fiction.
Fictionalisms can help individuals deal more effectively with reality, or they may block attempts to accept reality (Corsini & Wedding, 2009).
51
Adler formalized this concept as fictional finalism, the notion that fictional ideas guide behaviour as individuals strive toward a complete or whole state of being. Individuals direct the course of their lives using many such fictions, but the most pervasive one is the ideal of perfection. Adler suggested that the best formulation of this ideal developed by human beings so far is the concept of God, that is, human beings act ‘As If’ there is god. If a person believes that there is a heaven and a hell, such beliefs will influence how they live. Adler preferred the terms ‘subjective final goal’ or ‘guiding self-ideal’ to describe this concept, but it continues to be known as fictional finalism (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
In Adler’s view, individuals and society are interrelated and interdependent. People must function constructively with others for the good of all. Thus, to Adler, human beings perpetually strive for the fictional, ideal goal of perfection. How in their daily lives do individuals try to attain this goal is what Adler answered with his concept of the style of life
(Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
3.4.7. The style of life. The ultimate goal for every individual is superiority or perfection, but to attain that goal takes many different behaviour patterns. Each individual expresses the striving differently. Individuals develop a unique pattern of characteristics, behaviours, and habits, which Adler called a distinctive character, or style of life (Adler, 1929). To understand how the style of life develops one can look at the concepts of inferiority feelings and compensation, which was explained in detail earlier. Infants are afflicted with inferiority feelings that motivate them to compensate for helplessness and dependency. In these attempts at compensation, children acquire a set of behaviours. These behaviours become part of the style of life, a pattern of behaviours designed to compensate for inferiority (Meyer et al.,
2008).
Everything a person does is shaped and defined by their unique style of life. It determines which aspects of the environment a person attends to or ignores and what attitudes the person
52 holds. The style of life is learned from social interactions that occur in the early years of life.
Adler suggested that the style of life now known as lifestyle is so firmly crystallized by the age of 4 or 5 that it is difficult to change thereafter (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
The style of life becomes the guiding framework for all later behaviours. Its nature depends on social interactions, especially the person’s order of birth within the family and the nature of the parent-child relationship. One condition that can lead to an inferiority complex is neglect. Neglected children may feel inferior in coping with the demands of life and therefore may become distrustful and hostile toward others. As a result, their style of life may involve seeking revenge, resenting others’ success, and taking whatever they feel is their due
(Adler, 1964).
Adler was unable to accept that lives are completely programmed by what happens in the first five years of childhood. Even though he believed that individual’s lifestyle forms in early childhood Adler argued that it is partly determined by what particular inferiority affected the individual most deeply during their formative years when each individual develops a style of life that greatly influences their behaviour in later years. Additionally,
Adler believed that this core personality system typically - as it forms early in childhood - strives to protect itself from change in later years, even when the perceived adaptive requirements under which it formed may have changed. Yet he believed that the individual also has the power to choose, to exercise character and to affect the direction of their life
(Adler, 1929; 1930).
For Adler, lifestyle was the sum total of the values, passions, knowledge, meaningful deeds and eccentricities that constitute the uniqueness of each individual. The lifestyle is essentially the core schema of a person, it affects and is reflected by everything the individual does, thinks, and perceives manifesting itself in all behaviours. According to Adler, the individual’s lifestyle is one’s personality, the unity of the personality, the individual form of
53 creative opinion about oneself, the problems of life and his whole attitude to life and others.
Thus the lifestyle of the individual is considered the key to the behaviour (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956).
3.4.7.1. Psychological types. Although all neurosis is, for Adler, a matter of insufficient social interest, he did note that four psychological types could be distinguished based on the different levels of energy they involved (Adler, 1929).
3.4.7.1.1. Ruling type. From childhood this type is characterized by a tendency to be aggressive and dominant over others. They are also known as the active-destructive type
(Meyer et al., 2008), they have selfish goals that disadvantage the community, they are power seeking and might exhibit antisocial behaviour. Their energy, the strength of their striving after personal power, is so great that they tend to push over anything or anybody who gets in their way. The most energetic of them become bullies and sadists. The somewhat less energetic ones hurt others by hurting themselves, and include alcoholics, drug addicts and suicide.
3.4.7.1.2. Leaning type. Also known as the passive-constructive type (Meyer et al., 2008), they are inclined to be community oriented but in a passive way, likely to be friendly and charming but somehow lacking in independence and enterprise. They are sensitive people who have developed a shell around themselves which protects them, but they must rely on others to carry them through life’s difficulties. They have low energy levels and so become dependent. When overwhelmed, they develop typical neurotic symptoms including phobias, obsessions and compulsions, general anxiety, hysteria and amnesias, depending on individual details of their lifestyle.
3.4.7.1.3. Avoiding type. Also known as the passive-aggressive type (Meyer et al., 2008), they have antisocial behaviour tendencies and tend to be lazy and passively aggressive. These have the lowest levels of energy and only survive by essentially avoiding life, especially
54 other people. They avoid failure by avoiding involvement with work, friends or society in general. They are likely to have low social contact for fear of rejection or defeat in any way.
When pushed to the limits, they tend to become psychotic, retreating finally into their own personal worlds. They try not to deal with problems in order to avoid any defeat or embarrassment. Agoraphobia would be a manifestation of this maladaptive style of life. They tend to be isolated, and seem cold in nature.
3.4.7.1.4. Socially useful type. Also known as the active-constructive type (Meyer et al.,
2008), they develop in a family atmosphere predominated by a spirit of cooperation, trust and respect. They are marked by optimism and a positive supportive community oriented approach to problem solving. This is the healthy person, one who has both social interest and energy. It should be noted that without energy, an individual cannot really have social interest, since they would not be able to actually do anything for anyone (Boeree, 2006;
Meyer et al., 2008).
Individuals who fall into the socially useful category tend to be mature, positive, well adjusted, and courteous and considerate of others. They do not strive for personal superiority over others. Instead, they seek to solve problems in ways that are helpful to others. Socially useful types help others in their families, and they work for social or political change (Adler,
1929).
3.5. Mental health development.
Adler (1929) postulates that children need an accommodating environment to allow them to excel, to become popular, or to be a real men or a real women. If children evaluate their own abilities and believe that they can achieve their desired places, they will pursue positive behaviours and have positive mental health. On the other hand, if they feel that they cannot find their places, they will become discouraged and may engage in disturbing behaviour in an effort to find their place. The maladjusted child is not ‘sick’ but rather discouraged.
55
Ansbacher and Ansbacher (1956) placed the goals of the misbehaving child into four categories; (1) attention getting, (2) power seeking, (3) revenge taking and (4) declaring deficiency or defeat.
In adults Adler (1958) observed that individuals’ health is significantly influenced by their ability to form and maintain friendships and meaningful relationships with others. Individuals who experience difficulty establishing and maintaining meaningful friendships are often at risk for depression, frustration, anger, and social alienation. Mental health is also linked with encouragement; whereas poor mental functioning is associated with discouragement. It was
Adler’s (1929) belief that individuals cling to the mental, emotional, and behaviour habits developed in childhood to cope with feelings of inferiority.
Individual’s underdeveloped social interest is the one factor that underlies all types of psychological maladjustments. Individual psychology conceptualized maladjustment as the individual’s development of exaggerated feelings of inferiority and exaggerated striving for superiority (Adler, 1930). Adler equated psychopathology with a feeling of discouragement, a feeling of hopelessness, and the belief that one’s world is not going to change for the better.
Thus maladaptive behaviour develops when individuals become discouraged or when they encounter disappointing circumstances. When individuals lose the courage to face demanding life situations, they move from a position of inferiority to inferiority complex (Adler, 1927).
They become unconsciously convinced of their inferiority, and as a consequence, they develop abnormal behaviour to divert attention from their difficulties (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956).
Adler (1929; 1964) considered the mother the primary person for teaching children social interest. A mother demonstrates nurturing, cooperation, and social interest in general when she nurses the baby at her breast. Mothers help their children extend positive relationships to the father and to others within the family. Mothers who fail to show sufficient social interest
56 while parenting their children risk raising young individuals who become maladaptive in their interpersonal relationships because they lack sufficient social interest.
Adler (1927) used a number of characteristics to describe the maladjusted or neurotic individual. One of them is that the neurotic person overcompensates for feeling insecure. For instance, the overindulged child may become self-centred; the neglected child may seek revenge against society. Neurotic approaches to life include a distancing attitude and a hesitating attitude. Individuals use distancing attitude attempts to protect themselves by keeping others at bay, perhaps even becoming overly formal in conversations (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956).
3.5.1. Safeguarding tendencies. What distinguished one maladjusted individual from another are the safeguarding tendencies each individual acquired to protect themselves from feelings of inferiority. Adler (1930) used the term ‘safeguarding tendencies’ to describe his belief that people create patterns of behaviour to protect their exaggerated feelings of inferiority against public disgrace. His concept of safeguarding tendencies is similar to
Freud’s concept of defence mechanisms. Whereas Freud maintained that defence mechanisms operate unconsciously to protect the ego against anxiety, Adler asserted that safeguarding tendencies are primarily conscious (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009). The type of safeguarding tendency chosen differentiated the type of disorder the individual developed.
Adler considered an individual’s selection of a safeguarding tendency as a creative act
(Adler, 1982). Some common safeguarding tendencies are excuses, aggression, and withdrawal.
Everyone develops some form of safeguarding tendency. They can become neurotic or self-defeating because their goals of self-protection and personal superiority block them from obtaining authentic feelings of inferiority (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009). Adler was convinced that most compulsive behaviours are attempts to waste time. He considered compulsive hand
57 washing, retracing one’s steps, behaving in an obsessive orderly fashion, and leaving work incomplete as all examples of hesitation. He believed that people construct ‘straw houses’ to protect their self-esteem and prestige (Adler, 1982).
3.6. Optimal development.
The active-constructive lifestyle is the most appropriate for achieving the basic human goals of superiority and perfection (Meyer et al., 2008). The peak of human development is not when an individual strives for perfection of the self but for the service of society
(Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
In Adler’s theoretical framework, the optimally developed person is therefore someone who has a widely expanded social interest and empathy with other people and who feels united with the present and the future worlds as a whole. Social interest includes characteristics such as love one’s neighbour, awareness of the environment and involvement in the future development of the world. Although the ideal might appear to be unattainable, people should not lose sight of Adler’s concepts of fictional finalism. Even though the ideals that people hold may be fictions; they can still strive for the fulfilment of these ideals as if they were attainable. In this way mechanism of self enhancement is established (Meyer et al.,
2008).
The healthier the person is, the more they are drawn toward the goal of social interest.
Social interest can adjust for the overemphasis on individualism and competition found in
Western culture (Meyer et al., 2008). It is the innate potential to live cooperatively with other people and helps value the common good above personal welfare. Social connections with others enhance growth. Empathic people respond emotionally and share the joys and sorrows of others. This is the basis for all moral development. Without social interest, life seems purposeless and the self feels empty. Ultimately it may contribute to spirituality by
58 encouraging a loving attitude toward all others. This is a core concept in Adlerian theory
(Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
All neurosis stems from inadequate social feeling. Schizophrenics show a startling lack of social feeling and lack of empathy, much like criminals. Females show higher social interest and empathy than males. Groups and cultures can be described by social interest or lack thereof. Without a social interest, a group can implode on itself. Such cultures glorify war, the death penalty, physical punishment and abuse, failing to provide humane conditions for all classes of people. Healthy social institutions of all sorts teach how to love their neighbour.
People who are high on social interest develop attitudes toward love that emphasize companionship and reject game playing. These people also are healthier, have more friends and are more satisfied with their jobs (Meyer et al., 2008).
Adler observed that individuals’ health is significantly influenced by their ability to form and maintain friendships and meaningful relationships with others. People who experience difficulty establishing and maintaining meaningful friendships are often at risk for depression, frustration, anger and social alienation. Mental health is also linked to encouragement; whereas poor mental functioning is associated with discouragement (Adler,
1929). According to Adler individuals cling to the mental, emotional and behavioural habits they developed in childhood to cope with feelings of inferiority. Because they interpret these experiences in terms of their lifestyles (or habitual ways of viewing the world), they invent excuses to support their world perceptions. Common excuses may include ‘Nothing ever works out for me,’ or ‘nobody ever really loved me’ (Meyer et al., 2008).
According to Adler (1958), an individual’s underdeveloped social interest is the one factor that underlies all types of psychological maladjustments. Adlerian psychology conceptualized maladjustment as the individual’s development of exaggerated feelings of inferiority and exaggerated striving for superiority (Adler, 1930). Adler equated psychopathology with a
59 feeling of discouragement, a feeling of hopelessness and the belief that one’s world is not going to change for the better. Maladaptive behaviour develops when individuals become discouraged or when they encounter disappointing circumstances. When people lose the courage to face demanding life situations, they move from a position of inferiority to inferiority complex (Adler, 1927). They become unconsciously convinced of their inferiority, and as a consequence, they develop abnormal behaviour to divert attention from their difficulties (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
3.7. Evaluation of individual psychology.
Adler holds that an individual’s basic personality, uniqueness and how they live their lives, comes from the creative power of the self, to which heredity, environment, the conscious and unconscious all contribute. This, of course is not completely true. Personality development cannot be reduced to feelings of inferiority versus superiority but must include spirituality (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009). Adler’s rejection of the determinism of Freud and others, however, is indeed more compatible with spirituality.
Other criticisms of Adler tend to involve the issue of whether or not, or to what degree, his theory is scientific. The mainstream of psychology today thrives to be experimentally oriented. This means that, among other things, the concepts a theory uses must be measurable
(Corey, 2009). This in turn means that an experimental orientation prefers physical or behavioural variables. Adler uses basic concepts that are far from physical and behavioural.
For example, how can ‘striving for perfection’, ‘feelings of inferiority’, ‘social interest’ and/or ‘the creativity of a person’s lifestyle’ be measured?
The experimental method makes a basic assumption: That all things operate in terms of cause and effect (Meyer et al., 2008). Adler would certainly agree that physical things operate in terms of cause and effect, but he would adamantly deny that people do. Instead, he takes the teleological route, that people are ‘determined’ by their ideals, goals, values and ‘final
60 fictions.’ Teleology takes the necessity out of things; a person does not have to respond in a certain way to a certain circumstance; a person has choices to make; a person creates his own personality or lifestyle. From the experimental perspective, these concepts are illusions that a scientist, dare not give in to (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
Adler could, however, respond to these criticisms very easily. Firstly, he believed in teleology. If the concept of teleology is accepted, it therefore means that individuals are guided not only by mechanical forces but that they also have the free will to move toward certain goals of self-realization. Secondly, he went to great lengths to explain his ideas about fictional finalism (Corsini & Wedding, 2009). All of his concepts are useful constructs, not absolute truths and science is just a matter of creating increasingly useful constructs. His concern for his fellow human being is reflected in his philanthropic preoccupation with children, families and education. Adler’s logical approach to human issues and common sense language render definition and interpretation generally unnecessary (Corsini &
Wedding, 2009).
3.8. Application to psychobiography
Adler’s influence within psychology has been substantial. These contributions make
Adler’s personality theory one of the most enduring. He was ahead of his time and his cognitive and social emphases are more compatible with trends in psychology today than with the psychology of his own day. Abraham Maslow (1970) wrote: “Alfred Adler becomes more and more correct year by year…….as the facts come in, they give stronger and stronger support to his image of man” (p. 13).
Adler’s emphasis on social forces in personality can be seen in the theory of Karen
Horney (1937). His focus on the whole person and the unity of personality is reflected in the work of Gordon Allport (1937). The creative power of the individual in shaping a style of life, and the insistence that future goals are more important than past events, influenced the
61 work of Abraham Maslow (1970). A social-learning theorist, Julian Rotter (1982), wrote that he “was and continues to be impressed by Adler’s insights into human nature” (pp. 1-2).
Applying Adler’s theory of individual psychology to psychobiography promotes understanding over explanation (Carlson, 1988). The theoretical dynamism and flexibility allows for an interpretation of the complexity of an ever-changing subject. The subject, therefore, must be understood within the socio-cultural and historical context and from a subjective view of reality to emphasize individual lifestyle within the bounds of teleology
(Adler, 1930, 1958). Individual psychology is valuable in psychobiographical research as it views a life in light of its end, because the fictional goal renders this comprehensible
(Carlson, 1988). An Adlerian psychobiography thus focuses on individual creativity and explores heredity and environmental influences within the perception of reality.
3.9. Conclusion
This chapter explored Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology as a theoretical perspective to uncover the complex personality development of an enigmatic figure. Adler’s childhood was marked by intense efforts to compensate for his feelings of inferiority and is reflected in his theory. His system of individual psychology differs from Freudian psychoanalysis in its focus on the uniqueness of the individual, on consciousness and on social rather than biological forces. It minimizes the role of sex and emphasis the role of constitutional attributes, creative self and social interest. What follows in chapter 4 is the biography of Marechera. It provides a comprehensive historical overview of the life of
Marechera to simultaneously highlight both his personality development across his lifestyle as well as the uniqueness of his life.
62
CHAPTER 4
THE LIFE OF DAMBUDZO MARECHERA
4.1. Chapter preview
This chapter provides a biographical overview of the life of Marechera. His life is presented over a historical period of 35 years, from his birth in 1952 to his death in 1987.
Although the information regarding Marechera’s life is characterized by a level of factual and chronological ambiguity, it was however triangulated to ensure trustworthiness. It is the researcher’s contention that the life of an enigmatic individual cannot be ignored because of historical discrepancies, but rather that it further motivates the necessity to make psychological sense of a unique subject.
Marechera was born at the time when Zimbabwe was still Rhodesia, one of the last bastions of white colonial rule on the African continent. From 1965 Rhodesia was under an official state of emergency and violence was common as black nationalists battled with a racist white government to gain some measure of political representation. The troubled atmosphere brought unease to Marechera’s life. A background of the socio-political history of Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) from colonialism to independence is followed by Marechera’s biography.
4.2. Brief history of Zimbabwe.
In 1888 Lobengula, the Ndebele ruler, signed the Rudd Concession giving mineral rights to the representatives of Cecil Rhodes who formed the British South Africa Company
(BSAC). A Royal Charter was obtained in 1889 and the following year pioneer settlers and troops arrived to establish a settlement which they called Salisbury, now renamed Harare. In
1894 the country was given the name of Rhodesia in honour of Rhodes. The Ndebele and the
Shona initially put up fierce resistance to the encroachment of the settlers in a series of battles
63 which became known as the First Chimurenga. But white supremacy was firmly established by 1897. The BSAC actively encouraged white settlement and ran Rhodesia until 1923 when it became a self-governing colony following the 1922 referendum (Caute, 1983; Needham,
Machingaidze & Bhebhe, 1984).
A series of legislative Acts in the 1920s and 1930s increased the social, political and economic dominance of the white minority and weakened the position of black Africans by denying them, among other things, access to the best land and to skilled employment. By the
1940s and 1950s, and from a position of absolute power, some moderate leaders were prepared to make limited concessions to the black Africans to encourage economic growth and to gain some African support (Martin & Johnson, 1981).
In October 1953, the British Government established the Central African Federation
(CAF) following long and difficult negotiations. This consisted of Southern Rhodesia (now
Zimbabwe), Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) and Nyasaland (now Malawi). The declared aims behind the formation of the CAF were to promote economic development and to create a multi-racial partnership to ease the path to independence as the movement to disband the
British Empire gathered pace with impetus from Westminster. The move to Federation was resisted by white supremacists who rejected any notion of power-sharing, and by black leaders who dismissed the arrangement as little more than a sham, due in part at least, to the complete failure of the British Government to consult with any black Africans (Moorcraft,
1990; Needham, et al., 1984).
It is now a matter of record that the Federation never developed meaningful multi-racial co-operation, although massive benefits did accrue, principally to whites. Most of the black population in the self-governing colony of Southern Rhodesia were further impoverished as tariffs increased the price of goods which grew at a faster rate than wages. Against this background black resistance hardened and took shape, generating Black Nationalism and
64 culminating in the election of nationalist leaders: Hastings Banda in 1961 in Nyasaland, and
Kenneth Kaunda the following year in Northern Rhodesia. The Central African Federation was officially disbanded in 1963 and the independent republics of Malawi and Zambia were recognised in 1964 (Martin & Johnson, 1981).
Britain refused to grant independence to Southern Rhodesia until the Rhodesian
Government accepted the principle of majority rule. As the Rhodesian Front Party had successfully contested the 1962 elections on a ticket opposing concessions to the blacks, negotiations were protracted and acrimonious, and inevitably broke down. In November 1965 the Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith dispensed with the pretence of further negotiations and proclaimed a Unilateral Declaration of Independence, (UDI). Most of the international community (including Britain) regarded the Smith Government as illegal; refused to recognise it and imposed sanctions. This tactic was aimed at the country’s economy but the resulting isolation had a devastating effect on the intellectual development of black
Zimbabweans, who were excluded from the intellectual freedom beginning to be expressed and enjoyed by other black Africans (Caute, 1983, Martin & Johnson, 1981).
To a rather limited degree sanctions were effective and did exert economic pressure. But the greatest difficulties for the Smith regime came from within the country itself, or more accurately from across its borders as the Zimbabwe African Liberation Army (ZANLA), the military wing of Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), based itself firstly in Zambia and then in Mozambique as black opposition became organised and increasingly militant.
ZANLA, first formed in 1963, and secretly trained in China, announced the arrival of the armed struggle and launched the Second Chimurenga at the Battle of Chinhoyi in April,
1966. However at that time black opposition was not united (Caute, 1983).
The UDI not only locked Rhodesia’s blacks into an essentially apartheid system, it also sparked a fierce battle for the cultural and political soul of the nation with the two main
65 parties of black resistance. From bases in Zambia and Mozambique, Joshua Nkomo’s
Zimbabwe African Peoples Union (ZAPU) and Robert Mugabe’s ZANU respectively, mounted a guerrilla war against Rhodesia’s security forces, farms and infrastructure
(Moorcraft, 1990).
Twelve years of sanctions and increasingly bloody internal warfare seriously weakened
Smith’s Government and after an ill-judged arrangement with Bishop Muzorewa and other
African bishops which led to the short lived Muzorewa Government, Prime Minister Smith renounced UDI and accepted the Lancaster House Agreement in late 1979. Under the supervision of the British Government, represented by Lord Soames, a rapid transition to
African majority rule was undertaken. In 1980 ZANU-PF secured a majority in the pre independence elections and Robert Mugabe was elected Prime Minister. On 17th April 1980
Zimbabwe became independent and gratefully gave up its status as the last colony in Africa
(Caute, 1983; Martin & Johnson, 1981; Needham, et al., 1984).
Having presented the socio-political environment that Marechera was born into, a biographical overview of his life and work will follow. It is divided into the different life stages from his birth in 1952 to his death in 1987.
4.3. The family and childhood.
The roots of the writer, poet and novelist lie in the overcrowded township of Vengere,
Rusape about 170 kilometres east of Harare, Zimbabwe, where he spent his childhood and youth. Marechera was born on 4 June 1952 at Rusape Hospital. He was the third child of
Isaac and Musvotwa Venezia (nee Nyamaropa). The family lived in a ghetto, a so called location for blacks attached to the small town of Rusape. His father was an alcoholic and unskilled worker who worked in the early 1960s for a groundnut factory as an assistant truck driver. His mother worked as a house maid and then for a longer period as a nanny at a crèche for white children (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit Wild, 2004).
66
He was born into a family of nine children, four boys and five girls, born between 1948 and 1964. The family of eleven lived in poverty in a small, overcrowded house in Vengere.
Marechera was a quiet and withdrawn child. While in primary school he was a boy scout. He developed a passion for reading from a very early age. He escaped into the world of books to shut himself from the poverty and violence around him. “I acquired the ability to simply go on reading even while my father and mother were fighting, or while someone was being mugged just outside the house. I would simply just concentrate, knowing very well about the horrifying circumstances around me. A total escapism!” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 114).
Instead of playing sport with other children in the township, he would read or play in a little house made of cardboard boxes they called ‘office’ with his friends, the twins
Washington and Wattington Makombe. “They were the Chairman and General Manager. I was the office boy” (Marechera, 2009, p. 5). It had an old typewriter which they had picked from the junk heap, and books- from comic strips to novels. They collected books from the rubbish dump on the other side of the town where white people lived.
I searched around the rubbish with other kids, looking for comics, magazines, books, broken toys, anything that could help us kids pass time in the ghetto. But for me it was the reading materials that was important……my most prized possession was a tattered Arthur Mee’s Children Encyclopaedia (Marechera, 2009, p. 5).
Marechera was exceptionally intelligent and his mother had to send him to school at the age of five and half in January 1958. His excellent performance was not diminished by the strong stammer which he developed as a little boy which people considered a symptom of intelligence (Fraser, 1989). He spent his first three years at St Mathew’s school, the small mission school in Vengere, and then attended Vengere Primary, a government school
(Chennells & Veit-Wild, 1999).
In a first person-narrator of the story The House of Hunger, Marechera remembers a conflict with his mother when he was nine years old: 67
I remember coming home one day…I was on heat with living. I burst into the room and all at once exploded into my story, telling it restlessly and with expansive gestures, telling it to mother who was staring. A stinging slap… stopped me. I stared up at mother in confusion. She hit me again. ‘How dare you speak in English to me,’ she said crossly. ‘You know I don’t understand it, and if you think because you’re educated …’ She hit me again. ‘I’m not speaking in Eng-’ I began, but stopped as I suddenly realised that I was talking to her in English.
I rushed out of the room and sat down heavily on a rock in the garden. I was trying not to cry. I jumped up and rushed back into the room, and dragging my box from under the bed took out my English exercise-books and began to tear them up with a childish violence. Mother watched me in silence. When I had finished she took out my food and set it before me. I pushed it away (Marechera, 2009, p. 29).
Michael (his older brother) and Marechera obtained places at one of the most prestigious secondary schools for blacks at that time; St Augustine’s Mission in Penhalonga. It was run by the Anglican Community of the Resurrection. He was a boarder from 1966 to 1971, completing form one to six and his ‘A’ levels (Form one is the first year of secondary school according to the British style, and form six is the final year of secondary school). Because of good results in his junior certificate (after Form two), he was awarded the Alfred Beit scholarship which covered half his fees. The mission paid the rest (Veit-Wild & Schade,
1988).
The most significant event in the writer’s childhood was his father’s death in February
1966. He was hit by a car while walking home at night from the neighbouring town of
Headlands (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006). This accident had a profound impact on the 13 year old Marechera. For several days he refused to speak and invented the story that his father had been killed by ‘the Rhodesian Light Infantry.’ He later reinvented the story that his father was run over by a train:
The old man died beneath the wheels of the twentieth century. There was nothing but stains, bloodstains and fragments of flesh, when the whole length of it was through with eating him. And the same thing is happening to my generation. No, I don’t hate being black. I’m just tired of saying it’s beautiful. No, I don’t hate myself. I’m just tired of people bruising their knuckles on my jaw (Marechera, 2009, p. 60).
68
His mother forced him to look at his father’s body in the mortuary, which caused the young boy great trauma (Veit- Wild, 2004).
After his father’s death, the poor living conditions of the family deteriorated even further.
Their subsequent eviction in 1969 brought more hardship. His mother lost her job at the crèche and she started abusing alcohol and resorted to prostitution to feed her family and secure schooling for her children. From 1969 the family was destitute. For a while they lived in a slum area near Lesapi River on the fringes of the township. The young, sensitive boy felt very ashamed of the predicament of his family. Those who grew up with him noticed how he suffered, how his behaviour changed. He withdrew more and more into the world of books and learning (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006).
It was at this time, at thirteen years of age, that Marechera began the habit of packing his things and leaving. Mostly he was escaping the shame of his family, the poverty, the chaos, the pain- The House of Hunger. He was always leaving the ‘houses of hunger’, seeking the sun, in most instances, the sun would turn out to be school, scholarship. As he honestly says it in the opening lines of The House of Hunger, “I got my things and left. The sun was coming up. I couldn’t think where to go” (Marechera, 2009, p. 11). Apart from being one of the most interesting opening lines in African fiction, it is a fair summary of the writer’s life.
4.4. The ‘Wretched’ youth (Veit-Wild, 2004).
4.4.1. St Augustine Mission. Many of Zimbabwe’s leading intellectuals and politicians attended St Augustine’s Mission. It was the first mission school to enrol blacks in the country and was always one of the most prestigious. To attend secondary school it was a rare privilege for blacks during Marechera’s time. The lucky few who managed to get a place found themselves under immense emotional strain, as the system was highly selective and competitive. This was heightened by the great expectations of their families. The learners
69 also went through the usual process of acculturation through colonial and Christian education which alienated them from their traditional background (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004).
In 1966 when Marechera started his secondary education, the nationalist movement in
Zimbabwe began the armed struggle for liberation (Caute, 1983; Habila, 2006). Thus he and his fellow learners were mentally colonised by the same system their compatriots were fighting. This conflict and deep anger that elite learners like Marechera felt when they contemplated their limited future were to be important motivators for the writing of their generation. On the other hand, the non-racial attitude of mission educators offered their learners a respite from the racism around them. For Marechera, St Augustine’s Mission was a temporary refuge from the harsh reality of his existence (Pattison, 2001a).
During the first two years at secondary school, he was quite a popular character and he was elected monitor by his classmates. In Form three and four he changed, becoming more withdrawn and slightly eccentric (Fraser, 1988). Catherine Mauchaza, one of his former classmates remembers:
He was very brilliant and almost abstract in his thinking. But towards Form 4, he started having problems with authority. So he fought with Father Williams, one of the Community of the Resurrection fathers (teaching mainly physics but also Old Testament for A level), and called him ‘Napoleon Bonaparte’. When I asked him why he said he would write about it (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 62).
His fellow students were in awe of his intelligence and creative abilities but alienated themselves from him due to his increasingly unsociable and unpredictable behaviour (Fraser,
1988; Habila, 2006).
Marechera’s relationship with his educators was equally contradictory (Veit-Wild, 2004).
He had a close rapport with some teachers who tolerated his moods and fed his insatiable mind with as much knowledge as possible. Some even gave him access to their personal libraries and provided him with books on African and world history as well as literature. With
70 other educators he had fierce arguments. Marechera’s clashes with his educators partly arose from his growing awareness of the political predicament of his country and his dissatisfaction with the colonial teaching syllabus.
It was during his high school days that he developed his creative abilities. Apart from writing he was also seriously involved in painting. His decision to become a writer was made when he read his first book by an African; Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s (1964) Weep Not Child
(Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004). He later read all the African Writers’ Series he could find.
Another important element of Marechera’s literary development at that time was drama.
Mr Pearce (the principal of St Augustine’s Mission at that time) involved him in the production side of plays, mostly on the directing side as his acting was hampered by his stammer. It is during this period that Marechera developed his creative character. The concise profile that Mr Pearce gave of his exceptionally gifted and difficult student in his recommendation for the University of Rhodesia comes very close to observations made by people who knew the writer in the latter stages of life. Mr Pearce wrote:
I tried to be patient with him- and often did not succeed. But even my irritation seemed to be something he understood and felt was appropriate in the circumstances. He was someone you could be brutally frank and open with-and who seemed to bear no long term grudges. But the withdrawn, terrified and angry man with the hunched shoulders is a figure I already recognise (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 67). During his last two years at St Augustine’s Mission, Marechera developed symptoms of what can be described as a psychological disorder. He manifested auditory hallucinations and imagined being persecuted by someone (Fraser, 1988; Marechera, 2009). As he reflected in
The House of Hunger:
There had been four of them; three men in threadbare clothes and the woman of the faded shawl. This happened a few weeks before my sixth form examinations- which I then wrote with the assistance of white tranquillisers and pink triangular pills. At first the three men and the woman followed me about the school saying nothing but just being there…. One day this terrified me that I rushed stark naked out of the showers
71
screaming my head off. Their attacks after that became more mischievous. They began to talk (Marechera, 2009, p. 41-42).
The symptoms of a possible psychological disorder could be attributed to the traumas of his childhood as reflected in his personal interview years later, when he was asked about his life after the death of his father, he said:
What did it mean that father is dead? What did it mean to not have a home? It was the beginning of my physical and mental insecurity. It was terrible. Even speech, language, was deserting me (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 52).
When the auditory hallucinations erupted during his time in secondary school he found expression in an extraordinary way. He became creative on one side, writing poems and doing abstract painting. While on the other side he became unpredictable and somehow acted like a haunted person. It was during those difficulties and disturbed formative years that St
Augustine’s Mission became the only element of stability, a kind of haven for him, which in his later life he would never find again (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006).
4.4.2. University of Rhodesia. Marechera registered as a first year student for the BA
English course at the University of Rhodesia in March 1972 at the age of 20. When he began his first year, the University of Rhodesia comprised 510 white, 407 black and 68 Asian full time students. The University of Rhodesian was seen as a multiracial institution which it was not. Permanent fights were going on between white and black students. The atmosphere was highly political and the concept of multiracialism on campus had become a façade
(Marechera, 1978; Veit- Wild, 2004). For students from mission schools like St Augustine’s
Mission, which taught interracial harmony, this came as a severe shock. It also radicalised their views. Their anger was also fed by the uncertainty of their future given that Zimbabwe was going through a civil war.
72
His experience with the police while at the University of Rhodesia was a gloomy one and he chronicles one of the brutal interrogations by the Rhodesian police before fleeing to
England:
‘Another one of them, Sergeant.’ ‘Communist.’ A little blood trickled down from my wrists. ‘Terrorist, huh?’ ‘Says he’s is at the University.’ ‘Ach!’
And then up and down into and out of corridors and, I don’t know, deep down or high up into a small room. There was only a bench in it. And with the questions and questions and questions and the blows, the bench began to grow and grow with my life and my bruises, with my breath and the stains of my blood (Marechera, 2009, p. 72).
4.4.2.1. Marechera at Manfred Hadson hall. During his time at the University of
Rhodesia Marechera stayed at Manfred Hadson Hall, a residence for black and white male students. He received a grant from the Beit Trust with which he was financially well off compared to other students. The warden was Alfred Knottenbelt, popularly known as Knotty.
He was famous for his prominent role in African education, his humour, understanding and common sense. Even the warden found Marechera hard to cope with, but he helped him whenever necessary and remembered him with a mixture of horror and affection. In a memorandum to the head of the English Department, Mr Knottenbelt wrote:
This wretched youth continues to infuriate all of us in the Hall, and one day very soon tempers will break. Would you do me a favour of saying what his academic work is like? He appears to be wandering round most of the day when he is not drinking at the S.U. (Student Union) or elsewhere. It may be that he is very fast reader and I believe he is highly intelligent, so possibly greater severity in assignments than is usual might keep him more innocently occupied! (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 109).
4.4.2.2. The political individualist. Politically, Marechera was outspoken. Although he involved himself in student activities he always remained an individualist and did not fit into any political grouping. He was involved in a one-man protest march in the city centre on 11
July 1972. He was arrested on charges under the Law and Order (Maintenance) Act and held in custody until the next day when he was released after the prosecutor declined to prosecute
73
(Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004). Marechera was very much a radical left and did not want to compromise. Socially, he moved across the colour line and mixed easily with whites. He had friends among those white students of the time who were politically liberal; they lived in communes, smoked dope and listened to Jimi Hendrix (Marechera, 2009; Fraser, 1988).
In 1972 Zimbabwe, other than South Africa, was the only African country not yet independent. The white minority government, under Ian Smith, had unilaterally declared
Rhodesia a republic and independent of British rule. Unjust laws, segregation, arbitrary arrests, and other repressive measures were used to keep the black population under control.
Marechera’s distrust of power would from that moment begin to grow, leading to numerous brushes with the law in Britain (Habila, 2006; Needham, et al., 1984).
After independence he would distrust and criticize the new black leaders as much as he had distrusted the white minority rulers. He said; “the very thought that someone has got enough power to organise thousands of people’s lives, whether he makes a mistake or not, really horrifies me” (Marechera, 1984, p. 4). His distrust of power would lead him to embrace the ideas of the American beat music generation and to begin to study anarchist literature seriously; it became the main theme of his second book, Black Sunlight (Chennells & Viet-
Wild 1999; Habila, 2006; Marechera, 1980).
4.4.2.3. Marechera’s academic performance. There were 18 students in his BA English class, half of them blacks. When he went to university he was already exceptionally widely read and had an intense interest in literature. The syllabus and general class work, however, did not correspond with his very personal and spontaneous approach to literature. His fellow black students’ interest in the emerging African literature and in political matters was not at all covered by the university course. Hence, Marechera produced some brilliant work in class but on the whole tended to attend lectures and seminars irregularly and failed to hand in the
74 required papers. He passed the first year examination with a third class pass only. Despite this
‘shameful result’ Marechera’s lecturers regarded him as the most outstanding black student they had ever had (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
The focus of the students in the English Department was mainly on European writers from the 20th century who depicted the individual struggle in the modern society against forces of their control (for example, Joseph Conrad, D.H. Lawrence, Graham Greene and T.S. Eliot).
This manifested itself in some of their own writing attempts through the Creative Writers’
Club that was run by the English Department. Several future Zimbabwean writers participated in that initiative contributing short stories and poems, Marechera was among them (Chennells & Viet- Wild 1999; Habila, 2006).
Marechera’s poetry at that time was influenced by poets like Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot as was later commented by his former classmate Kizito Muchemwa, in the editorial section of a literary magazine called Two Tone published in June 1976:
The intensity, the apocalyptic images, the incantatory rhythms, the eclectic sensibility of Charles Marechera’s poetry echo Blake, Ezra Pound, the poets of the ‘40s. Marechera manages to make the borrowings his own but creative imitation has its evident fault- obscurity. Without this obscurity- the images and the symbols never defined in the context of the poem- his poetry promises a new beginning: a Rhodesian Christopher Okigbo in making (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 121).
Marechera later left the writer’s club at the English Department and set up his own writing club at Manfred Hadson Hall with Stanely Nyamfukudza and Danisa Mhlanga (Fraser, 1988).
4.4.2.4. Expulsion from university. The military struggle of the Zimbabwean liberation armies reached a decisive stage in early 1973. This resulted in the Rhodesian state being deeply divided, hostility among races and fear about the future of the country had reached a precarious stage. In April 1973 the government and the white right wing camp launched claims that for years taxpayer’s money had been used to subsidise not only the filth and
75 subversion at the African dominated University but wide spread theft of funds in student organisations. They claimed that it had become a breeding place for theft, filth and subversive politics (Needham, et al., 1984; Pattison, 2001b; Veit-Wild, 2004).
On 26 July 1973, parliament debated the establishment of a separate second university for blacks. The Rhodesian Front MP Denis Fawcett-Phillips argued that many of the African students were unable to live up to the ‘standards’ of civilisation required at the University of
Rhodesia (Habila, 2006). On 27 July 1973, Marechera aged 21 led university students on a counter protest staged outside the parliament building. Afterwards about 200 students gathered for a peaceful sit-in at the Administration Block of the University. They demanded an end to racial discrimination on campus and that 50 percent of all administrative and teaching posts be filled by Africans (Fraser, 1988; Pattison, 2001b).
Professor Robert Craig, a former professor of theology who was the university principal at that time was anxious about any direct confrontation with the rebellious students and agreed to address the black students on Wednesday, 1 August 1973. The students were not satisfied by Professor Craig’s responses and they started to prepare for action. On Friday 3 August
1973, a crowd of about 150 students conducted the famous ‘pots-and-pans demonstration.’
They gathered all tea equipment throughout the campus and prevented the residence catering staff from cooking meals. Marechera played a leading role in the demonstration (Pattison,
2001a; Veit-Wild, 2004).
Disciplinary proceedings were immediately started against 23 students who allegedly had participated in the action; nine cases were soon withdrawn and the remaining 14 appeared before the disciplinary committee of the university, among them Marechera. The next day six were dismissed, four suspended for the rest of the year, four fined $50 each and all 14 were to
76 share the cost of the damage. The six expelled included Marechera (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild,
2004; Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
After his expulsion Marechera went into hiding because he feared being arrested. By the end of August he found himself back at St Augustine’s Mission where he stayed with Father
Pearce before going back to his family in the Vengere Township in September 1973.
Although he appealed against his expulsion, the University Council raised concern over his mental health. The Council suggested that Marechera needed psychiatric treatment
(Chennells & Viet- Wild 1999; Fraser, 1988).
Back at home with nothing to do, he applied for the Oxford Common Room Scholarship through the World University Service with the assistance of Knottenbelt. To back his scholarship application, three lecturers from the English Department wrote very supportive testimonials which illustrated the future of the writer’s extraordinary academic and creative profile despite poor grades in his first year. One of his lecturers, Anthony Chennells wrote:
He is a sensitive critic whose sensitivity towards literature is controlled by rigorous powers of evaluation. He has an original mind that occasionally tempts him into ingenuousness but this will certainly be modified as he becomes more mature. As it is even his most novel ideas are carefully evidenced and argued. He has read a great deal more than most of our students black or white and is also a poet of considerable promise…. I can think of no student here, who on academic grounds alone so merits the attention of your committee. His personal circumstances serve to make his claim even stronger (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 146).
On 2 October 1974, Knottenbelt saw him off the Salisbury airport (now Harare
International Airport). He had been awarded the Common Room scholarship to continue his studies at New College, Oxford University, United Kingdom. In his short story, Thought
Tracks in the Snow, Marechera would later recreate his departure from Rhodesia:
As the plane burred into the night, leaving the Angolan coast and heading out into the void across the Atlantic, I suddenly remembered that I had, in the rude hurry of it all, left my spectacles behind. I was coming to England literally blind. . . I was on my
77
own, sipping a whisky, and my head was roaring with a strange emptiness. What was it really that I had left behind me. . . I think I knew then that before me were years of desperate loneliness, and the whisky would be followed by other whiskies, other self- destructive poisons: I had nothing but books inside my head, and they were burning me, burring with the engines of hope and illusion into the endless expanse of air (Marechera, 1978, p. 143).
4.5. Oxford University
4.5.1. New College. On 3 October 1974 Iris Hayter, wife of Sir William Hayter, warden of
New College, Oxford University, United Kingdom, answered a call from Heathrow Airport informing her of the arrival of a young man from Rhodesia. The young man had neither money nor personal belongings but he said he has a place at New College. The ‘young
Rhodesian’ was Charles Dambudzo Marechera. After the expulsion from University of
Rhodesia, twenty black Zimbabwean students were selected on the basis of academic potential to go to Oxford funded by the Common Room Scholarship and Marechera was one of them (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a).
At the age of 22 Marechera left behind the tear gas fumes and police dogs of the Rhodesia university campus after just one and half years, the degrading conditions of township life and a war-torn country, he resumed his studies of English literature at the University of Oxford.
He took up residence at New College in the first academic term and was expelled during his second year, in March 1976 (Marechera, 2009; Fraser, 1988). During his stay at Oxford, Sir
William Hayter and his wife cared for the Zimbabwean students with as much understanding, humour and common sense as his previous warden at the University of Rhodesia. As
Marechera had hardly any belongings, Iris Hayter lent him things and took him shopping
(Pattison, 2001a; Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
Uncompromising as ever, Marachera rebelled and subverted the college rules and routine.
Lady Hayter’s diary continually recorded problems with Marechera; he was ‘nocturnal’
78 clashed violently with college domestic staff and generally felt isolated. She was quoted saying:
He physically assaulted an elderly college servant who dared to draw his attention to an infringement of college rules. Such incidents with the college servants were all based on the assumptions that they had been behaving in a racist manner to him (Veit- Wild, 2004, p 154).
Marechera’s anxieties in the college environment had several causes, which accumulatively, led to outbursts of rudeness. Although there was hardly any open racism, he resented the implicit racism, real or imagined, that black students at Oxford encountered. This resulted in his frequent brushes with the college domestic staff (Pattison, 2001b; Shaw, 2006).
Another reason for Marechera’s rudeness to college staff was the uneasiness about his new social position. For the first time in his life he had domestic servants, but these servants were white. In an interview with Alle Lansu on his experience at Oxford University he said, “....for the first time at Oxford I had a white servant. She had to come every day to my house, sweep up everything, clean my empty bottles, clean up everything” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 24). When they tried to tell him how to behave, there was mutual resentment. He also resented the disparity between himself and most of the white students:
I was shocked at the casual attitude to education and life. One of my fellow students was a Lord at only 18 years. Money to him meant nothing at all. What he took for granted to me was expensive. I was confronted with people who saw knowledge as merely an appendage of social success (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 154).
In addition to problems with personal discipline, the college authorities complained about
Marechera’s refusal to comply with his scholarly duties. Marechera detested what he saw as the dryness, arrogance and hypocrisy of Oxford academic life (Marechera, 1978; Pattison,
2001a). He read vicariously, extended his knowledge of world literature, devoured all African writing and political texts, which were now freely available, and delved into new theories of psychoanalysis, and linguistic and literary structuralism. But he soon began to neglect
79 compulsory studies. Owen Kibel, a white student from Rhodesia and Marechera’s friend at
New College, also remembers him as a writer in the making, whose personality contrasted dramatically with the traditional environment of an English college (Veit-Wild, 2004; Veit-
Wild & Schade, 1988).
Marechera saw himself at Oxford University as the black underdog fed from the hands of white academia. The Common Room Scholarship was an initiative by white students at
Oxford University to fund black students from Africa who had academic potential. He withheld obedience and his revolt against the college rules sprang from a sense of inferiority and isolation; anger and self-doubt. He wanted to achieve something but at the same time resented depending on the goodwill of others. Such inner conflict resulted in him causing increasing havoc until he finally earned the name ‘outsider’ (Gaylard, 1999; Veit-Wild,
2004).
4.5.1.1. Expulsion from Oxford. Two myths surround Marechera’s eventual expulsion from New College. One is that he set fire to the college; the other, which he personally maintained was that, given a choice between accepting psychiatric treatment and leaving the college he chose to leave: “I had to invite them to expel me” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 159).
Marechera’s stay at New College consisted of a series of clashes; he continually overspent his scholarship, borrowed money and accumulated debts. He disturbed college life through frequent bouts of drunkard rude behaviour. The final major crisis occurred in early 1976 when he assaulted students and members of the domestic staff, threatening to murder them and set the college on fire (he started one small fire); he was arrested and fined by the police for being drunk and disorderly (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001b; Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
While the fire myth corresponded with the popular image of the outrageous rebel-poet,
Marechera in fact only threatened to burn the college down and started a small fire. Although
80 a link between psychiatric treatment and his expulsion existed; this differed in detail from his future description and interpretation (Buuck, 1997; Crehan, 1994; Pattison, 1994). The underlying contradiction forms a typical pattern of his life. Marechera often embellished and re-invented his own biography both within his work and within the subsequent construction of the ‘Marechera myth.’ It was adequately summarised by Crehan (1994) when he said:
One should perhaps bear in mind that a key principle of Marecherian aesthetics is to blur fact and fiction and to fuse emotion and reality through techniques of distortion and dislocation.... The biographical facts do not really illuminate the writing because Marechera was such a self-conscious and, for all his self-invention such an honest writer, that setting the ‘facts’ against his heavily autobiographical fiction is rather like throwing a cup of water on a bonfire (p. 198).
On one hand Marechera desperately wanted to stay at Oxford and on the other hand, the insinuation that he was mentally ill was an enormous insult and contradicted his view that it was the Oxford environment rather than himself that was ‘insane.’ Thus he had to maintain the simplified version; that his refusal to accept psychiatric care led to his expulsion:
I very much resented the implied accusation from Oxford of insanity. They demanded that I either sign myself voluntarily into their psychiatric hospital or I would be sent down. That choice really freaked me out. I had to invite them to expel me (Marechera, 2009, p. 2). 4.5.2. Writing and acceptance of The House of Hunger. With his expulsion from
Oxford in March 1976 Marechera’s life as a homeless wanderer began. His early experiences in the ghetto, the struggle to survive, and the abuse by white students at the University of
Rhodesia, established the nihilistic basis for his fiction writing. His first major published work at the age of 26, The House of Hunger (Marechera, 1978) emanated from this crisis:
With, The House of Hunger, my initial impulse was simply one of utter despair. Well, I felt that I had lost everything. There I was in exile, seemingly no future, no nothing. I started asking myself what had happened to my generation. A kind of lost generation feeling (Veit-Wild, 2004 p. 177). After Heinemann’s acceptance of The House of Hunger, Marechera moved to London. He stayed there from September 1977 until his return to Zimbabwe in February 1982, with brief
81 interludes in Wales, Sheffield and West Berlin. After he signed the publishing contract for
The House of Hunger, Marechera hitch-hiked to Cardiff, Wales. He was arrested on charges of theft, possession of cannabis and overstaying his visa and was jailed for three months
(Habila, 2006; Fraser, 1988).
James Currey, the publisher at Heinemann African Writers Series had to come to
Marechera’s rescue by getting him a solicitor to oppose his deportation. Currey then facilitated him to go to the University of Sheffield as a way of improving his living condition.
Marechera arrived in Sheffield in February 1978 as a writer in residence. In April 1978 he was asked to leave University of Sheffield and headed back to London. The Sheffield residential secretary G. Lawrence wrote to Currey on 10 April 1978; “I am sorry to advise you that Mr Marechera was requested to leave the hostel last Sunday because of his disorderly behaviour. I understand he deliberately broke a glass panel in front of our notice board and set off a fire extinguisher at the night watchman” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 226).
Reverend R. D. de Berry a vicar in Sheffield also wrote to Currey:
It seems to be almost impossible to help Mr Marechera, but that he is in need of help, there is no doubt about it at all...... I doubt if Mr Marechera will be alive for very much longer- he hardly eats and only drinks. Despite his dissipated way of life, he has an attractive shrewd side to him. I can’t say I enjoyed The House of Hunger but part of it stands out like jewels; it’s so obviously so much his own tortured autobiography (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 227).
In June 1979 Marechera aged 27 was invited to participate in the Berlin International
Literature Days from 23 June to 1 July. This was the first time the young writer had been exposed to an international audience outside Britain. His fame was established through his spectacular arrival, rumours had spread that he had been detained by the police, since he did not have valid travel documents. He was held for a few hours. He later arrived at the conference venue accompanied by Currey and gave an impressive, impassioned reading from
82
The House of Hunger for which he got a standing ovation (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001b).
After the reading he was given the opportunity to address a press conference on his difficulties on arrival in West Berlin. He used the incident to establish himself as a politically persecuted guerrilla writer, “I am a communist Party member in England. I support Robert
Mugabe. I know that anytime I am back in Zimbabwe, even under Muzorewa, I will be arrested” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 227).
At the conference, The House of Hunger was awarded the Guardian fiction prize. The prize giving ceremony was held at the Theatre Royal in West Berlin. During the event his alcohol abuse reached its peak as he displayed his gratitude by tossing saucers at the chandeliers and a chair across the room, apparently aimed at the literary editor of an African newspaper (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a; Veit-Wild, 2004)
The House of Hunger, a vividly written autobiographical work focused primarily on a black township, dealing with roving characters struggling against poverty, abuse and oppression (Habila, 2006; Marechera, 1978). Turning his back on the traditions of realism,
Marechera sought to express subjective visions with fragmented language, without linear or chronological order. In Zimbabwe, his style was labelled as ‘alien to Africa’ (Pattison, 2001a;
Toivanen, 2011).
While in London brushes with the police due to his rowdy behaviour, drunkenness, not holding a valid visa, detentions and imprisonment intensified his anger and resentment. But he also had bursts of literary creativity, especially during his first two years writing poems and short stories for the West Africa publication and the Sunday Times, as a freelancer. His life in the fringe community of the London informal settlement and his visit to West Berlin for the conference internationalised his outlook. He developed an interest in the African urban guerrilla movement of the late 1970s and defined his stance as an intellectual anarchist.
83
He wrote articles, stories and reviews, and received writing grants from the British Arts
Council. His work of this period reflects anger and frustration but also moves from the autobiographical into literary and philosophical discourse (Pattison, 1994; Shaw, 2006).
4.6. Independent Zimbabwe
4.6.1. The Black Sunlight. In 1980 Marechera wrote Black Sunlight, which was initially banned in Zimbabwe by the censorship board for obscenity and blasphemy. However, the ban was lifted after an appeal by the Zimbabwe Writers Association (Veit-Wild, 2004).
Marechera’s surrealistic, unstructured, radical book drew parallels between the political transformation in Zimbabwe and the transformation of the self. His analysis of the independence process was satirical: his characters eventually are destroyed in their fight
(Buuck, 1997; Marechera, 1980).
The novel is about a photojournalist named Christian whose life very nearly mirrors that of the book’s author. Each chapter is a segment of Christian’s life and some of these chapters coincide with others, while others are completely separate from the narrative (Marechera,
1980). Explaining once the absence of chronological order in his works, Marechera said that history is rather “a psychological condition in which our senses are constantly bombarded by unresolved or provisional images” (Viet-Wild, 2004, p. 52).
Marechera discusses in many different ways questions of reality, of man’s capacity to perceive reality, of illusion and delusion, and of the task of the artist in relation to all these.
His doppelganger says to the photographer:
Day to day reality is therefore itself any illusion created by the mass of our needs, our ideas, our wants. Transform the needs, the ideas, the wants, and at once, as though with a magic wand, you transform the available reality. To write as though only one kind of reality subsists in the world is to act out a mentally retarded mime, for a mentally deficient audience. If I am an illusion, then that is a delusion that is very real indeed (Marechera, 1980, p. 68).
84
The understanding of Black Sunlight can be enhanced by reading about Marechera’s personal life. He appeared to be an anarchist, opportunistic and quarrelsome as his character
Christian. Both author and character attended Oxford, had a miserable experience there, and became members of political groups that were in revolt against the government (Buuck,
1997). Marechera adhered to the adage ‘write what you know;’ the depiction of Christian’s life mirrors Marechera’s, and while it is creative in its format, the novel does not create a story outside Marechera’s experiences.
4.6.2. The return to Harare. In February 1982 Marechera aged 30 now dreadlocked, returned to Zimbabwe after eight years in exile. He had spent the last two rootless years in
London, hanging out with Rastafarians, sometimes living on the streets, and writing. His return was in order to take part in a television film based on The House of Hunger. After a quarrel with the film’s director, he stayed on. Impulsively he decided that the director, Chris
Austin, a white South African, was being neo-colonial and exploitative in his dealings with the black crew members. Marechera was kicked out of the plush hotel that the television company had booked him into. He soon became known as a relentless and outspoken critic of post-colonial politics and society (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a; Veit-Wild, 2004). His third published book, Mindblast (Marechera, 1984), became the manifesto of his satiric indictment.
Mindblast is a collection of three plays, a prose narrative, a collection of poems, and a park-bench diary. In a more accessible style than his first two books, Marechera describes with humour, intelligence and vivid imagery his view of the newly-independent state of
Zimbabwe: the materialism, the political intolerance, the stupidity and corruption, the socialist slogans, how a few become rich while the masses become poorer. At the same time, the Marechera’s own existence as an artist preys on his mind, full of hate, self-pitying or ironic; he was out of place, made to feel like an outsider, misunderstood, despised, taken for a mentally ill person (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001b; Chennells & Veit-Wild, 1999). 85
In Mindblast he describes how various artists from the generation of those who were greatly influenced by the stormy years of the revolt of the intellectuals in Europe, now, back in Africa, are neither understood nor accepted. However, Marechera does not limit himself to a one-sided indictment of post-colonial society, but, in the tragicomic death of the poet who collapses in the toilet of a bar in a pool of blood and alcohol, questions his own existence as an artist. The external collapse is preceded by an inner breakdown: the sudden realisation that his poems are characterless, shallow and useless (Habila, 2006; Marechera, 1984; Pattison,
2001b).
Although his writing and personality were a great inspiration for younger Zimbabweans, particularly university students, he felt alienated in independent Zimbabwe. Homeless in his country, a myth that he was cursed developed around his unconventional life style and eccentric behaviour. Brushes with government authorities confirmed his role as the persecuted rebel. Publishing institutions such as The Zimbabwe Publishing House and the
Mambo Press largely ignored him and he never felt recognised as a writer (Pattison, 2001a;
Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
After two years of homelessness, he found a small flat near the city centre. For about eight months in 1984 he was a part time educator at a private study centre. Apart from that, he had no income other than his meagre royalties and fees for very few book reviews. He depended on friends for survival. Though he continued to write during the last years of his life, he did not have the inspiration and energy to write a book of the expressive scope, clarity and strength of his previous writings. He died on 18 August 1987 after developing HIV/Aids related pneumonia. He left behind a number of unpublished manuscripts (Fraser, 1988; Veit-
Wild, 2004).
86
4.6.3. Marechera’s social life. Marechera was always packing his things and leaving; not that he had many things to pack (a typewriter and a few books). He spent his final years with friends, often drunk, sleeping on the floors in their houses and wandering on the streets homeless in Harare. The family, the community, the nation, and the state each ‘house’ a particular definition of who he was and the type of life he tried to live. In his writing he explores each different arena, and in the process experiences a sense of disillusionment with their inadequacy to represent him. His horizon begins to shrink, pointing back to himself as a centre and bringing the realisation that his experience defines his self. As he reflect, “My whole life has been an attempt to make myself a skeleton in my own cupboard” (Marechera,
2009, p. 3).
Although Marechera had a creative way of distorting reality, it is less interesting than identifying the order in which creative imagination of his social life was established. For example, if his father’s death was recalled as a rite of passage, it was because for any black person in Rhodesia the onset of manhood coincided with dawning political awareness. If
Marechera, for several days after his father’s death refused to speak, it was because faced with the unspeakable he refused to open his mouth. Having done so, he discovered that he was no longer free to talk. In this analysis Marechera’s stammer can be considered as the
‘half- silenced’ voice of the colonised person (Buuck, 1997; Viet-Wild, 2004).
Marechera’s alcohol abuse certainly began when he went to Oxford, an affair that was to reach its depth of lack of self-control and disinhibtion at the Guardian fiction prize ceremony where he shattered the face of the genteel British publishing establishment by hurling plates and wine bottles at the chandeliers. Alcohol became a way of suppressing the alienation and the loneliness. He would miss classes, sleep all day, and go out to the pubs at night to get drunk, more often than not ending up in fights (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001b).
87
During his time at Oxford he carried too much baggage, was too sensitive, too uncompromising to really fit into British society, or to lie low like other African students did, focusing on their studies and counting the days until they returned to their countries. He was also temperamentally unfitted for student life; his approach to literature and to learning was too personal, too subjective for the university curriculum that encouraged a more uniform and disciplined approach (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a; Chennells & Veit-Wild, 1999). After just two years at Oxford, when his alcohol abuse had become too riotous to ignore, he was expelled (Veit-Wild, 2004).
4.6.4. Love life. Marechera’s love life was controversial as clearly testified by his writing in The House of Hunger. There is little to suggest that he had a serious relationship. He never married but only had escapades with the prostitutes he wrote about in the novel. What is known is that he had a two week stint with a Germany prostitute he met when he went to the
West Berlin conference. He then met Flora Veit-Wild in Harare in 1983 (Marechera, 1978;
Veit-Wild, 2004; 2012). Ironically, all his relationships involved white women. He narrates in
The House of Hunger, that while at the University of Rhodesia he was brutally assaulted together with his white girlfriend by racist gangs;
One of the gang’s had come up and was staring with venom at her. He began to curse: ‘You bitch. Kaffir-lover. Kafferboetie. You cunt. You…’
I got up slowly.
He swung: ‘And you-!’
I ducked beneath the wild blow, grabbed his head from behind and, straightening abruptly, butted him making his jaws crack. Behind the other gangs were massing up looking ugly. I hurled her up on to her feet: ‘Run!’
Punched another down and followed her.
They were after us in an instant. We did not stand a chance, she and I; no one would intervene to try to help us because she and I had dared to flaunt our horns and hooves to our respective racial groups (Marechera, 2009, p. 90).
88
Marechera was 31 when he first met Flora Veit-Wild in 1983. She was 36. In the most candid article she has ever written about her relationship with Marechera, Veit-Wild - known worldwide as the foremost authority on Marechera and his works - narrates how she met
Marechera in Charles Mungoshi’s Zimbabwe Publishing House office and was immediately struck by his confidence and British accent (Veit-Wild, 2012). She goes on to write about the various meetings she had with the temperamental writer after that. Tumbling about on the grass next to the University of Zimbabwe swimming pool, spending her first night of passion together with Marechera at the 7 Miles Motel, booking a room with him at seedy city hotels and a three-day outing with him at Lake Mcllwaine (now Lake Chivero) are some of the revelations that Veit-Wild makes in her article titled Dambudzo and Me (Veit-Wild, 2012).
Her romantic affair with Marechera lasted 18 months. Several of these 18 months saw him housed in Veit-Wild’s family home, living with her, her husband and her two children.
Marechera moved into the Veit-Wild house after a few weeks into his relationship with
Flora. According to her, she felt bad leaving him on the streets after having had sex in the car or at a friend’s place. Her husband agreed to let him stay for a while as he recognized his extraordinary literary style, with the hope of stabilizing him and getting him off the streets completely. This failed as Marechera refused any attempts to get psychiatric help, stop alcohol abuse or establish a healthier lifestyle as he was afraid of losing his distinct personality which was a source of his art (Veit-Wild, 2012).
4.7. Marechera’s life after death.
4.7.1. The Marechera cult perception. After Marechera’s death due to HIV/Aids in 1987 a ‘Marechera cult’ developed with university students beginning to grow dreadlocks. They started drinking and smoking and interestingly some of them begun to write their own poems and short stories for the first time (Toivanen, 2011). ‘Budding writers’ flooded the Dambudzo
Marechera Trust with eulogies of their hero and imitation of his poetry. Marechera songs
89 were composed and t-shirts were printed and worn. Unfortunately, some of the university students begun to be ‘antisocial;’ not meeting assignment deadlines, not attending classes on time and not taking down notes when in class. They were doing this so that they keep within the ‘Marechera tradition.’ They began to think that each one of them is a little Marechera
(Pattison, 2001a; Veit-Wild, 2004).
His greatest and most immediate impact was on the young generation of Zimbabweans, those who had been to school and university in the 1980s, the children of independence, the
‘Mindblast generation’ (Pattison, 2001a). With the legacies of the nationalist era, rebellious against tradition, suspicious of the promises of the new black rulers, they were eager to identify with Marechera’s iconoclastic behaviour. During his last years in Harare, university students and other young Zimbabweans had greatly admired him; after his death an authentic
Marechera cult sprang up (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004).
Marechera’s contribution to African literature is often underrated for many reasons, one being the sheer impenetrability of his prose style. He was nothing like any African writer before him. Up until the time he appeared, leading writers like Chinua Achebe, Ngugi wa
Thiong’o and Ayi Kwei Armah had written in an accessible, social realist mode. Most of the writers that came immediately after them adopted the same style. This was not only because of the earlier writers’ influence, but also because of the effectiveness of that very accessible style in presenting the anti-colonial, nationalist themes that had become the predominant concern of early post-colonial African fiction (Habila, 2006). He defended himself by saying:
I think that I am the doppelganger whom, until I appeared, African literature had not yet met. And in this sense I would question anyone calling me an African writer. Either you are a writer or you are not. If you write for a specific nation or a specific race, then f--- you. (Buuck, 1997; p. 121).
Marechera, heavily influenced by the European modernists, departed emphatically from the tradition, choosing the rather self-reflective, technically ostentatious stream-of- 90 consciousness mode (Fraser, 1988; Pattison, 2001b). This led him to being perceived as a cult figure as his legacy is always celebrated and commemorated publicly and there has been talk of a ‘Marechera cult.’
He has inspired several Zimbabwean writers; internet fan sites dedicated to him have been set up; and scholarly undertakings have been initiated to compensate for the wrongs done to his critical reputation (Shaw, 2006). This is because the earlier unwelcoming African critiques were based on ‘mistaken assumptions’ as a result of which Marechera became
‘condemned, marginalized, and censured’ during his lifetime in Zimbabwe (Shaw, 2006; p.
275). Shaw’s choice of words is illustrative of the phenomenon, as it implies that the writer had been subjected to a wrong doing that requires restructuring. It is on the basis of these different celebratory practices, that the notion of ‘cult author’ is applicable to Marechera
(Tiovanen, 2011).
Marechera’s death left a gap in Zimbabwean society. Nobody has been as outspoken as him. After his death people realised that life would definitely be a lot more boring (Habila,
2006). Those who had found it difficult to cope with his provocative personality while he was alive realised whom and what they had lost. Friends, writers, critics and publishers inside and outside Zimbabwe remember, often with a mixture of affection and embarrassment, how
Marechera had challenged their own lives. Marechera’s death was also a loss to African literature. Fellow writers mourned the passing of a creative, rebellious spirit; a voice who undermined every kind of complacency and hypocrisy (Fraser, 1988; Tiovanen, 2011).
4.7.2. Marechera the writer and poet. Marechera was an ‘outsider’ (Gaylard, 1999). He cannot be incorporated in any of the categories into which modern African literature is currently divided. His writings have nothing in common with the various forms of anti- colonial or anti-neo-colonial protest literature. Nor can it be interpreted as being an
91 expression of the identity-crisis suffered by an African exiled in Europe. Marechera refused to identify himself with any particular race, culture or nation. He was an extreme individualist, an anarchistic thinker. He rejected social and state regimentation, be it in colonial Rhodesia, in England, or in independent Zimbabwe. The freedom of the individual was of the utmost importance. He was uncompromising, and that is how he tried to live
(Toivanen, 2010).
Marechera was a man with a reputation. His figure embodied the notion of the rebel artist, who devoted his life to artistic creation, was doomed by misunderstanding during his life, and then, passes away before his time (Shaw, 2006). He is often represented as the enfant terrible
(terrible child) of the Zimbabwean literary scene (Gaylard, 1999). In his works, Marechera explores the psyche of colonised subjects; their marginalisation and the violence to which they are subjected to and which they themselves enact. The post-colonial realities of
Marechera’s work are cruel and overtly disillusioned (Tiovanen, 2010).
Marechera’s writing vision rejected the belief of a better future for Zimbabwe, conveying that colonialism had penetrated all levels of reality in a definite manner (Pattison, 2001b).
Because of his explicit pessimism, Marechera’s work was criticised in Zimbabwe as being apolitical and uncommitted. Over time, the author has been elevated to cult status and the earlier critiques have been condemned as they are seen to have been based on misunderstanding (Shaw, 2006; Toivanen, 2011).
It is important to emphasise the role that the writer’s early death played in the cult phenomenon surrounding him. He is seen as an unclaimed prospect that, due to the difficult socio- political environment that he was living in was unable to prosper (Shaw, 2006). Today,
Marechera is seen to haunt the world of the living in a ghostly manner, which indicates a dejected unwillingness to accept the writer’s loss (Toivanen, 2011).
92
Marechera is now represented as a prophet who saw the Zimbabwean crisis coming. In an interview in 1984 he said; “I am afraid of one-party states, especially where you have more slogans than content in terms of policy and implementation” (Marechera, 2009, p. 8). There is a phenomenon of speculating on what Marechera would say about, for instance, the current
Zimbabwean crisis if he was still alive. Marechera’s memory was marked by an interesting tension between victimhood and heroism, which suggests that the writer’s figure captures the meanings of both the failures and potentials of the Zimbabwean nation (Shaw, 2006;
Toivanen, 2011).
It would seem that Marechera found himself always persecuted, endlessly pursued. With his sensitivity, he could only survive the constant, threatening blows of the social environment through the powerful and magical exorcism of the written word (Shaw, 2006).
This makes his language strikingly immediate and intense, with exceptionally vivid imaginative power. The ‘power’ of his words, always highlighted by critics, cannot be taken quite literally: with the ‘power’ of the word and of the imagination, he sought to counter the manifestation of power (that is violence) which he met in all its forms in his own life, and which he abhorred and feared more than anything else (Pattison, 2001b).
Marechera’s writing career was launched in the Zimbabwean context of anti-colonial struggle and nation building, in the late 1970s and early 1980s. His postmodern writing style together with his disillusioned visions on the future of the independent Zimbabwe made him the traitor of his nation. In his works, he criticised the new rulers for sustaining the colonial legacy and seeking their personal profit while pretending to work for the good of the people
(Marechera, 1984). As a reflection of the role of a writer in a revolution he said “I think writers are usually recruited into revolutionary movements before that revolution gains whatever it’s seeking. Once it has achieved that, writers are simply discarded, either as
93 nuisance or as totally irrelevant” (Marechera, 2009, p. 9). After his early death at 35 years of age, the understanding of the artist as a genius has gained ground (Toivanen, 2011).
African criticism is divided in its judgement of Marechera (Shaw, 2006). It is true that his unique literary talent and his important contribution to the treatment of the Rhodesian past are acknowledged; however, several critics describe his writing as bourgeois, immoral and
Europeanized (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001b, Toivanen, 2011). Shaw saw him as alienated from African tradition, considering his negative, nihilistic visions of the situation in a young
African state embarking on independence to be inappropriate (Shaw, 2006). Others assessing the social reality of post-colonial Africa more realistically and critically, recognize the important (and, indeed, political) function of a writer such as Marechera, who took nothing for granted, but saw it as his task to disturb, to disrupt and to destroy.
4.7.2.1. Psychological influence in Marechera’s writing. Due to the historical features of his time, Marechera’s writing embodies states of mind that seek to come to terms with the extreme aspects of human experience, war, poverty, mental illness, loss and blind human cruelty (Marechera, 1978; 1980; 1984). Marechera seeks to elucidate an underlying psychological reality that comes from direct experience of life’s extremes, rather than taking the political positions of the main political players of his time at face value. Marechera’s writing is heavily influenced by his insights into and awareness of what Carl Jung refers to as the ‘participation mystique’ (Toivanen, 2011).
One of the more subtle themes in Carl Jung’s work is a dialectical exploration of the nature of the psyche in terms of subject-object differentiation. This exploration is weaved throughout his writings but is most clearly brought to light in his writings on participation mystique (Meyer, et al., 2008). Participation mystique refers to the undifferentiated state of awareness that precedes differentiated awareness. Jung said:
94
Participation mystique denotes a peculiar kind of psychological connection with objects, and consists in the fact that the subject cannot clearly distinguish himself from the object but is bound to it by a direct relationship which amounts to partial identity (Jung, 1921; p. 781).
In his essay Psychology and Literature, Carl Jung (1930) claims, “The human psyche is the womb of all the sciences and the arts” (p. 84). Jung maintains that artistic creation has two sides, the psychological side that deals with the experience of conscious life and the visionary side that deals with matters buried in the unconscious mind.
Marechera was obviously aware of the psychological effect of dealing with conscious life, he was also aware of the baggage carried by the collective unconscious. This was made clear by references to ‘the territory enclosed in their skull and feeling’ and ‘the ordinance map of their own madness’ (Marechera, 1990). He was also made aware of the impossibility of escape from the trials of conscious and unconscious violence:
Apart from such ectoparasites as bugs, like fleas, mosquitoes, leeches, and vampire bats ... (which) periodically attack the host to suck the blood, there are endoparasites which actually live permanently in our minds. The latter are known collectively as culture, tradition, history or civilisation (Marechera, 1990, p. 46).
In less colourful language Marechera offers the following from a philosophical debate between several of his characters about individual development: “Heredity supplies the raw material which the influence of the environment moulds into the individual…” and offers the conclusion that “our actions, I suppose are not our fault but that of our genes and environment” (Marechera, 1990, p. 118).
The randomly selective effect of genes and the environment, Jung’s collective un- conscious which is Marechera’s endoparasites, clearly shows that the uninfluenced writer is an impossible dream. Typically, Marechera’s answer is unique: if the person contaminates the writer then the person has to die. ‘The writer is no longer a person: he has to die in order to become a writer (Marechera, 1990, p. 103)
95
4.8. Conclusion
This chapter highlighted the major socio-political events in the life of Marechera, in order to satisfy the aim of the study. Marechera died young and his output regrettably low, with only three publications to his name. But it is the difference in his voice that made him an enduring figure in African literacy history. His writing and life was closely related. The findings and discussion of the personality development using the theory of individual psychology on the life of Marechera are discussed in Chapter 6. The research design and the methodology follow in the next chapter.
96
CHAPTER 5
RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY
5.1. Chapter preview
This research and methodology chapter details the research aim, the psychobiographical subject, the research design and the methodological considerations in psychobiography. Data collection, data analysis and interpretation, elitism and easy genre, inflated expectation, ethical considerations and reflexivity form part of this chapter as a guideline on how the results of the research were obtained.
5.2. The research aim
The primary aim of the research was to explore and describe Marechera’s personality development across his lifespan. The dynamic concepts of Adler’s (1929) individual psychology were used to provide a more comprehensive idiographic interpretation of
Marechera as an individual.
Personality has been defined by several researchers as a relative and elusive construct whose investigative focus varies amongst the theoretical views of the different psychological schools (Meyer, et al., 2008). With this in mind the researcher took an idiographic stance that allows for personality development to be conceptualized developmentally and holistically.
Thus, the aim of the study was not to prove or disprove Marechera’s optimal personality functioning. Rather, the aim was to explore the nature of his holistic personality development throughout the chronological history of his life (McAdams, 2006).
It should further be noted that the aim of the study was not to generalize the research findings to the larger population through statistical generalization. Rather, through the investigation of Marechera’s personality development over time, this study aimed to
97 generalize the results to the theory used, which is known as the construct of analytical generalization (Yin, 2009).
5.3. The research design
The study may be specifically defined as a qualitative single-case psychobiographical study over a lifespan (Stake, 2005). The design serves as a means of inquiry into an individual case through the systematic use of psychological theory to coherently reconstruct and reinterpret a life through an illuminating narrative that contributes to knowledge building
(McAdams, 2006).
Qualitative studies tend to have a peculiar life cycle, one that spreads collection and analysis throughout the study, and calls for different modes of inquiry at different moments
(Huberman & Milles, 1994). The qualitative researcher makes a series of decisions at the beginning, middle and end of the study. It therefore means a qualitative design has an elastic quality, it adapts, changes and is redesigned as the study proceeds. Accordingly the qualitative researcher focuses on description and exploration, and all design decisions ultimately relate to these acts (Creswell, 2011).
Built into qualitative research design is a system of checks and balances that includes staying in a setting over time and capturing and interpreting the meaning in individuals’ lives
(McAdams, 2006). By staying in a setting over time, the researcher has the opportunity to use data triangulation and interdisciplinary triangulation to ensure trustworthiness. This allows for multiple views of framing the problem, selecting research strategies, and extending discourses across several fields of study (Yin, 2009).
A qualitative psychobiographical study can be described as being both exploratory descriptive and descriptive-dialogic in nature (Edwards, 1990). The exploratory-descriptive nature refers to the provision of a rich and accurate description of Marechera’s psychological
98 development over his lifespan so as to provide an in-depth understanding of his individual case within its socio-historical context (Edwards, 1990). By applying the selected psychological concepts to Marechera as a singular case over his entire lifespan, a dialogue will be created between the exploratory-descriptive findings and the theoretical concepts and propositions for analytical generalization (Yin, 2009).
5.4. The psychobiographical subject
Case studies by nature usually focus on gaining an understanding of the uniqueness and eccentricity of a particular case in all its complexity. One rationale behind selecting a particular individual for study is related to the individual’s significance and interest (Elms,
1994). A pilot literature study of Marechera revealed that he was an enigmatic figure whose life story instils anxiety and fascination (Fraser, 1988; Pattison, 2001a; Shaw, 2006; Veit-
Wild, 2004). Although he died young and his publications were regrettably few, the difference in his voice, in his concerns, and his attitude added something special and enduring to the body of African literature (Fraser, 1988).
The intense, slightly aggressive young writer made an immediate impression (Veit-Wild,
2004). But the intensity was real. The writing talent which was being applauded was real. The aggression or anger was real, was deeply felt, and was in part pain and resentment against acts of arrogance, racism and cruelty as well as deeper anger at the pervasive injustice displayed everywhere in the generality of society (Shaw, 2006). The researcher being familiar with some opinions regarding Marechera’s life and work is of the opinion that these opinions are conflicting, with one side seeing him as a hero figure (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit-
Wild, 2004), while the other side views him as a traitor, a man who betrayed Africa (Gaylard,
1999; Pattison, 2001b; Shaw, 2006).
99
5.5. The research methodology
5.5.1. Methodological considerations. Yardley (2000) suggested three broad principles as guidelines to evaluate the value of qualitative psychological research. The first principle is sensitivity to context. This was accomplished in the present study by the researcher being conscious of the existing literature, taking into account the degree to which the study was sensitive to the data and paying attention to the way in which the socio-cultural setting of the study may have influenced its management and outcome. Sensitivity to the relationship between the researcher and the subject was also taken into consideration through regular consultation with the supervisor who is an experienced clinical psychologist.
The second principle was embraced by the commitment of the present researcher to scientific rigour, transparency and ensuring coherence of the research and the results thereof.
The third notion of impact and importance is the crucial test of trustworthiness, whether the research conveys anything of use, anything that would make a difference, or anything important (Yardley, 2000).
Several methodological challenges related to the effective execution of psychobiographical studies were taken into account whilst employing the psychobiographical approach. These difficulties, as well as a description of how the study lessened their influence are addressed below.
5.5.1.1. Research bias. Psychobiographers often experience counter transference as a result of the relatively in-depth and long-term nature of the psychobiographical approach
(Anderson, 1981a). Research has shown that the psychobiographer may idealize the subject and enjoy the status of being connected to such an exalted figure. At other times, they may find fault with their subject as a way of persuading themselves that they are more rational, smarter or friendlier than the subject (Anderson, 1981a; Fouché & van Niekerk, 2005b).
100
In order to negate these criticisms, the researcher examined his feelings about the subject and developed empathy with the subject. Sustaining the empathy was also useful against any inclination to belittle the subject (Anderson, 1981a). The researcher also enlisted the assistance of biographers by allowing them to comment on his relationship with the subject.
Above all, the research supervisors, who are experienced clinicians, were consulted regularly to comment on the relationship between the subject and the researcher.
5.5.1.2. Reductionism. Another criticism of psychobiographies is that of reductionism.
This takes many forms including: (i) Psychobiographies are said to neglect the complex social, historical and cultural context within which the individual existed (Runyan, 1988a);
(ii) Psychological factors are overemphasized at the expense of external social and historical factors; (iii) Psychobiography focuses excessively on psychopathological processes and gives insufficient attention to normality and creativity; and (iv) Reductionism also explains adult character and behaviour exclusively in terms of early childhood experience while neglecting later formative processes and influences (Runyan, 1983).
The researcher was very conscious about the social and historical context that the subject experienced as he lived in the same community that the subject lived in, although at different times. The researcher also read extensively on the historical context that prevailed during the subject’s time. Through the use of Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology, which provides a dynamic view of the complex development of personality in a social context, the researcher aimed to avoid reductionist tendency that are associated with the psychodiagnostic view of individual pathology.
Individual psychology is holistic which reduces the reductionist tendencies of explaining adult character exclusively in terms of childhood experiences. By utilising multiple sources in the data collection and analysis, avoidance of excessive use of psychological jargon,
101 avoidance of pathologising the subject through use of health oriented rather than disease oriented approaches, and approaching the subject as a complex whole person in context were some of the techniques used by the researcher to reduce reductionism.
5.5.1.3. Cross-cultural differences. According to Anderson (1981a), psychobiographical studies may be considered a form of cross-cultural research in that the culture in which the subject lived would have differed significantly from present-day culture. The cross-cultural application of psychological concepts has been criticized because of the likelihood that the cultures within which the subjects lived would have been sufficiently different from the culture of the psychobiographer. Therefore, present-day psychological concepts might not be applicable or cross-culturally sensitive (Carlson, 1988). Bearing this in mind, the researcher undertook extensive historical research in order to develop a culturally empathic understanding of the subject thereby overcoming the cross-cultural criticism.
5.5.1.4. Analysing an absent subject. Some researchers believe that psychobiographers are at a disadvantage because they have limited or no direct contact with the subject and hence less information is available (Carlson, 1988). In response, the researcher believes that he was, in fact, at an advantage because he was able to access various information sources which cover the subject’s entire lifespan, including some information that was only revealed
25 years after the death of the subject. The researcher also had the opportunity to analyse events in the light of their eventual effects. Thus, in turn, resulted in a more accurate and objective view of the subject’s life (Anderson, 1981a).
While the entire body of work created by or about the subject, such as public speeches, diaries, personal interviews, written books and other creations were collected and analysed,
Anderson (1981a) maintained that the greatest possibility for research comes when the research subject is still alive, allowing the psychobiographer to interview him or her.
102
5.5.2. Data collection. The primary data that were utilised for the study are documents produced by the subject, his autobiographical writings, personal correspondence and interview material. The secondary materials that were utilised for the study are those produced by other researchers, focusing on the subject’s life history, development, personality and individuality (Yin, 2009). In this study, only published primary and secondary materials were used because of their stability, factual accuracy, relative accessibility and corroboration with other sources (Yin, 2009). Data was triangulated to ensure objectivity, thereby increasing the credibility of the study. Sources were noted in the reference list to enhance transferability by creating an accessible database.
5.5.3. Data analysis and interpretation. The goal of the psychobiographer is to highlight the salient defining events in an individual’s life and apply psychological theory in order to organize the data into a compelling narrative (McAdams, 2006). Thus, the subject’s life must be understood within its particular social, cultural and historical context and not merely reduced to causal notions of early experience or force fitted into theory (Runyan, 1983).
Alexander’s (1990) model of data extraction was used as a way to organize and prioritize qualitative biographical data and assist the researcher to clearly demarcate which content to set aside and safely ignore, and which content to consider.
Alexander’s (1990) method of analysing personal data involves asking the data questions in order to extract core-identifying units (that is, themes or scripts) that have relevance to unravelling and attaining the objective of the study. These questions are based on the theoretical approach to the study, and the aim and objectives of the research. Alexander
(1990) postulated nine guidelines for the successful extraction of salient data. These nine guidelines provide an overall indication or impression of which information or descriptions are significant in terms of the study. A brief description of each guideline follows and examples are provided as to how the researcher applied it to the database of this study. 103
5.5.3.1. Uniqueness. As an indicator of salience, uniqueness can be employed in a variety of ways. It may actually be pointed out by the subject as a frame for the unit of communication. More subtle, however, are the signs of uniqueness that arise from either departures of expression from those commonly held in the general language, or more importantly, clear departures from the usual language expressed by the subject. The sudden appearance of street jargon in an otherwise formal presentation might be such a sign.
Uniqueness refers not only to verbal expression but also to the content of what is being expressed. Where one is to examine a sequence in which a certain outcome would be clearly expected and find instead a different and unexpected outcome without explanation; it should be taken as a sign of salience, that which needs to be examined further. Uniqueness as a salience indicator is clearly related to a variety of normative assumptions. What must inevitably be kept in mind in invoking this criterion are the various baselines with which the elected material is being compared.
An example of uniqueness is a quotation from one of Marechera’s books The Black
Insider (Marechera, 1990) which formed the basis of his ideology. Although the book was published posthumously it was written when he was in exile in England but rejected by
Heinemann Publishers in 1979 (Veit-Wild, 2004)
The thing I remember most about it (writing) is that I always tried to reduce everything into a sort of autobiographical record. As though I needed to stamp myself with evidence of my own existence (Marechera, 1990, p. 80).
5.5.3.2. Frequency. Of all the indicators of importance, frequency of appearance probably needs the least justification although there are complications involved if one assumes a direct positive relationship between frequency and recognition of importance. There is something paradoxical about experience in this regard, in that beyond a certain point as frequency increases, awareness of importance seems to decrease. In many instances frequency may be
104 an expression of powerful conscious value schemas. When frequency is coupled with other salience indicators, it may reveal less conscious schemas. In reading through material, the researcher isolated sequential units of material or information in terms of means-end structures, frequent or repetitive sequences stood out in bold relief.
An example of frequency can be seen from the opening lines of The House of Hunger, “I got my things and left. The sun was coming out. I couldn’t think of where to go” (Marechera,
1978, p. 1). Apart from being the most stimulating opening lines in African fiction, it was a fair summary of the writer’s life. He was always getting his things and leaving; not that he had many things to get, in his last years, homeless and reduced to sleeping on park benches in
Harare, Zimbabwe, all he had was his typewriter and a few books.
5.5.3.3. Primacy. The association of ‘first’ with importance has a long-standing history in folktale and in human customs and values. Certainly in psychology the idea is upheld in the importance assigned to early childhood experience in the development of personality by both
Freud and Adler and countless successors. The first as the foundation stone upon which structures are built is also a common metaphor in language (Alexander, 1990). The first as the key to the unfolding of meaning is also a prevalent idea in most cultures.
As a sign of primacy Marechera was exceptionally gifted as a child and his favourite pastime was reading. In school he was always top of his class. He was also much attached to his parents and postulated that his world was unhinged when his father Isaac, was killed in
1966 by a hit-and-run driver. In The House of Hunger, (Marechera, 1978), the car was replaced by a train.
5.5.3.4. Negation. While sometimes coupled with either frequency or uniqueness, negation deserves an independent discussion as a mark of salience. Freud (1952) called particular attention to the importance of negation statements by patients in the analytic hour
105 as indicators of hitherto repressed, unconscious material making its way to the surface thinly disguised by the cover of unlikelihood or impossibility. Freud’s assumption about negation, namely that one can entertain the likelihood of the statement by eliminating its negative component, is but one of the possibilities available.
To illustrate how negation was applied to this study, the researcher will refer to imagery framed negativity as being tagged without assuming the exact nature of its importance, or how directly it might reveal a meaningful sequential pattern. The way Marechera recalled the death of his father and how this was linking to challenges of his generation is a sign of negation. He said, “The old man died beneath the wheels of the twentieth century. There was nothing left but stains, bloodstains and fragments of flesh. . . . And the same thing is happening to my generation” (Marechera, 1978; p. 36)
5.5.3.5. Emphasis. Since all salience indicators are in some ways forms of emphasis, it will be best to restrict the explication to rather specific instances of its appearance. In general, individuals are aware of emphasis when it is called to their attention deliberately by the teller.
For example, ‘I want you to know that….’ or ‘A critical event in my life was…..,’ or other obvious forms. Whether such units necessarily contain important material remains open to question. In some instances the material may be so identified by the teller and not reveal significant properties.
Emphasis can be seen in an interview by Veit-Wild on his life after the expulsion from
Oxford University and the writing of, The House of Hunger, Marechera stated that “With The
House of Hunger, my first initial impulse was simply one of utter despair. Well, I felt that I had lost everything. There I was in exile, seemingly no future, no nothing. I started asking myself what had happened to my generation. A kind of lost generation feeling” (Veit-Wild,
2004; p. 177).
106
5.5.3.6. Error or distortion. A large part of Freud’s (1952) discussion on distortion deals with the role of error in its variety of forms, including slips and distortions as indicators of important, hidden motives. In his treatment he gave countless examples of its manifestation in both oral and written productions. In many instances the appearance of error is recognized by the subject and as such called to the attention of the observer. This is especially true with slips.
Factual error, such as time, place, or person distortions, and misquotations are easily recognizable if the data in question are also part of the researcher’s store of knowledge.
However, when the data is relating to personal experience, all sorts of error may go undetected in that, criterion templates are not available for comparison. Not infrequently the subject may think over the causes of past error which may suffice to alert the observer. Such an instance might be given in the communication.
A typical example of error or distortion is related to Marechera’s expulsion from New
College, Oxford University. Two myths surround Marechera’s eventual expulsion from New
College. One is that he set fire to the college; the other, which he personally maintained was that given a choice between accepting psychiatric treatment and leaving the college he chose to leave. While the fire myth corresponds with the popular image of the outrageous rebel- poet, Marechera in fact only threatened to burn the college down and started a small fire.
Although a link between psychiatric treatment and his expulsion existed; this differed in detail from his future description and interpretation (Buuck, 1997; Crehan, 1994; Pattison,
1994).
5.5.3.7. Isolation. As a mark of salience, isolation is best recognized by the criterion of fit.
It is often recognised when the reader starts asking questions like, ‘Where did that come from’ or ‘Does that really follow.’ In this case it is highly likely that important personal
107 material is contained in the communication. Although it seems like a perfectly straightforward statement, a statement that should easily translate into action by the reader, it may at first contain hidden difficulties.
The present researcher found himself having to overcome a fair amount of what he has learned to do in successful social communication for him to be able to understand the subject’s perspective except where the data was clear and stark. Marechera’s writing was not chronologically ordered and his explanation for the absence of chronological order in his works was that history is rather “a psychological condition in which our senses are constantly bombarded by unresolved or provisional images” (Veit-Wild, 2004; p.115).
5.5.3.8. Omission. To know when something is missing the researcher must begin from the baseline of what exists when completion is reached. The standards of comparison may be given or implied by the subject or may be invoked by either cultural or logical criteria. An example of an implied standard is Marechera’s autobiographical work in which he identifies all family members, then goes on to describe interactions with all but one, his mother, she remained missing in all his writings.
5.5.3.9. Incompletion. An obvious form of incompletion occurs when an expository sequence begins, follows a course, but ends before closure is reached. In his writings the subject may have been aware of what was happening and in verbal discourse simply stop abruptly, indicating that to continue would be too painful. This can be seen in how most of his characters are destroyed. In such an instance, outcome may be known. Another example may include more subtle changes, where distraction serves to interrupt the narrative flow and there is no return to the original story line which was common in the subject’s writing as he tried to reconstruct his life story. Whether avoidance of outcome or its implications contributes to incompletion under these circumstances is much more difficult to determine.
108
The nine identifiers of salience acted as guidelines for the researcher’s reflections made upon the data gathered. They facilitated a systematic approach and enhanced the consistency with which the data was assessed. By following these guidelines for the extraction of salient data, and asking the data questions related to the theory and the research aim, the researcher attempted to establish a consistent approach in order to enhance the study’s trustworthiness.
5.5.4. Elitism and easy genre. Arguments have been made that psychobiographical research is both easy and elitist. Regarding elitism, psychobiographical researchers have been accused of focusing too much on political and military leaders and the privileged, while ignoring the lives of ordinary men and women (Elms, 1994). Runyan (1988a) has argued that it can be honourable to learn more about the oppressed and the neglected. He warned, however, that it is not the social class, but rather the extent of influence that should be considered. Thus, the psychobiography approach is suited for studying lives from any social stratum with subjects being chosen according to personal characteristics rather than social class, which informed the selection of the subject in the present study.
Runyan (1988a) contended that a superficial biography may be written quickly and easily, but a good biography demands consultation with numerous sources, extensive knowledge of the subject’s socio-historical context, psychological knowledge and good literary skill. It is the researcher’s conviction that the criticism of an easy genre has no basis in the present study since numerous sources were consulted over a long period of time to build a strong social historical narrative of the subject.
5.5.5. Inflated expectations. Psychobiographical explanations should be recognized as speculative and not viewed as the final word about the subject (Anderson, 1981a). Thus, the researcher was aware of the shortcomings of the approach and recognized that psychological explanations do not replace, but add to other explanations.
109
5.5.6. Ethical considerations. According to Elms (1994) and Runyan (1983), the nature of the psychobiographical study raises ethical concerns about privacy and confidentiality. The
Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA, 2008) published broad ethical guidelines for research. The ethical guidelines stipulates that, firstly, psychobiographies should ideally be conducted on departed individuals, preferably those who have no close surviving relatives who may be made uncomfortable by any revelations. Secondly, psychobiographies may not be conducted on any living person without their prior consent to being studied or interviewed and subsequent publication of findings.
The subject of the study passed away 26 years ago and the information collected for the current study was archival, information that already exists in the public domain and is freely accessible. This limited the possibility of information that could potentially make living relatives of Marechera uncomfortable becoming public knowledge and in the process satisfied the ethical requirements for psychobiographical study.
The researcher’s values and biases were considered in the process as that awareness was crucial for objectivity. All intimate knowledge that was obtained was referenced accurately and objectively and its relevance carefully assessed to accord the subject relevant respect.
Subjective responses were managed in a way that preserves scientific rigour.
5.5.7. Reflexivity. Narratives are not emitted in vacuum. They are encouraged and shaped by a certain social context (Murray, 2003). Although the narrator tells the story, the character of the story will depend upon whom the story is being told to, the relationship between the narrator and the audience, and the broader social and cultural context (Murray, 2003). The narrator is an active agent who is part of a social world. Through narrative, the agent engages with that world. Since stories develop out of particular social contexts and told to a certain audience, Murray, (2003) argues that it is important that such details are recorded.
110
According to Alvesson and Skolberg (2000) when conducting narrative research, a complex relationship exists among the researcher, the context of the research, the subject and the observers. Within a narrative framework, the creation of knowledge is influenced by the linguistic, social, political, and theoretical elements of the researcher, the subject or participant, and the observers. Stroud (2004) pointed out that it is difficult for researchers to step out of their own context constituting their values and perceptions, and recognise their own blind spots and prejudices having an influence on the interpretation of the findings of the research. It is through reflexive methods that a researcher takes the opportunity to step back from their research position and to gain critical reflection and awareness of the restrictions they place on their research (Alvesson & Skolberg, 2000; Stroud, 2004).
The principle of reflexivity makes modest claims for research results. Reflexivity implies that the knowledge is local and that the results remain open-ended so to speak, that every new reader will create new meaning to it. Meaning is therefore not the creation and the property of the subject in the research project, or the observers of the research project, nor is the creation of the property of the researcher, the subject, and the observer, and the result of the collaboration between them (Alvesson & Skolberg, 2000).
The researcher does not claim that the knowledge created by the research has universal meaning or that the analysis of the research is final. Thus for this reason, and as a triangulative technique the suggestion of creating an audience was employed (Stroud, 2004).
Within a narrative approach an audience is the person or persons who would be interested in listening to, or be invited to listen to the subject’s story (Freedman & Combs, 1996). Thus, the researcher attempted to broaden the audience of the subject so as to reach other researchers and invite them to think differently about their way of practice and research.
111
5.6. Conclusion.
This chapter served to highlight the research design and method, and the psychobiographical subject of the present study. In addition the primary aim, methodological considerations, data collection methods, data analysis and interpretation, and ethical considerations were described. Finally, reflexivity within qualitative research was briefly discussed. The next chapter will integrate Adler (1929) theory of individual psychology into the life of Marechera as it discusses the findings of the study.
112
CHAPTER 6
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
6.1. Chapter preview
This chapter discusses how Marechera’s personality development can be conceptualised using Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology. Individual psychology views each individual as following a consistent law of movement towards a final goal of mastery or superiority. That particular form of a final goal, which is Marechera’s definition of success, is unique to the individual and is established quite early. There is evidence that Marechera had a fictional goal of personal superiority, that is, of becoming famous through writing. From a young age he set it as an ideal goal for himself. The chapter integrates Adler’s view of human nature, structure and development of personality and Marechera’s optimal development.
6.2. The view of human nature.
Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology does not depict individuals as victimised and controlled by biological forces or childhood experiences. It emphasizes an examination of the individual’s social and cultural embeddedness, a holistic view of personality, taking personal responsibility, striving to achieve life goals, growth towards a sense of completion and belonging and a practical approach to meeting life’s challenges. Individual psychology theory focuses on the uniqueness of the individual and does not agree with the universality of biological motives. Marechera was born into a poor black family during the time the
Rhodesian government had declared a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) which literally locked the Rhodesian blacks into what was essentially an apartheid system. The third born in a family of nine, Marechera lived in a small overcrowded house. As a way of overcoming his childhood experience and environment of poverty and violence, Marechera developed a unique personality. He became a writer of extraordinary creativity who lived an
113 unorthodox life style. In his early childhood he escaped into a world of books to shut himself away from the poverty and violence around him. He attended the most prestigious secondary school of his time, St Augustine Mission, where he became withdrawn, eccentric and unpredictable. At university Marechera was constantly involved in conflict as he challenged authority, which resulted in him being expelled (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit Wild,
2004). He was later described as a talented but undisciplined writer (Shaw, 2006).
Adler believed that individuals’ pursuit of their overarching life goals ‘pulls’ them from positions of inferiority, inactivity, and inertness to positions of mastery and completion
(Adler, 1930). Marechera started off as shy and withdrawn to emerge as a famous writer to the extent that he was perceived as a cult figure and one of Africa’s most influential writers in the 1970s. His greatest and most immediate impact was on the young generation of
Zimbabweans, those who had been to school and university in the 1980s. They greatly admired him; after his death at a tender age of 35, a veritable ‘Marechera cult’ sprang up
(Pattison, 2001a; Toivanen, 2011; Veit Wild, 2004).
The theory of individual psychology was greatly influenced by Adler’s early childhood experiences, which consisted of sibling rivalry, jealousy and sickness. How he survived illness and trauma provided the basis for his theory on organ inferiority and inferiority feelings. Marechera stammered in his childhood. His childhood experience of being the third in a family of nine meant that sibling rivalry was inevitable. Marechera went on to become the most famous member of his family. It is the present researcher’s belief that Marechera’s sibling rivalry could have resulted in his competitive spirit that made him the most famous child in the family. The stammering could be attributed to his feelings of inferiority since he struggled to express himself vocally and that could explain his choice of becoming a writer.
How he managed these childhood experiences influenced his adulthood personality (Adler,
1964; Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004).
114
Adler (1929) developed a theory of individual psychology that views human nature as optimistic and goal directed instead of a personality being driven by unconscious forces.
According to Adler (1964) individuals have a free will and creatively construct their unique life style. In that sense he believed that personality can only be understood as a whole. From an early age, Marechera escaped into the world of books. He would search the rubbish bins for comics, magazines and books while his age mates were searching for broken toys. His decision to become a writer was made while he was still in high school, after reading Weep not Child (Ngugi wa Thiong’o, 1964). He was a brilliant abstract thinker, in about Form 4 he started having problems with authority. When Marechera was asked why he had called Father
Williams ‘Napoleon Bonaparte’ he said he would write about it; a sign that his goal in life was to become writer (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004).
During his time at the University of Rhodesia, the environment was highly political and the concept of multiracialism on campus had become a façade. Marechera became a member of the English Department writing club where he contributed poems and short stories. When he went to Oxford University he read vivaciously, extended his knowledge of world literature, devoured all African writing and political texts, which were freely available, and delved into new theories of psychoanalysis, and linguistic and literary structuralism. In an interview with Veit-Wild (2004), Owen Kibel, a white Rhodesian student who studied at
Oxford University the same time as Marechera, remembered him as a writer in the making whose personality contrasted dramatically with the traditional environment of an English college. This is evidence to show that Marechera’s personality can be said to have been equally optimistic and goal directed. He later went on to write his most famous novel The
House of Hunger while living in squalor after his expulsion from Oxford University
(Chennelles & Veit-Wild, 1999; Habila, 2006; Marechera, 2009).
115
The present researcher is of the opinion that even though the environment in which
Marechera was brought up in was one of poverty, violence and discrimination, it did not prevent him from being optimistic. He realised that his family was not financially supportive enough so he had to excel academically in order to receive bursaries to fund his education.
This saw him become a beneficiary of the Alfred Beit and the Common Room scholarships.
According to Adler (1929) individuals are social beings who interact with nature. This means that individuals cannot survive on their own, but need the support of society which tends to be violent. Furthermore, Adler (1964) indicated that individuals need the support of communal living because they are weak. All individuals are born with a small and inferior body which make them vulnerable and dependent on others for survival. Marechera grew up in a colonial state at a time when the community was being brought together to fight an oppressive regime. It was through community participation that led to the war of liberation.
He was outspoken but remained very individualistic and did not fit into any particular political grouping during his days at the University of Rhodesia. He was arrested on several occasions for one man demonstrations against the minority government of Ian Smith (Caute,
1983; Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004).
Marechera’s behaviour contradicted what Adler believed to be the essence of social beings that is, striving to achieve one’s life goals while meeting life’s tasks in a socially responsible and supportive manner. Marechera strove single-mindedly after personal goals, which offered only a fleeting sense of self-efficacy or self-esteem, that life tasks go unmet and other individuals are viewed as obstacles that must be manipulated, mastered or defeated. This approach is the antithesis of healthy mental functioning (Adler, 1929; 1964).
Marechera grew up at the time Zimbabwe (then Rhodesia) was going through a liberation war and his socio-political awareness was well advanced considering his age. This could be the reason why at the age of 13, he claimed that his father was killed by ‘the Rhodesian Light
116
Infantry.’ The way he later reinvented the story of his father’s death shows the anger and frustration of his generation:
The old man died beneath the wheels of the twentieth century. There was nothing but stains, bloodstains and fragments of flesh, when the whole length of it was through with eating him. And the same thing is happening to my generation (Marechera, 2009, p. 60).
In Adler’s (1929) view, some aspects of human nature are innate, for example, the potential for social interest and striving for perfection. Experience is therefore what determines how these inherited tendencies will be realised. As a child Marechera was quiet and withdrawn, his childhood was dominated by poor living conditions, poverty and violence in the community, but it became a great motivation for his writing. Being the third born in a family of nine it meant competing for attention from his parents with eight others. This he could not get and thus this often resulted in wrangles with his parents. One such incident is when he came home from school and started speaking English to his mother only to be stopped by a stinging slap. When she asked him he said “I’m not speaking in Eng-” only to stop after realising that he was speaking in English (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit-Wild,
2004). The present researcher speculates that Marechera’s relationship with parents and the family social environment of poverty and violence could have contributed to his underdeveloped social interest. His later behaviour of failing to develop sustainable interpersonal relations reflects neglect in childhood.
Zimbabwe, other than South Africa, was the only African country not yet independent by the time Marechera went to university. The white minority government had unilaterally declared Rhodesia a republic and independent of British rule. Unjust laws, segregation, arbitrary arrests, and other repressive measures were used to keep the black population under control. It is at this time that Marechera’s distrust of power started to grow and resulted in numerous brushes with the law, arrests and detention (Habila, 2006; Needham, et al., 1984).
After their expulsion from the University of Rhodesia, most of his colleagues decided to join
117 the liberation struggle. To them the expulsion was a result of the discriminatory practice of the colonial government and they were obliged to retaliate by joining the struggle for independence but Marechera chose to stay at home and then went into exile to study
(Chennelles & Veit-Wild, 1999; Fraser, 1988).
It is the present researcher’s belief that Marechera’s personality development appears to reflect what the theory of individual psychology would consider as deeply unhappy - the neurotic and desolate person - as he was deprived in his younger years of being able to develop the feeling of community, courage, optimism, and the self-confidence that comes directly from the sense of belonging. His childhood coincided with the time that the community was brought together by poverty and discrimination to fight against the oppressive system of the colonial government but Marechera chose to remain - to some extent - individualistic.
Individual psychology tenets of personality theory provide a promising means of advancing the understanding of Marechera’s personality. Certain personality traits described by Adler (1964) such as, feelings of inferiority, striving for superiority and creative self, may be attributed to the lifestyle that writers like Marechera can be associated with. It cannot be denied that social forces have profound effects on individuals and help shape the personality which in turn drives behaviour. However, individuals constantly evaluate the social situation that they find themselves in and make judgements accordingly. Marechera was no exception to this. He was brought up in an environment of poverty, violence and discrimination. He then escaped into the world of books shutting himself from his predicament.
In summary, the theory of individual psychology posits that an individual who is deeply unhappy emerges from among those who have failed to develop community feeling in their childhood. On the other hand, courageous, optimistic and self-confident individuals have developed a sense of community belonging. Marechera can be considered to be deeply
118 unhappy as he was from an early age always avoiding life and escaping into the world of books. He acquired the ability to read believing that it was the only way to escape from his poverty. “I would simply just concentrate, knowing very well about the horrifying circumstances around me. A total escapism!” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 114). Marechera’s behaviour is closely related to what Adler called ‘safeguarding tendencies.’ Safeguarding tendencies describes the belief that individuals create patterns of behaviour to protect their exaggerated feelings of inferiority against public disgrace. The type of safeguarding tendency chosen is differentiated by the type of disorder the individual developed. Adler considered an individual’s selection of a safeguarding tendency as a creative act (Adler, 1930).
6.3. The structure and development of personality.
Adler’s (1929) view of personality is that it cannot be structured. Accordingly, personality should be seen as a whole entity moving towards a predetermined goal. Adler termed this a
‘goal of superiority.’ This goal is fictional and is hampered by the feelings of inferiority, inadequacy and incompetence. Marechera had a predetermined goal of becoming a writer but he strove for it in an unorthodox way. Marechera challenged authority figures to the extent that he fought with one of his educators, Father Williams while in high school at St
Augustine Mission. Although he was not expelled, the act warranted expulsion.
At the University of Rhodesia his warden, Mr Knottenbelt, remembers him as a
‘wretched’ youth who continuously infuriated everyone in the halls. He saw him as a student who aimlessly wandered most of the day when he was not drinking beer. Although Mr
Knottenbelt believed Marechera was highly intelligent and a fast reader, he doubted if he was doing his assignments well. He was expelled in his second year for misconduct. While at
Oxford University, Marachera rebelled and subverted the college rules and routine. Lady
Hayter (the warden’s wife) continually recorded problems with Marechera. She said he was
‘nocturnal,’ clashed violently with college domestic staff and generally felt isolated (Fraser,
119
1988; Veit-Wild, 2004). According to Lady Hayter, Marechera physically assaulted an elderly college servant who tried to draw his attention to an infringement of college rules.
Such incidents with the college servants were all based on the assumptions that they had been behaving in a racist manner to him (Veit-Wild, 2004).
According to Adler (1929) all individuals strive for fulfilment, perfection and self- actualisation, but for many their goals remain unfulfilled, imperfect and far from self- actualised. In most cases individuals are too self-interested. Adler (1930) believed that most of the problems individuals face are social that is why they should be seen in social context.
According to his theory individuals strive for perfection and to secure a better place for themselves. Marechera’s goal was to influence the world through writing poems and short stories (Habila, 2006). He made some progress towards being a famous writer as he managed three published novels during his life. One of them; The House of Hunger (Marechera, 1978) won the Guardian Prize for fiction in 1979. He later died poor, homeless, having failed to live up to his expectations. He was never recognised as a writer by publishing houses in his own country.
Marechera’s behaviour is an example of what Adler (1930) considered to be indicative of a psychologically disturbed individual. This type of behaviour generally occurs in the presence of two conditions: an exaggerated inferiority feeling and an insufficiently developed feeling of community. Under these conditions, an individual may experience or anticipate failure before a task that appears impossible and may become ‘discouraged.’ When the individual is discouraged, they often resort to fictional means to relieve or mask - rather than overcome - their inferiority feelings.
One of Adler’s (1929) tenets of individual psychology is that individuals have constitutional attributes as well as a creative self. These two interacting with the environment
120 determine the type of life-style a person develops. The following section integrates
Marechera’s constitutional attributes and creative self into the environment as a way of exploring individual psychology.
6.3.1. Constitutional attributes. The theory of individual psychology defines constitutional attributes as a set of genetically determined attributes. These attributes are not decisive in determining the nature of individual personality development. They interact with the creative self and the environment to create a unique individual (Adler, 1964). The physical and organic weaknesses that an individual is born with or acquires in early childhood are examples of constitutional attributes.
Marechera was exceptionally intelligent and his mother had to send him to school before the primary school going age. His excellent performance was not diminished by the strong stammer he developed as a little boy. In high school he was brilliant and analytical in his thinking as testified by his former classmates and educators. His environment was characterised by poverty, violence and discrimination. Coming from such a background he had to use the interaction between his constitutional attributes, that is, his intelligence and creative self to obtain bursaries to fund his education. His first success was when he was awarded the St Augustine bursary after Form 2, then the Alfred Beit scholarship to study at the University of Rhodesia. It was through the Common Room scholarship that he was able to study at the Oxford University (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit-Wild, 2004).
After his expulsion from Oxford University he found himself living in squalor and a homeless wanderer, but he managed to use his predicament as a motivation to write The
House of Hunger. This narrative describes his experiences of the ghetto where poverty and violence were the order of the day. The novel reflects how his environment had impacted on
121 his adult personality. It was the ‘house of hunger’, the ghetto with its ills, that he wanted to escape from the whole of his life.
With, The House of Hunger, my initial impulse was simply one of utter despair. Well, I felt that I had lost everything. There I was in exile, seemingly no future, no nothing. I started asking myself what had happened to my generation. A kind of lost generation feeling (Veit-Wild, 2004 p. 177). In the second novel Black Sunlight, Marechera adheres to the adage ‘write what you know’ as his depiction of Christian, the photojournalist, mirrors that of his own life. The novel describes Marechera’s experiences after his expulsion from Oxford University and while living in squalor in England. In Mindblast, Marechera’s third novel, he uses his intelligence and vivid imagination to view the newly independent state of Zimbabwe. He describes how materialism, political intolerance, stupidity and corruption had penetrated all levels of the post-colonial government. The present researcher agrees with Toivanen (2010) that Marechera’s writing also prophesied the present Zimbabwean crisis where political intolerance and corruption have become the order of the day.
6.3.1.1. Inferiority feelings and compensation. Feelings of inferiority stem from birth when a child is born small, weak and inferior to adults. It therefore means that inferiority is a crucial part of personality. It is the driving force behind an individual’s striving for superiority through compensation. Adler (1929) conceptualised feelings of inferiority as much more than just inadequacy. These feelings provide a motivational force behind striving for growth and development. They constitute a negative state that individuals seek to overcome. The inferiority feelings are characterised as inevitable, universal and normal.
As a child Marechera played with his friends in a little house made of cardboard boxes that he called ‘office’ and saw himself as the office boy and his friends as the Chairman and
General Manager (Marechera, 2009; Veit-Wild, 2004). This is evidence to suggest that
Marechera was born with a sense of inferiority as evidenced by how he perceived himself in
122 the ‘office’ game with his friends, twins Washington and Wattington Makombe. In that way feelings of inferiority became a crucial part of his personality, in the sense that it was the driving force that pushed him to strive for superiority, that of becoming a famous writer.
Adler (1929) considered birth order as a major factor in the development of inferiority.
First borns may develop inferiority complexes when younger siblings arrive as they feel dethroned. The middle children always have a sense of superiority as they are not pampered like their older or younger siblings. It therefore means they have the greatest potential to be successful in life. Marechera was the third born in a family of nine, making him a middle born child. He was not as pampered as his older or younger siblings. When the present researcher looked at birth order as a major factor in the development of personality, it suggests that Marechera could have developed a sense of superiority by dethroning his older sibling in a healthy competition as he managed to excel in school and received scholarships to attend the University of Rhodesia and Oxford University. He later became a writer and the most famous child in the family. As a middle child he had the greatest potential to be successful in life.
6.3.1.1.1. Organ inferiority. Adler (1929) considered organic inferiority as a physiological deficiency found in all individuals. The inferiority can be in the form of a weaker or stronger part of the anatomy or physiology, for example, a heart murmur, weak lungs or kidneys or liver problems. Individuals respond to these organic inferiorities through compensation.
Marechera stammered from an early age. Weeks before his A level examinations he manifested auditory hallucinations and imagined being persecuted. He had to write the examination with the assistance of sedatives (Marechera, 2009; Veit-Wild, 2004).
According to Adler (1958), an individual’s underdeveloped social interest is the one factor that underlies all types of psychological maladjustments. Maladjustment is conceptualized as the individual’s development of exaggerated feelings of inferiority and exaggerated striving
123 for superiority (Adler, 1930). Adler equated psychopathology with a feeling of discouragement, a feeling of hopelessness, and the belief that one’s world is not going to change for the better. It therefore means maladaptive behaviour develops when individuals becomes discouraged or when they encounter disappointing circumstances. They become unconsciously convinced of their inferiority, and as a consequence, they develop abnormal behaviour to divert attention from their difficulties.
6.3.1.1.2. Psychological inferiorities. According to Adler (1930) psychological inferiority is not an organic retardation, deformation or weakness. It is when individuals learn to believe that they are not capable or they are weak. Individuals compensate for psychological inferiority by becoming very good in what they feel inferior at or by becoming competitor elsewhere. Some just never develop self-esteem. During his childhood Marechera searched rubbish bins for books, comics and magazines. His most prized possession was a tattered
Arthur Mee’s Children Encyclopaedia, which he found in a bin. He was totally reliant upon bursaries and scholarships to fund his education. When he became a professional writer he depended on donations and writing grants from the British Arts Council. He was homeless after his expulsion from Oxford University and had to depend on his publisher James Currey for accommodation and finances for survival (Fraser, 1988; Marechera, 2009; Veit-Wild,
2004). Although both the normal and the maladjusted individuals manifest feelings of inferiority, these feelings are exaggerated in the maladjusted individual. Adler (1929) believed that poor mental health results only when individuals behave as if they are inferior.
Marechera never believed he could care for himself, he always perceived himself as an underdog, depending on the blessings of the rich. He believed that he was never good enough to take care of himself. Adler (1929) considers this not as a matter of true organic inferiority but a psychological one. Marechera was not really weak, but he learnt to believe that he was and had to depend on others to survive. He compensated for his psychological inferiority in
124 an unorthodox way, on the one hand, by becoming rude and ill-disciplined, as he subverted college rule and routine when he was at Oxford University, and on the other hand, by becoming very good academically. In his recommendation to the selection committee of the
Common Room scholarship, one of his lecturers, Anthony Chennells, wrote “…his sensitivity to literature is controlled by rigorous power of evaluation…. He has read a great deal more than most of our students black or white and he is also a poet of considerable promise….I can think of no student here, who on academic grounds alone so merit the attention of your committee” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 146)
6.3.1.1.3. Inferiority complex. Adler (1964) believes that during the process of development children construct schemas about personal and social conditions that are necessary for them to feel secure. When these conditions are not met it means that there is conflict between an individual’s self-concept and ideal self, the individual then develops feelings of inferiority. When individuals are overwhelmed by forces of inferiority, which can take the form of general difficulties of growing up, they develop an inferiority complex. They develop a poor sense of themselves and are unable to cope with life’s demands. An inferiority complex can arise from feelings of inferiority such as neglect in childhood, ‘society owes me.’
Marechera was born into a poor family in a society were violence and racial discrimination was rampant. He stammered from an early age and in high school he manifested auditory hallucinations and imagined being persecuted. Marechera depended on bursaries and scholarship to fund his education. The present researcher believes that this could have resulted in him developing an inferiority complex. As an individual who had an inferiority complex Marechera had a poor opinion of himself and sometimes felt helpless and unable to cope with the demands of life. The philosophy of avoiding life by packing his bags and leaving can be attributed to this inferiority complex (Habila, 2006; Veit-Wild, 2004).
125
The present research suggests that the other source of Marechera’s inferiority complex could be that he was born in a ghetto that meant he did not have the opportunity to develop skills for rugby, cricket, football or basketball- sports that encourage teamwork and social cohesion. So, as he grew up, he became shy and withdrawn, and concentrated on the only thing he was good at, excelling at his schoolwork. Marechera had an inferiority complex about his status in the society and as Adler (1930) said inferiority feelings are not abnormal but behaving inferior is problematic.
An alternative explanation for Marechera’s behaviour is that he developed a superiority complex. According to Adler (1930) abnormal behaviour results from an individual developing a massive sense of inferiority in early childhood such that they become discouraged about life. In an effort to compensate, they develop inappropriate patterns of behaviour, show an unrealistic striving for superiority over others, develop a superiority complex, or create an exaggerated opinion of their own abilities and accomplishments.
6.3.2. Creative self. The ability of an individual to form their own life goals and to plan how to achieve them is what Adler (1964) called the creative self. It is not a structure of personality but rather the capacity of the whole person to function productively. It is the self in the creative aspect of personality that interprets and makes meaning out of the constitutional attributes and environmental factors. Marechera, from an early age, realised that his family was poor and could not afford to send nine children to boarding school so he had to excel to get funding for his education (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit-Wild, 2004).
The present researcher posits that Marechera had a unique way of getting along with life.
He had the ability to form life goals and creatively plan how to achieve these life goals in an extraordinary way. Instead of playing sport with other children in the township, he would read books, instead of searching around the rubbish for broken toys like other kids; he searched for comics, magazines and books. He considered his social environment as a ‘house
126 of hunger’ that he had to escape from. Therefore he had to have a creative ability to escape.
In high school he had to excel to remain in school by being awarded a bursary that would keep him away from the poverty of his family. This accords with Adler’s belief that human nature is essentially active, creative and purposeful in shaping its response to the environment
(Engler, 2009).
Adler (1929) used the concept of the creative self to reinforce the belief that individuals make their own personalities using raw materials from heredity and the environment. He believed that individuals are aware of what they do and through self-examination they can understand why they behave in a certain way.
Marechera’s writing had a creative way of distorting reality; for example, how he described his departure from Rhodesia,
As the plane blurred into the night, leaving the Angolan coast and heading out into the void across the Atlantic, I suddenly remembered that I had, in the rude hurry of it all, left my spectacles behind. I was coming to England literally blind. . . I was on my own, sipping a whisky, and my head was roaring with a strange emptiness. What was it really that I had left behind me. . . I think I knew then that before me were years of desperate loneliness, and the whisky would be followed by other whiskies, other self- destructive poisons: I had nothing but books inside my head, and they were burning me, burning with the engines of hope and illusion into the endless expanse of air (Marechera, 1978, p. 143).
He interpreted his expulsion from Oxford University in the following manner:
I very much resented the implied accusation from Oxford of insanity. They demanded that I either sign myself voluntarily into their psychiatric hospital or I would be sent down. That choice really freaked me out. I had to invite them to expel me (Marechera, 2009, p. 2). Marechera’s distortion of reality is less interesting than identifying the order which creative imagination was established and how he uses his intelligence and the environment into fiction writing. If his father’s death is recalled as a rite of passage, and for several days after his father’s death he refused to speak, it was because faced with the unspeakable, he refused to
127 open his mouth. Having done so, he realised that he was no longer free to talk. Marechera’s stammer has been analysed as the ‘half – silenced’ voice of the colonised person in the socio- political environment that prevailed during his childhood (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a).
The present researcher believes that Marechera’s personality can be said to have emerged from the raw materials of heredity and environment. He used the creative self consciously to become the centre of his personality development. He was aware of what to do given his socio-political environment, and through self-examination he could understand why he had to behave that way. Marechera’s creative self can best be explained by Adler’s (1929) belief that people become largely aware of their deepest impulses and fictional finalisms and with conscious intention create their own personality and life styles that will make them achieve superiority.
6.3.3. Social environment. A child’s first social interaction has been regarded by Adler
(1929) as the source of inferiority. It persists throughout life as a source of motivation towards success. It therefore means that factors outside the family can equally influence how an individual views himself and the world. Marechera grew up in a family where his father – an alcoholic - was abusive as evidenced by the fights he had with Marechera’s mother.
Although he died when Marechera was 13, he had a profound impact on Marechera’s adult personality. His mother was a house-maid and then a nanny at a crèche for white children, meant she never had enough time for her 9 children. After the death of Marechera’s father his mother became alcoholic and turned to prostitution to provide for her family (Habila, 2006;
Veit-Wild, 2004). The present researcher agrees with the Adlerian point of view that the source of Marechera’s feelings of inferiority can be traced back to his parent-child relationship and family environment. It is from this source of inferiority that he developed a motivation for success and superiority that is, using the power of the pen to escape from the
‘house of hunger.’ 128
Marechera interpreted the conflict with his mother when he came home: “I remember coming home one day…I was on heat with living. I burst into the room and all at once exploded into my story, telling it restlessly and with expansive gestures, telling it to mother who was staring” (Marechera, 2009, p. 29). Telling her stories in English - which she did understand - was what Adler emphasized when he said, it is not just the objective facts or influences that can impact on the child, but the interpretation the child gives to them (Adler,
1964). Marechera interpreted English as the language of the oppressor and speaking it to his mother was to him an act of oppressing his mother. However, in high school he realised that it was through English that he could escape from the ‘ghetto demon.’ “I took to English the way a duck takes to water” (Marechera, 2009, p.7).
According to Adler individuals feel connected to one another and develop an ability to cooperate (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956). Marechera was good at establishing interpersonal relationships but found it difficult to sustain them. At St Augustine Mission his relationship with educators was equally contradictory as he had a close rapport with some educators while he had fierce arguments with others. While at the University of Rhodesia he was outspoken and involved himself in student activities but also remained very individualistic. When he arrived at Oxford University he became withdrawn and isolated. On his return to Zimbabwe
Marechera became an outspoken critic of the post-colonial government. Adler (1930) believed that neglected children grow up to be adults who try to resolve their problems by making unrealistic demands on other people and by expecting everyone to respond positively to their desires. Their inferiority gets manifested by suspicious behaviour, isolation, and maliciousness. Marechera’s feelings of inadequacy can be attributed to parental inattentiveness.
6.3.4. Social interest. Adler (1929) referred to social interest as having a sense of being part of the human community. According to Adler society is an important part in the
129 development of individual personality and emotion. Individuals seek to find their places in society as they develop a sense of belonging and of contributing. Marechera was popular in class while in high school as he was elected class monitor. His later involvement in student activism - although it led to his expulsion from the University of Rhodesia, - his distrust of power, he criticised both the Rhodesian and Zimbabwe governments, and ultimately his writing is evidence to support his social interest or community feeling.
6.3.4.1. Origins of social interest. Adler (1958) believed that the roots of unhealthy goal striving develop during childhood from a confluence of variables such as dysfunctional family environments that were discouraging and disempowering, undiagnosed or untreated psychological conditions and lack of encouragement. Such conditions overwhelm the child’s ability to develop a healthy lifestyle and a sense of belonging. Adler observed that under these circumstances a child may act out or misbehave as a means of seeking attention, becoming more powerful, exacting revenge, or withdrawing from a task or interaction. Adults also may develop self-defeating life goals that give rise to physical or psychological symptoms and to interpersonal difficulties.
In The House of Hunger Marechera narrates his early social experience of living in a ghetto, how his alcoholic father would beat his mother, his confrontation with his mother when he spoke English to her and being evicted after his father’s death (the Marechera family had to live in a slum area near Lesapi River). He also reflects on the poverty, violence and later abuse by white students at the university - he was brutally assaulted together with his white girlfriend by racist gangs while at the University of Rhodesia. All this established a rebellious basis for his writing and underdeveloped social interest. It is the present researcher’s belief that Marechera’s level of social adjustment, which is part of the social interest, can also be seen from his early interaction with the friends twins Washington and
Wattington Makombe. He regarded himself as an ‘office boy’ serving the Chairman and the
130
General Manager which reflects that he was born to serve, a sign of what Adler (1929) consider as community feeling.
Adler (1929) viewed individuals as more strongly influenced by social forces than biological forces. That is, although the potential for social interest is innate, the extent to which an individual’s social interest is realised depends on early social experiences. Adler believed that no-one can entirely avoid other people or obligations towards them. When social interest has been developed adequately, individuals find solutions to problems and live in peace in the world. It was Adler’s (1964) belief that to experience productive mental health an individual must have adequate social interest. Social interest is an individual’s deep feeling of belonging and empathy with the human race. Social interest is about appreciating interdependence with others, which is reflected through actions aimed at self-development as well as by being helpful towards others.
Psychopathology originates from the individual’s childhood, especially within the family and within sibling relationships. Developing adequate social interest is critical to individuals’ positive mental health. Adler considered the mother as the primary person for teaching children social interest. A mother demonstrates nurturing, co-operation, and social interest in general when she nurses the baby at her breast (Adler, 1929; 1964). Mothers then help their children extend positive relationships to the father and to others within the family. Mothers who fail to show sufficient social interest while parenting their children risk raising young people who become maladaptive in their interpersonal relationships because they lack sufficient social interest. Marechera’s later life is a testimony of failed sufficient social interest from his mother.
6.3.4.2. Importance of social interest. Social interest was Adler’s yardstick for measuring psychological health and is thus the sole criterion for human value (Adler, 1930). Marechera
131 grew up in a socio-political environment of a colonised state fighting for independence and had to connect with the society. He was involved in demonstrations against the Rhodesian government while at the University of Rhodesia. He became a member of the communist party in England, and he used his writing skills to conscientise people about the injustices that prevailed in Rhodesia, England and independent Zimbabwe (Pattison, 2001a, Marechera,
1980, 1984, 2009). As a reflection of the role of a writer in a revolution he said “I think writers are usually recruited into revolutionary movements before that revolution gains whatever it’s seeking. Once it has achieved that, writers are simply discarded, either as nuisance or as totally irrelevant” (Marechera, 2009, p. 9).
Individual psychology considers social interest as an inevitable compensation for the natural weakness of human beings. It is through social interest that individuals feel confident and develop a genuine interest in the welfare and well-being of others (Adler, 1929). If the feelings of inferiority are not great, an individual will always strive to be worthwhile and contribute usefully to society (Adler, 1964). Marechera seemed to have under-developed social interest in his childhood as seen by how he would shut himself awat from the poverty and violence in his society by escaping into the world of books. “I acquired the ability to simply go on reading even while my father and mother were fighting, or while someone was being mugged just outside the house. I would simply just concentrate, knowing very well about the horrifying circumstances around me” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 114). His stammering also contributed to his feeling of inferiority since it hindered him from expressing himself vocally. The present researcher suggests that Marechera’s goal of becoming a writer could have evolved from this feeling of inferiority.
According to Adler true happiness is inseparable from the feeling of giving; a social individual is much closer to happiness than the isolated individual striving for superiority
(Adler, 1964). Instead of playing sport with other children in the township, Marechera would
132 read or play in a little house made of cardboard boxes they called ‘office’ with his friends. He acquired the ability to simply read even if someone was being robbed outside. He regarded books as the only opportunity to escape from the ‘house of hunger.’ As a child he was a sensitive boy who felt very ashamed of the predicament of his family. Those who grew up with him noticed how he suffered, how his behaviour changed after his father’s death. He withdrew more and more into the world of books (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006).
The present researcher believes that Marechera’s behaviour could have been strongly influenced by social forces which saw him challenging the colonial system during his years in high school. Adler (1964) postulates that children feel they have to stake out territory that will allow them to excel, to become popular, or to be a real man. If children evaluate their abilities and believe that they can achieve their desired places, they will pursue positive behaviours and have positive mental health. Conversely, if they feel that they cannot find their places, they will become discouraged and may engage in disturbing behaviour in an effort to find their place. The maladjusted child is not ‘sick’ but rather discouraged thus the misbehaving child’s goal is attention getting, power seeking, revenge taking or declaring deficiency or defeat.
An individual who is not interested in the community faces the greatest difficulties in life and often creates the greatest damage to others. A life-style that disregards the welfare of others is considered pathogenic. Pathological life-styles are self-centred, exploitive, demanding, uncaring and aggressive. The development of social interest is therefore critical to the prevention of antisocial behaviour. Adler proposed that social interest could be used to change the behaviour of antisocial individuals. It provides the basic positive outlook of life and an interest in developing the welfare for others (Adler, 1929, 1964).
133
6.3.5. Striving for perfection or superiority. Adler (1930) viewed striving for superiority or perfection as the ultimate goal in life to compensate for feelings of inferiority. To Adler all individuals strive for superiority. Striving for superiority is not an attempt to be better than others but rather it is an attempt to master external obstacles, gain control or power and to arrive at a positive state. Individuals can never completely get rid of feelings of inferiority; therefore striving for superiority becomes the dominant theme of life. Marechera wanted to achieve something but at the same time resented depending on the goodwill of others. While at Oxford University he saw himself as the black underdog fed by the hands of white academia. His revolt against the college rules sprang from his sense of inferiority and isolation; anger and self-doubt. Such inner conflict resulted in him causing increasing havoc until he finally earned the name ‘outsider.’ He was expelled and lived in squalor writing his first novel, The House of Hunger, which won him the Guardian prize for fiction writing
(Gaylard, 1999; Veit-Wild, 2004).
Marechera’s tendencies of always packing and leaving can be seen as a way of striving for perfection or betterment which Adler considers as the fundamental goal of life. Marechera did not attempt to be better than everyone else, nor become arrogant or have a domineering tendency or an inflated opinion of his abilities and accomplishments. He strove for what
Adler called a drive for perfection. Adler (1982) believed that most of the problems individuals face are social, that is why they should be seen in social context. According to his theory individuals strive for perfection and to secure a better place of themselves. For Adler, striving for only self-glory and perfection is socially useless and may become a cause of mental problems.
According to Adler (1964) the greatest motivation in life is the drive for perfection or superiority. It is this drive that explains personality and behaviour. The drive is futuristic as it is based on expectations for the future. Marechera had an imagination that rejected the belief
134 of a better future for an independent Zimbabwe, conveying that colonialism had penetrated all levels of reality in a definite manner (Pattison, 2001b). Because of this explicit doubt,
Marechera’s work was criticised in Zimbabwe as being apolitical and uncommitted. The present researcher posits that Marechera is now represented as a prophet who saw the present
Zimbabwean crisis coming. In an interview in 1984 he said “I am afraid of one-party states, especially where you have more slogans than content in terms of policy and implementation”
(Marechera, 2009, p. 8).
Looking at the personality development of Marechera the present researcher would agree with what Adler considered as the drive toward wholeness or completion. There is significant evidence to conclude that Marechera was oriented toward the future. He already knew that he was going to be a writer while he was still in high school. When he labelled Father Williams as ‘Napoleon Bonaparte’ and he was asked why, he said he will write about it. He died before he wrote about it. As a writer Marechera was a man of vision who is seen to haunt the world of the living today in a ghostly manner as those who criticised him for being apolitical and uncommitted see the realities of his predictions (Toivanen, 2011). Marechera confirmed what
Adler saw as human motivation in terms of expectations for the future (Adler, 1929; Meyer et al., 2008).
Striving for superiority is as good as striving for perfection. Healthy people do strive for superiority but they do not develop a superiority complex to mask their true feelings of inferiority. It is the striving for a fictional goal that pushes individuals to develop community feeling as it pushes them to make meaningful contribution to society (Meyer et al., 2008).
6.3.6.1. Fictional finalism. The idea that individuals have an ultimate goal is what Adler
(1929) called finalism. It is the final state of being that all individuals strive for. This state of being however is not an actuality but a potentiality. These goals are fictional and cannot be tested against reality. The fictional goal develops during the individual’s early childhood and
135 exists primarily at the unconscious level of awareness throughout life. It influences the way individuals think, feel and act.
Marechera did not grow up playing sports like other children in the township. He was focused on doing well in school. To him pastime activity in the ghetto was books. Entering high school Marechera read his first novel by an African writer; Weep Not Child (Ngugi wa
Thiong’o, 1964) which motivated him to become a writer. He was involved in the English
Department’s writing club and he contributed poems and short stories. Kizito Muchemwa, a member of the writing club during Marechera’s time at the University of Rhodesia, was later quoted as saying “…his poetry promises a new beginning: a Rhodesian Christopher Okigbo in making” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p.121). This suggests that Marechera was a poet in the making.
The present researcher believes that Marechera had an ultimate goal, a final state of changing the world through writing, and he moved toward it. The goal that he strove for was fictional, although he made significant progress towards achieving it. He died at the age of 35 with three published novels to his credit and today he is regarded as one of the most influential African writers (Shaw, 2006). Marechera’s goal is what Adler considered as fictional or an imagined ideal which cannot be tested against reality. Individuals live their lives around ideals such as the belief that all people are created equal or that all people are basically good (Schultz, & Schultz, 2009).
According to Adler (1929) fictional finalism has no relationship with reality and therefore cannot be tested or confirmed but it helps individuals deal effectively with reality.
Marechera’s decision to become a writer was made while in high school when he read his first book by an African writer. After that he read all the African Writers Series he could find
(Veit-Wild, 2004). He was seen as the enfant terrible of Zimbabwe literature, a man who betrayed Africa, as his writing was seen as Europeanised (Gaylard, 1999). In Black Sunlight
136 he called himself a doppelganger as he questions reality, man’s capacity to perceive reality, illusion and delusion (Marechera, 1980). He matched his fictional goal with the style of life he adopted. In Adler’s view, individuals and society are interrelated and interdependent.
People must function constructively with others for the good of all. Thus, to Adler, human beings like Marechera, perpetually strive for a self-centred fictional, ideal goal of perfection, and do this by adopting a unique style of life (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
6.3.7. The style of life. Although Adler postulated that the ultimate goal for every individual is superiority or perfection, he also believed that to attain that goal takes many different behaviour patterns which are unique to each individual (Adler, 1929). The style of life provides a theme that unifies life and is consistent throughout the individual’s life. The style of life is the key to behaviour as it includes goals, the individual’s opinion about himself and the world and the habitual behaviour the individual uses to achieve the desired outcomes.
Marechera expressed his striving differently. He was a man who packed up his things and left each time he felt challenged by life. This formed the distinctive character or style of life he pursued.
While at Oxford University Marechera’s style of life changed to being rude to college staff and students. He did not experience any open racism, but he resented implicit racism - real or imagined, as a way to compensate for his inferiority given his new social position
(Habila, 2006). His rebellious and undisciplined behaviours became part of his style of life, a pattern of behaviours he designed to compensate for his perceived inferiority. According to
Adler children who are discriminated against because of race or socio-economic status, for example, may find maintaining a positive sense of self difficult. But doing so is possible if someone provides sufficient contact, understanding, and encouragement (Meyer et al., 2008).
Marechera found it difficult to maintain a positive attitude towards life because of his new social position. For the first time in his life he had a maid and the maid happened to be white;
137
“...for the first time at Oxford I had a white servant. She had to come every day to my house, sweep up everything, clean my empty bottles, clean up everything” (Veit-Wild, 2004, p. 24).
Marechera also resented the disparity between himself and most of the white students. He saw the white students as taking for granted what for him was affluent; “I was shocked at the casual attitude to education and life. One of my fellow students was a Lord at only 18 years.
Money to him meant nothing at all. What he took for granted to me was expensive. I was confronted with people who saw knowledge as merely an appendage of social success” (Veit-
Wild, 2004, p. 154). His anger was intensified by the fact that he was a beneficiary of the
Common Room Scholarship – a scholarship fund pooled together by the white students to assist poor African students with great academic potential. It therefore meant his education depended on the goodwill of the white students.
The style of life consists of how individuals interpret events, rather than the events themselves. If individuals make faulty interpretations of events which may lead to mistaken beliefs in their private logic - the reasoning individuals invent to justify the kind of style of life they live – they develop a life-style based on the faulty interpretation. The mistaken belief can influence how they behave. Thus the style of life is the guiding framework for all later behaviours. Its nature depends on social interactions, especially the individual’s order of birth within the family and the nature of the parent-child relationship (Adler, 1929).
Individuals have life tasks that they cannot escape. These tasks include how to find a productive work role in life, how to establish and maintain an emotionally close relationship with a life partner and family members, and how to contribute meaningfully to the community of humankind. The manner in which an individual behaves towards each of these is the answer to the problems of life (Adler, 1964). Marechera failed to solve all the life tasks, he never had a stable occupation, resented others and failed to develop and maintain a stable love life and family relationship. He never married but only had brief escapades with
138 prostitutes that he describes in The House of Hunger. When Marechera went to Germany for the West Berlin conference he stayed behind for two weeks after the conference had ended, apparently with a prostitute (Veit-Wild, 2004). Marechera’s longest intimate relationship was when at 31 he met Flora Veit-Wild in 1983. She was 36 at that time. The relationship with
Veit-Wild was revealed in the most candid article titled Dambudzo and Me (Veit-Wild,
2012), where for the first time she writes about her relationship with Marechera. Veit-Wild met Marechera in Charles Mungoshi’s Zimbabwe Publishing House office and she was immediately struck by his confidence and British accent (Veit-Wild, 2012).
Marechera went on to have various romantic meetings with Veit-Wild; from tumbling about on the grass next to the University of Zimbabwe swimming pool to spending his first night of passion together at the 7 Miles Motel, Harare. Since Marechera could not afford any outings Veit-Wild made all the reservations; booking a room with him in seedy city hotels in
Harare and later a three-day excursion with him at Lake Mcllwaine (now Lake Chivero) are some of the revelations she makes in the article (Veit-Wild, 2012). Marechera’s romantic affair with Veit-Wild lasted for 18 months.
Marechera moved into the Veit-Wild house after a few weeks into his relationship with
Veit-Wild. According to Veit-Wild, she felt bad leaving him on the streets after having had sex in a car or at a friend’s place. Veit-Wild’s husband agreed to let Marechera stay for a while as he recognized his extraordinary literary style, with the hope of stabilizing him and getting him off the streets. This failed as Marechera refused any attempts to get psychiatric help, reduce alcohol abuse or establish a healthier lifestyle as he was afraid of losing his distinct personality which was a source of his art (Veit-Wild, 2012).
The present researcher concluded that Marechera’s love task, which saw him falling in love with white women, only reflects feelings of inferiority which he tried to compensate for.
His relationship with Veit-Wild which developed after his return from England may have
139 been an attempt to prove his superiority by going against the norm through expressing the liberalized life style that he had learnt during his time in England. It was a style of life that reflected the liberal anarchist writer that he had developed into and also the dependence syndrome that had become part of his life.
Marechera is an example of what Adler (1958) considered to be a discouraged individual.
Discouraged individuals may function relatively well for some time. Their functioning, however, is based on pretence of significance that emerges from their private ideas which do not hold up in reality. Eventually, their private views clash with reality and lead to a shock - for example, difficulties in work, friendships, love relationships, or family - which may lead to the development of symptoms.
These symptoms, however, are not the main focus of an Adlerian understanding of psychological difficulties. What is important is how individuals use their symptoms. The symptoms create a detour around and distance from the threatening tasks of life, protecting the pretence. Adler (1930) identified three factors that distinguish mild psychological disorders from severe disorders: these are the depth of the inferiority feelings, the lack of the feeling of community, and the height of the final goal.
Marechera’s dependency on alcohol began when he went to Oxford University, and reached its depth of lack of control at the Guardian fiction prize ceremony. Alcohol dependency became a way of suppressing the alienation and the loneliness. He would miss classes, sleeping all day, and going out to pubs at night to get drunk, more often than not ending up in arguments and fights (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001b). The present researcher posits that Marechera’s alcohol abuse and dependence could be associated with neglect in his childhood. It acted as what Adler considered as distancing safe-guarding tendencies.
According to Adler (1964) distancing from tasks and people can be done in many ways including procrastination, avoiding commitments, abuse of alcohol and/or drugs, or suicide.
140
Marechera felt inferior in coping with the demands of life and therefore became distrustful and hostile toward others. As a result, his style of life involved seeking revenge, resenting others’ success, and taking whatever he felt was due to him (Adler, 1964; Habila, 2006;
Pattison, 2001b).
The style of life is the sum total of the values, passions, knowledge, meaningful deeds and eccentricities that constitute the uniqueness of each individual. The style of life is essentially the core schema of a person, it affects and is reflected by everything the individual does, thinks, and perceives, manifesting itself in all behaviours (Ansbacher & Ansbacher, 1956).
Marechera’s style of life manifested in different forms at different times; from fights with the educator at St Augustine Mission; to one man demonstrations while at the University of
Rhodesia; to his subsequent threats to burn down Oxford University, and later his disorderly behaviour at Sheffield University where he deliberately broke the glass panel in front of the notice board and set off a fire extinguisher at the night watchman. These are some incidences that illustrate the impulsive antisocial and violent nature of his style of life.
According to Adler (1964) life-style constitutes the uniqueness of the individual. The individual’s life-style becomes the person’s personality which is unitary, thus the individual’s life style is considered the cornerstone of behaviour. Marechera’s stay in London involved frequent brushes with the police due to his rowdy behaviour, alcohol abuse and not having a visa. Detentions and imprisonment in both England and Zimbabwe intensified his anger and resentment and became part of his life style. When he returned to Zimbabwe he was homeless and lived an unconventional life style which the community speculated as a myth of being cursed as they considered him to be mentally ill (Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a; Veit-Wild,
2012).
6.3.7.1. Psychological types. Adler considered all neurosis as a matter of insufficient social interest, he noted four psychological types that can be distinguished based on the
141 different levels of energy they involved (Adler, 1964). Two of these psychological types significantly explain Marechera’s behaviour and energy levels.
6.3.7.1.1. Ruling type. This psychological type has a tendency of being aggressive and dominant over others. From childhood individuals with this type of personality develop selfish goals that disadvantage the community to the extent that they might exhibit antisocial behaviour. Their energy and the strength of their striving for personal power are so great that they tend to push over anything or anyone who gets in their way (Adler, 1964). Marechera’s life was characterized by the tendency to be aggressive and dominant over others. While in
Form 4 at the age of 17, he had problems with authority to the extent that he fought with
Father Williams, one of the educators at St Augustine Mission. In his first year at the
University of Rhodesia he was involved in a one man protest march. He was arrested and charged under the Law and Order (Maintenance) Act. On 3rd August 1973 he led a group of students to participate in the ‘pots and pans’ demonstration that led to his expulsion. His stay at New College consisted of a series of clashes with authority figures, he threatened to murder people and to burn down the university resulting in him being expelled (Fraser, 1988;
Habila, 2006; Pattison 2001b; Veit-Wild, 2004). The present researcher proposes that
Marechera’s type of behaviour manifestation was characteristic of a ruling type as he was both active and destructive (Meyer et al., 2008).
6.3.7.1.2. Avoiding type. This type is characterised by antisocial tendencies on one side, and laziness and passive aggressive behaviour on the other side. Individuals’ energy levels are low to the extent that they survive by avoiding life. They do not deal with challenges in order to avoid embarrassment (Adler, 1964). In his childhood Marechera was a quiet and withdrawn child. He escaped into the world of books to avoid dealing with life’s challenges.
“I acquired the ability to simply go on reading even while my father and mother were fighting, or while someone was being mugged just outside the house. I would simply just
142 concentrate, knowing very well about the horrifying circumstances around me” (Veit-Wild,
2004, p. 114). Faced with a difficult situation, he would pack his things and leave. He packed his bags and left for boarding school as a way of running away from the poverty and violence of the ghetto. He packed his things and left for the University of Rhodesia and started to enjoy his new lease of life at what was then the country’s only institution of higher learning.
He was expelled in his second year in 1973 and went back to the ghetto. Marechera packed and left for Oxford University, leaving behind the tear gas fumes at the University of
Rhodesia, the degrading conditions of the township and the war-torn country, to start a new life at Oxford University (Habila, 2006; Marechera, 1978, Veit-Wild, 2004).
The present researcher concluded that Marechera’s type of behaviour can also be described as passive-aggressive (Meyer et al., 2008), as he presented with antisocial behaviour tendencies and was lazy and passively aggressive. Individuals like Marechera tend to have the lowest levels of energy and only survive by essentially avoiding life, especially other people. They avoid failure by avoiding involvement with work, friends or society in general. They are likely to have low social contact for fear of rejection or defeat in any way.
When pushed to the limits, they tend to become psychotic, retreating finally into their own personal worlds. They try not to deal with problems in order to avoid any defeat or embarrassment.
6.5. Optimal development.
Adler (1929) theorised that individuals must be viewed holistically within a social context.
Every individual experiences feelings of inferiority as they strive for superiority. For Adler feelings of inferiority are the source of all normal human striving. The peak of human development is therefore when an individual strives to be of service to society. Failure to compensate for the normal inferiority feelings results in individuals developing what Adler considered an inferiority complex.
143
Adler (1964) viewed social interest as central to the development of positive mental health. Maladaptive behaviour is the result of discouraging experiences that can be traced to relationships in the family of origin. The pampered and the neglected child both develop maladaptive behaviours as a result of attempts to compensate for the development of an unrealistic striving for superiority. Individuals who are mature, positive and well-adjusted tend to fall into the socially useful category. Their striving is not for personal superiority; instead they strive to be of service to society. Socially useful individuals help in their family as they work towards social and political change (Meyer et al., 2008).
The present researcher posits a number of sources of Marechera’s failure to reach optimal development. He experienced feelings of inferiority which he failed to fully compensate for.
Marechera was born into a poor family and died poor and homeless. His limited social interest as evidenced by his earlier escape into the world books and his uncommitted approach to life - by packing and leaving each time he was faced with a challenge - reflects maladaptive behaviour. He wanted to compensate for the neglect he experienced as a child thereby developing selfish goals that disadvantaged society.
Adler (1964) theorised that an optimally developed individual is someone who has a widely expanded social interest and empathy with other people and who feels united with the present and the future worlds as a whole. Adler considers characteristics such as loving one’s neighbour, awareness of the environment and involvement in the future development of the world, as critical to optimal development. Marechera’s life embodied the notion of a rebel artist who devoted his life to artistic creation, was doomed by misunderstanding and died before his time (Shaw, 2006). As an artist Marechera had an immediate impact on the younger generation of Zimbabweans who were keen to associate with an unorthodox life- style resulting in the ‘Marechera cult.’ University students started to grow dreadlocks, drinking, smoking and writing poems and short stories just to be associated with their hero.
144
The optimally developed person is more drawn toward the goal of social interest. Social interest can adjust for the overemphasis on individualism and competition found in Western culture (Meyer et al., 2008). It is the innate potential to live co-operatively with other people and helps value the common good above personal welfare. Social connections with others enhance growth. Empathic people respond emotionally and share the joys and sorrows of others. This is the basis for all moral development. Without social interest, life seems purposeless and the self feels empty. This is a core concept in Adlerian theory (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956).
Marechera’s writing career was launched in the Zimbabwean context of anti-colonial struggle and nation building. But his postmodern writing style together with his disillusioned visions of the future of independent Zimbabwe resulted in him being perceived as a traitor of the nation. During his life-time Marechera was ‘condemned, marginalised and censored’ based on the mistaken assumptions that his writing and life-style were considered alien to
Africa. After his death, celebratory practices and internet fan sites have been dedicated to his life (Shaw, 2006; Tionvanen, 2010). It is based on this evidence that the present researcher is of the opinion that the ‘Marechera identity’ could have worked for the common good of the society. Today he is being celebrated as a hero.
Adler observed that an individuals’ health is significantly influenced by their ability to form and maintain friendships and meaningful relationships with others. Individuals who experience difficulty establishing and maintaining meaningful friendships are often at risk for depression, frustration, anger and social alienation. Mental health is also linked to encouragement; whereas poor mental functioning is associated with discouragement (Meyer et al., 2008). Marechera was always packing his things and leaving; not that he had many things to pack (a typewriter and a few books). He spent his final years with friends, often heavily drunk, sleeping on the floors in their houses, and wandering the streets homeless in
145
Harare. The family, the community, the nation, and the state each ‘house’ a particular definition of who he was and the type of life he tried to live. In his writing he explored each different arena, and in the process experienced a sense of disillusionment with their inadequacy to represent him. The present researcher considers Marechera’s failure to maintain interpersonal relationships as a cause for his poor mental health and life-style. His anger, frustration and social alienation were a manifestation of poor mental health.
Individual psychology conceptualises maladjustment as the individual’s development of exaggerated feelings of inferiority and exaggerated striving for superiority (Adler, 1930).
Adler equated psychopathology with a feeling of discouragement, a feeling of hopelessness and the belief that one’s world is not going to change for the better. Maladaptive behaviour develops when an individual becomes discouraged or when the individual encounter disappointing circumstances. When individuals lose the courage to face demanding life situations, they move from a position of inferiority to an inferiority complex (Adler, 1927).
They become unconsciously convinced of their inferiority, and as a consequence, they develop abnormal behaviour to divert attention from their difficulties (Ansbacher &
Ansbacher, 1956).
Marechera was homeless for two years upon his return to Zimbabwe. He had no income other than his meagre royalties and fees for some book reviews. He had to depend on friends for survival. During the last years of his life, he was hopeless and did not have the inspiration and energy to write a book of the expressive scope, clarity and strength of his previous writings (Fraser, 1988; Veit-Wild, 2004). Marechera’s personality was that of an individual who had an underdeveloped social interest - one of the factors that underlie all types of psychological maladjustments.
146
6.8. Conclusion
Marechera’s personality development was conceptualised using Adler (1929) theory of individual psychology. The theory’s view of human nature which does not depict individuals as victims of biological forces corresponds with how Marechera struggled with his early childhood stammering, hallucinations in high school, poverty and violence in society as he became one of Africa’s most famous writers. Marechera had several sources of inferiority which influenced his adulthood behaviour. His childhood experience as a neglected child could have contributed to his underdeveloped social interest. Analysing Marechera’s overall personality development, the present research can conclude that he did not reach optimal development.
In attempting to overcome feelings of inferiority and to discover a feeling of significance and social interest, Marechera set, early in life, a fictional goal of changing the world through writing but ended up unfulfilled and far from self-actualising. In his last years he was a homeless alcoholic. He concluded that his life was based on aspects of heredity and environment as well as his own experience; “My whole life has been an attempt to make myself a skeleton in my own cupboard” (Marechera, 2009, p. 3).
147
CHAPTER 7
CONCLUSION, LIMITATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
7.1. Chapter preview
This chapter summarises the research by revisiting the purpose of the study. A brief integration of individual psychology into the life of Marechera will also be presented. The value of the study in terms of the theoretical model of individual psychology, the psychobiographical case study method and the psychobigraphical subject will be reviewed.
The limitations of the study with regards to the theoretical model, the psychobiographical case method and the psychobiographical subject will be highlighted. The researcher will present recommendations for further research.
7.2. Revisiting the purpose of the study
The primary aim of the research was to explore and describe the genius, mystery and psychological decline of one of Africa’s finest post-colonial writers. The dynamic concepts of Adler’s (1929) individual psychology were used to provide a more comprehensive idiographic interpretation of Marechera as an individual. The present researcher used an idiographic stance in order to allow for personality development to be conceptualized holistically. Thus, the aim of the study was not to prove or disprove Marechera’s optimal personality functioning. Rather, it was to explore the nature of his holistic personality development throughout the history of his life (Carlson, 1988).
The findings of the study highlighted Marechera’s personality development in a holistic way; from his birth in the ghetto in Vengere, Rusape, to his experiences at St Augustine
Mission that included periods of impulsivity and artistic explosion. He had a brief study at the
University of Rhodesia where he was described as a ‘wretched’ youth and subsequently expelled during his second year. Marechera was then awarded the Common Room
148
Scholarship to resume his studies at Oxford University then expelled again. He lived in squalor in London while he wrote The House of Hunger. Marechera then wrote Black
Sunlight in 1980 and returned to Zimbabwe in 1983 were he wrote Mindblast in 1984. He died in 1987 at the age of 35.
It should be noted however that the aim of the study was not to generalise the research findings to the larger population through statistical generalisation. Rather, through the investigation of Marechera’s personality development over time, this study aimed to generalise the results to Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology, which is known as analytical generalisation (Yin, 2009). Although the present researcher noted that Marechera failed to reach optimal development according to Adler (1929) there are sufficient tenets from the theory to describe Marechera’s personality development.
7.3. Individual psychology in the life of Marechera
Adler (1929) theorised that individuals must be understood as a whole within a social context. Every individual experiences a feeling of inferiority as they strive for superiority.
For Adler feelings of inferiority are the source of all normal human striving. The peak of human development is therefore when an individual strives for the service of society. Failure to compensate for the normal inferiority feelings results in individuals developing what Adler considered as inferiority complex.
Adler (1964) viewed social interest as central to the development of a positive mental health. On the other hand maladaptive behaviour is a result of discouraging experiences that can be traced to the family of origin relationships. The pampered and the neglected both develop maladaptive behaviours as a result of attempts to compensate for the development of unrealistic striving for superiority. Individuals who are mature, positive and well-adjusted tend to fall into the socially useful category. Their striving is not for personal superiority,
149 instead they strive for the service of society. Socially useful individuals help in their family as they work towards social and political change (Meyer et al., 2008).
Marechera was born into a family of poverty, in a society of violence and racial discrimination. His father an alcoholic, worked for a groundnut factory, and his mother, a nanny at a crèche for white children, turned to alcoholism and prostitution to fend for her family. Marechera grew up at the time when the black community was being brought together in the fight for independence. Although he participated in some of the community activities he remained very individualistic. This could be explained by his decision to pursue education while his colleagues joined the liberation struggle after they were expelled from the
University of Rhodesia.
Marechera stammered in early childhood, hallucinated and imagined being persecuted in high school which contributed to his feelings of inferiority. His impulsive personality could be a result of this feeling of inferiority. He always found himself persecuted and endlessly pursued. Due to his sensitivity, he could only survive the constant threatening social environment through the powerful and fairy-tale exorcism of the written word (Shaw, 2006).
This is reflected in the language he uses, which was described by some writers as strikingly immediate and intense with exceptionally vivid imaginative power (Chennells & Veit-Wild,
1999; Habila, 2006; Pattison, 2001a; b; Toinvanen, 2011). Through the ‘power’ of the word and imagination, he sought to counter the manifestation of violence in the society, which he had met in all forms in his life, and which he hated and feared more than anything else.
Marechera’s social interest is clearly reflected in his writing and personality. Although it was a great inspiration for younger Zimbabweans, particularly university students, he felt alienated in independent Zimbabwe. Homeless in his country, a myth that he was cursed developed around his unconventional life style and eccentric behaviour as he was considered
150 a failure in life. Brushes with government authorities confirmed his role as the persecuted rebel (Pattison, 2001a; Veit-Wild & Schade, 1988).
Individual psychology conceptualises maladjustment as the individual’s development of exaggerated feelings of inferiority and exaggerated striving for superiority (Adler, 1930).
Adler equated psychopathology with a feeling of discouragement, a feeling of hopelessness and the belief that one’s world is not going to change for the better (Ansbacher & Ansbacher,
1956). Marechera was homeless for two years upon his return to Zimbabwe until he found a small flat near the city centre. He only managed to secure a part time job as an educator at a local private college. Apart from that, he had no income other than his meagre royalties and fees from very few book reviews. He depended on friends for survival. Though he continued to write during the last years of his life, he did not have the inspiration and energy to write a book of the expressive scope, clarity and strength of his previous writings (Fraser, 1988;
Veit-Wild, 2004). The present researcher agrees with Adler (1964) in describing Marechera’s personality as that of an individual who had an underdeveloped social interest, one factor that underlies all types of psychological maladjustments.
7.4. The values of the study
7.3.1. The theoretical model of individual psychology. Adler’s influence within psychology has been extensive and his contribution to personality psychology in particular is one of the most enduring. He was considered by some researchers to be ahead of his time and his cognitive and social emphases are more compatible with trends in psychology today than with the psychology of his own day (Meyer et al., 2008). This prompted Abraham Maslow
(1970) to write: “Alfred Adler becomes more and more correct year by year…….as the facts come in, they give stronger and stronger support to his image of man” (p. 13).
Adler emphasised social interest in personality and his focus on the whole person and the unity of personality is reflected in the work of Gordon Allport (1937). The creative power of
151 the individual in shaping a style of life, and the insistence that future goals are more important than past events, influenced the work of Abraham Maslow (1970). A social- learning theorist, Julian Rotter (1982), wrote that he “was and continues to be impressed by
Adler’s insights into human nature” (p. 2).
Applying Adler’s theory of individual psychology to psychobiography promotes understanding over explanation (Carlson, 1988). The theoretical dynamism and flexibility allowed the present researcher an interpretation of the complexity of an ever-changing subject. Marechera was therefore understood within the socio-cultural and historical context and from a subjective view of reality to emphasise his individual lifestyle within the bounds of teleology (Adler, 1930, 1958). Individual psychology is valuable in psychobiographical research as it views a life in light of its end, because the fictional goal renders this comprehensible (Carlson, 1988). As an Adlerian psychobiography the research focused on
Marechera’s creativity and explored heredity and environmental influences within the perception of reality.
7.3.2. The psychobiographical case study method. Given the common assumptions about what constitutes scientific psychology, psychologists have devoted relatively little attention to developing research methods applicable to individual case studies. There is little investment in improving such research methods as psychobiography and case history research continues to be seen as unscientific. Most psychologists are content to let this circular loop continue largely undisturbed (Runyan, 1988a).
However, there are a few personality psychologists who have been interested in studying individuals such as Henry A. Murray, Gordon Allport, and Robert White (Runyan, 1982a).
The single most influential figure in modern psychobiography was undoubtedly Erik Erikson
(1902-1994), who was at Harvard University from 1960 to 1970, whose studies of Young
152
Man Luther (1958) and Gandhi’s Truth (1969) had an enormous impact, drawing public attention to psychobiography and psychohistory not only within psychology and psychiatry, but in the culture at large.
Psychobiographers have argued that the methodological strategies by which psychological data are collected, organized and interpreted may differ substantially between the psychobiographer and the ethnologist or neuroscientist. The scientific objectives may differ as well, as indicated by Allport’s (1937) differentiation of idiographic research from nomothetic research. But studying a specific individual with the methods best adapted to individual study does not automatically exclude such research from scientific psychology.
Nor can it be sharply differentiated from the broader sweep of science that also includes biology, geology and chemistry (Elms, 2007). As Elms (2007) noted; “The proof is in the pudding and a closer examination of psychobiographical research methods shows that the scientific kitchen can reliably produce individual puddings of considerable merit, as well as institutional dishes more suitable to cafeteria dining” (p. 26)
7.3.3. The research subject. Marechera’s lifespan was presented over a historical period of approximately 35 years, from his birth in 1952 to his death in 1987. The roots of the writer lie in the overcrowded township where he spent his youth and childhood. He was third born in a family of nine, four boys and five girls born between 1948 and 1964. The family of eleven lived in poverty in a small house in Vengere. Marechera was a quiet and withdrawn child. For a while he was a boy scout. He developed his passion for reading from a very early age as he escaped into the world of books to shut himself from the poverty and violence around him (Fraser, 1988; Habila, 2006; Veit-Wild, 2004).
Marechera attended St Augustine’s Mission, the first secondary school for blacks in the country and was always one of the most prestigious. It was a rare privilege for blacks to attend secondary school was during Marechera’s time. The lucky few who managed to get a
153 place found themselves under immense emotional strain, as the system was highly selective and competitive, which was heightened by the great expectations of their families. The learners also went through the usual process of acculturation through colonial and Christian education which alienated them from their traditional background (Fraser, 1988; Pattison,
2001a).
Marechera was a man with a reputation. He was twice expelled from university and went on to become a writer. As a writer his figure embodied the notion of the rebel artist, who devoted his life to artistic creation, was doomed by misunderstanding during his life, and then passes away before his time. Marechera is often represented as the enfant terrible of the
Zimbabwean literary scene (Gaylard, 1999; Shaw, 2006). In his writing which is autobiographical, Marechera explored the psyche of colonised subjects; their marginalisation and the violence to which they are subjected and which they themselves endorse. The post- colonial realities of Marechera’s writings are harsh and overtly disillusioned (Tionvanen,
2010).
Through Marechera’s authorial vision he discards belief in a better future for Zimbabwe, conveying that colonialism had penetrated all levels of reality in a definite manner (Pattison,
2001b). Because of his explicit pessimism, Marechera’s work was criticised in Zimbabwe as being apolitical and uncommitted. Over time, he has been elevated to cult status and the earlier critiques have been discredited as they are seen to be based on a misunderstanding
(Pattison, 2001a; Shaw, 2006; Toivanen, 2011).
It is important to emphasise the role that the writer’s early death plays in the cult phenomenon surrounding him. Marechera is seen as an unclaimed prospect that, due to the difficult circumstances that he was living in, was unable to prosper. Today, Marechera is seen to haunt the world of the living in a ghostly manner, which indicates a dejected unwillingness to accept the writer’s loss (Shaw, 2006; Toivanen, 2011).
154
Marechera is now represented as a prophet who saw the Zimbabwean crisis coming. In an interview in 1984 he said “I am afraid of one-party states, especially where you have more slogans than content in terms of policy and implementation” (Marechera, 2009, p. 8).
Marechera’s memory was marked by an interesting tension between victimhood and heroism, which suggests that the writer’s figure captures the meanings of both the failures and potentials of the Zimbabwean nation (Pattison, 2001a; Toivanen, 2011).
7.4. Limitations of the study.
7.4.1. The theoretical framework. Psychobiographies can be anchored in a single theory, in multiple theories or in no theory in particular. For example, Jones’s (1951) analysis of
Paul Morphy and Reuben Fine’s (2008) analysis of Bobby Fischer are exclusively anchored in Freudian psychoanalytic theory (Ponterotto, 2012). By contrast Schultz’s (2011) psychobiography of Truman Capote is anchored in the attachment theory and script theory.
It has been argued that viewing a historical figure within the lens of one theoretical model is potentially very limiting. Jones’s psychoanalytic treatment of Morphy was harshly criticized as well as Fine’s Freudian analysis of Fischer (Ponterotto, 2012). In some ways, these psychobiographies fell short of Schultz’s (2005b) final criteria of holding up and maintaining interpretive credibility over time and in the eyes of new scholars. The present researcher believes that the same limitation is equally applicable to the present study since it is based on one theory.
7.4.2. The psychobiographical case study method. Psychobiography is a form of cross cultural research, unless the subject lived in contemporary society. Often behaviour of the subject will not have had the same meaning in the subject’s era as it does in the present era.
The present researcher, like all other psychobigraphers, made interpretations on the basis of the present values and standards (Elms, 2007). Marechera lived in the pre and post-colonial
155
Zimbabwe; this means that the cultural context and more importantly the values have changed from that time to the present era, thereby limiting their proper interpretation. Over and above, that the nature of the research meant that the present researcher did not conduct interviews with individuals that shared the same cultural values with Marechera.
7.4.3. The psychobiographical subject. Marechera died at an early age of 35, which make it difficult to analyse his complete personality development. Furthermore, the scarcity of information regarding his life is characterised by a level of factual and chronological ambiguity. Not all the historical facts could be triangulated thereby limiting the study as far as credibility is concerned. However, the social constructionist nature of the psychobiographical narrative integrates a multi-dimensional perspective with a relatively consistent chronology of Marechera’s development. The present researcher content that the life of an enigmatic individual cannot be ignored because of historical discrepancies, but rather that it further motivates the necessity to make psychological sense of a unique subject.
7.5. Recommendations for future research.
The life of such an enigmatic figure like Marechera cannot be fully explored by a single study. It is therefore the present researcher’s recommendation that further research be done on Marechera using a multiple model approach. A combination of the following will help understand Marechera’s personality development better: (1) the diathesis stress model, that looks at the biological dispositions and environmental circumstances that lead to both the development of psychological strengths and challenges; (2) the family systems theory, that looks at Marechera’s life in the context of family dynamics, and (3) the psychosocial development theory that focuses on critical life tasks over the life span.
On a broader perspective the present researcher recommends the need for public and academic exposure of the psychobiographical case study research through academic
156 institutionalising psychobiography and its marketing by means of conference presentations and article publications. Psychobiography has remained housed in a few institutions in South
Africa and there has not been any formal coursework to prepare researchers for this type of research thereby, stalling its development.
7.6. Conclusion.
The life of the Zimbabwean writer, poet and novelist Marechera (1957-1987) was explored and described using Adler’s (1929) theory of individual psychology through the psychobiographical case study methodology. This chapter brought to closure the study of this enigmatic figure. A 1979 Guardian fiction prize winner for The House of Hunger, author of
Black Sunlight and Mindblast, Marechera is today regarded as one of the most influential
African writers. He was nothing like any of the African writers before him, Marechera considered himself a doppelganger;
I think that I am the doppelganger whom, until I appeared, African literature had not yet met. And in this sense I would question anyone calling me an African writer. Either you are a writer or you are not. If you write for a specific nation or a specific race, then f--- you. (Buuck, 1997; p. 121).
157
REFERENCES
Adler, A., (1927). Understanding human nature (W. B. Wolfe, Trans.). New York: Premier Books. Adler, A., (1929). The practice and theory of individual psychology (P. Radin, Trans.), London, England: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Adler, A., (1930). The science of living. London, England: George Allen & Unwin.
Adler, A., (1958). What life should mean to you. New York: Capricorn Books.
Adler, A., (1964). Problems of neurosis: A book of case histories. New York: Harper Torchbooks. Adler, A., (1982). The fundamental views of Individual Psychology. Journal of Individual Psychology, 38(1), 3 - 6. Alexander, I. E., (1988). Personality, psychological assessment and psychobiography. Journal of Personality, 56(1), 265 - 294. Alexander, I. E., (1990). Personality: Method and content in personality assessment and psychobiography. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Allport, G. W., (1937). Personality- A Psychological Interpretation. New York: Henry Holt and Company. Allport, G. W., (1942). The use of personal documents in psychological science. New York: Social Science Research Council. Alvesson, M. and Sköldberg, K., (2000) Reflexive Methodology: New Vistas for Qualitative Research. London, England: Sage. Anderson, J. W. (1981a). The methodology of psychological biography. Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 11(3), 455 - 475. Anderson, J. W. (1981b). Psychobiographical methodology: The case of William James. In L. Wheeler (Ed.), Review of personality and social psychology 2(1), 245 - 272. Ansbacher, H. L., & Ansbacher, R. R., (1956) (Eds.). The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler: A systematic presentation in selections from his writings. London, England: Allen & Unwin. Barlow, V. M., & Durand, D. H., (2010). Abnormal psychology: An integrative approach (5th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Group. Barnouw, V. (1973). Culture and personality. Homewood, Il: Dorsey. Bertaux, D. (Ed.) (1981). Biography and society: The life history approach in the social sciences. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Boeree, C. G., (2006). Alfred Adler. Retrieved November 25 2011 from: http://www.socialpsyhology.de/do/pt_adler.pdf.
158
Bujold, C. (1990). Biographical-hermeneutical approaches to the study of career development. In R. A. Young, & W. A. Borgen (Eds.), Methodological approaches to the study of career (pp. 57 - 69). New York: Praeger Press. Buuck, D. (1997) “African Doppelganger: Hybridity and Identity in the Work of Dambudzo Marechera.” Research in African Literature 28(2), 118-31. Carlson, R. (1988). Exemplary lives: The uses of psychobiography for theory development. Journal of Personality, 56(1), 105 - 138. Caute, D. (1983). Under the Skin: The Death of White Rhodesia, Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Chennelles A., & Veit-Wild, F., (1999). Introduction: The Man Who Betrayed Africa? In F. Veit-Wild, & A. Chennelles, (Eds.), Emerging Perspective on Dambudzo Marechera Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press. Cole, A. L., & Knowles, J. G., (2001). Lives in context: The art of life history research. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press. Corey, G. (2009). Theory and practice of counselling and psychotherapy (9th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/ Cole. Corsini R. J., & Wedding, D. (2009), Current Psychotherapies (8th ed.). Belmont, CA: Brooks/ Cole. Crehan, S. (1994) Review of Dambudzo Marechera: A Source Book on his Life and Work by Flora Veit-Wild. Research in African Literatures 25(2): 197-200. Creswell, J. W. (2011). Research design: Qualitative and quantitative approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Dinkmeyer, D. C., Pew, W. L., & Dinkmeyer, D. C., Jr. (1979). Adlerian counselling and psychotherapy. Belmont, CA: Brooks/ Cole. Edwards, D. (1990). Case study research method: A theoretical introduction and practice manual. Unpublished manuscript, Grahamstown, Rhodes University, South Africa. Elms, A. C. (1994). Uncovering lives: The uneasy alliance of biography and psychology. New York, Oxford University Press. Elms, A. C. (2005). Jung’s lives. Journal of the History of the Behavioural Sciences, 41, 331 - 346. Elms, A. C. (2007). Psychobiography and case study methods. In R. W. Robins, R. C. Fraley, & R. F. Krueger (Eds.), The Handbook of Research Methods in Personality Psychology. New York, Guilford Press, 97 - 13. Engler, B. (2009). Personality Theories: (8th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cenage Learning. Erikson, E.H. (1958). Young Man Luther. New York, Norton. Erikson, E.H. (1968). Identity: Youth and Crisis. New York: Norton.
159
Finlay, L. (2004) The practice of psychosocial occupational therapy (3rd ed.). Cheltenham, England: Nelson Thornes. Fiske, D. W. (1988). From inferred personalities towards personality in action. Journal of Personality, 56(1), 816 - 833. Fouchè, J. P. (1999). The life of Jan Christiaan Smuts: A psychobiographical study. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Port Elizabeth, Port Elizabeth, South Africa. Fouchè, J. P., Smit, R., Watson, M. B., & van Niekerk, R. (2007, September). Psychobiographical research in South Africa: A systematic review from 1995 to 2004. Paper presented at the PsySSA Conference, Pretoria, South Africa. Fouchè, J. P., & van Niekerk, R. (2005a, June). Psychobiography: An interdisciplinary approach between psychology and biography in the narrative reconstruction of personal lives. Paper presented at the International Society of Theoretical Psychology Conference, Cape Town, South Africa. Fouchè, J. P., & van Niekerk, R. (2005b, June). Psychobiography: Methodological criticisms, constraints and strategic considerations. Paper presented at the International Society of Theoretical Psychology Conference, Cape Town, South Africa. Fouchè, J. P., & van Niekerk, R. (2010). Academic psychobiography in South Africa; past present and future. South Africa Journal of Psychology 40(4), 495 – 507. Fraser, R. (1988). “Tribute to Dambudzo Marechera”, In F. Veit-Wild & E Schade (Eds.), Dambudzo Marechera, 4 June 1952 - 18 August 1987: Pictures, poems, prose, tributes Harare, Zimbabwe: Baobab Books. Freedman, J. & Combs, G. (1996) Narrative Therapy: The social construction of preferred realities. New York: Norton Freud, S. (1952). The major works of Sigmund Freud. Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica. Gaylard, G., (1999). Marechera’s Politic Body: The Menippeanism of “Lost Generation” in Africa? In F. Veit-Wild, & A. Chennelles, (Eds). Emerging Perspective on Dambudzo Marechera Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press. Gronn, P. (1993). Psychobiography on the couch: Character, biography and the comparative study of leaders. The Journal of Applied Behavioural Science, 29(3), 343 - 358. Habila, H., (2006). On Dambudzo Marechera: The Life and Times of an African Writer. The Virginia Quarterly Review, winter 2006, 251-260. Hasselkus, B. R. (2003). The voices of qualitative researchers: sharing the conversation. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 57(1), 7 - 8. Horney, K., (1937). The Neurotic Personality of Our Time. New York: Norton & Co. Howe, M. J. A. (1997). Beyond psychobiography: Towards more effective syntheses of psychology and biography. British Journal of Psychology, 88, 235 - 248.
160
HPCSA, (2008). Health Professions Council South Africa; Ethics guidelines for research. Accessed on 10 June, 2013 from; www.hpcsa.co.za/downloads/...ethics/rules/...ethical_rules/booklet_6.pdf Huberman, A. M. & Miles, M. B., (1994). Qualitative data analysis: A sourcebook of new methods. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Jung, C.G. (1921). Psychological Types, Collected Works, 6, Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. Jung, C.G., (1930), Psychology and Literature. In The Spirit in Art, Man and Literature (Collected Works 15, pp. 84-105), London, England: Routledge Classics. Manganyi, N. C., (1996). A black man called Sekoto. Johannesburg, South Africa: Witwatersrand University Press. Martin D., & Johnson, P., (1981). The Struggle for Zimbabwe: The Chimurenga War. London and Boston, England: Faber and Faber. Marechera D. (1978). The House of Hunger. London, England: Heinemann. Marechera D. (1980). Black Sunlight. London, England: Heinemann. Marechera D. (1984). Mindblast. Harare, Zimbabwe: College Press. Marechera D. (1992). Cemetery of Mind: Collected Poems of Dambudzo Marechera, edited by Veit-Wild, Harare, Zimbabwe: Baobab Books. Marechera D. (2009). The House of Hunger. Trenton, NJ. Africa World Press (reprint). Maslow, A. H. (1970). Motivation and Personality, (2nd ed.), New York, Harper & Row. McAdams, D. P. (2006). The person: An introduction to the science of personality psychology (4th ed.). New York: Wiley. McAdams, D. P., & Ochberg, R. L. (1988). Psychobiography and life narratives. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. McLeod, J. (1994). Doing counselling research. Thousand Oakes, CA: Sage.
Meyer, W., Moore, C. & Viljoen, H., (2008). Personology: From individual to ecosystem (4th ed.) Johannesburg, South Africa: Heinemann. Moorcraft, P. (1990). African Nemesis: War and Revolution in Southern Africa (1945-2010). London, England: Brasseys. Mosak, H. M., & Maniacci, M. (2009). The case of Roger. In R. J. Corsini & D. Wedding, (Eds.) Case studies in psychotherapy, 23 - 57. Itasca, IL: F. E. Peacock. Murray, H. A., & Kluckhohn, C., (1953). Personality in nature, society and culture. New York: Knopf. Murray, M. (2003). Narrative psychology and narrative analysis. In Camic, P. M., Rodes, J. E., & Yardley, L. (Eds.), Qualitative research in psychology: Expanding perspectives in
161
methodology and design, 95 - 111. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Needham, D. E., Machingaidze, E. K., & Bhebe, N., (1984). From Iron Age to Independence: History of Central Africa. London, England: Pearson Education Limited Pattison, D., (1994). “Call No Man Happy: Inside The Black Insider.” Journal of Southern African Studies 20(2), 231 - 232. Pattison, D. (2001a): Dambudzo Marechera: A Zimbabwean writer, or a writer from Zimbabwe? Wasafiri, 16:33, 18-22 Accessed August 21, 2011 from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02690050108589724 Pattison, D. (2001b). No Room for Cowardice Asmara, Eritrea: Africa World Press. Ponterotto, J. G., (2012). A psychobiography of Bobby Fischer. Illinos, Charles C. Thomas Publisher. Roberts, B. (2002). Biographical research. Buckingham, England: Open University Press. Rotter, J. B. (1982). The development and applications of social learning theory. New York: Praeger. Runyan, W. M. (1982). Life histories and psychobiography: Explorations in theory and method. New York: Oxford University Press. Runyan, W. M. (1983). Idiographic goals and methods in the study of lives. Journal of Personality, 51(3), 413 - 437. Runyan, W. M. (1988a). Progress in psychobiography. Journal of Personality, 56(1), 295 - 326. Runyan, W. M. (1988b) (ed.). Psychology and historical interpretation. New York: Oxford University Press. Schultz, T. W., (2005), Handbook of psychobiography, New York: Oxford University Press. Schultz, T. W. (2005a). How to write a psychobiography. In T. W. Schultz (Ed.), Handbook of psychobiography, 3 - 18, New York: Oxford University Press. Schultz, T. W. (2005b). How to strike psychological pay dirt in biographical data. In T. W. Schultz (Ed.), Handbook of psychobiography, 42 – 63, New York: Oxford University Press. Schultz, T. W. (2011). Truman Copote; A Psychological Portrait. Genius and Madness. New York, Oxford University Press, April, 208. Schultz, D. P., & Schultz, S. E. (2009). Theories of Personality (9th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Cengage Learning Shaw, D., (2006). ‘Deviant’ Innovations in Zimbabwean Writing: From the Racial Divide to Same Sex Desire. The Round Table 95(384), 273 - 281. Stake, R. E., (2005). Qualitative case studies. In N. K. Denzin, & Y. S. Lincoln, Strategies of qualitative inquiry, 443 - 466, Thousand Oakes, CA: Sage.
162
Stroud, L. (2004). A psychobiographical study of Mother Teresa. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Port Elizabeth, Port Elizabeth, South Africa. Toivanen, A., (2010). Negotiating Nationhood and Commitment: Readings of Yvonne Vera’s and Dambudzo Marechera’s Work and Authorial Image against the Backdrop of Crisis. Retrieved from; www.academia.edu/489504/PhD_Thesis_Introduction on 21 June 2012. Toivanen, A., (2011). “At the Receiving End of Severe Misunderstanding:” Dambudzo Marechera’s Representations of Authorship. Research in African Literatures, 42(1), 14 – 31. Veit-Wild, F., (2004). Dambudzo Marechera: A Source Book on his Life and Work, Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press. Veit-Wild. F., (2012): Me and Dambudzo, Wasafiri, 27(1), 1 - 7. Veit-Wild, F., & Schade, E., (Eds.), (1988). Dambudzo Marechera, 4 June 1952 - 18 August 1987: Pictures, poems, prose, tributes. Harare, Zimbabwe, Baobab Books. Watson, L. C., (1976) Understanding a life history as a subjective document; Hermeneutical and phenomenological perspectives. Journal of the Society for Psychological Anthropology. 4(1) pp. 95 - 131. Yardley, L. (2000). Dilemmas in qualitative health research. Psychology and Health, 15, 215 - 228. Yin, R. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods (4th ed.) Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
163
APPENDIX A: CHRONOLOGY OF MARECHERA’S LIFE
4 June 1952; Born; Vengere Township, Rusape
1958-1965; Primary school
1966-1971; Secondary school at St. Augustine’s Mission, Penhalonga
1972-July 1973; English Honours course at the University of Rhodesia
October 1974- March 1976; Undergraduate studies at New College, Oxford University
On leaving New College Marechera’s life style became increasingly nomadic as he
tried to become established as a writer. He had no regular employment and, until 1985,
no fixed abode.
March 1976 -September 1977; Oxford
October 1977 - January 1978; Wales
February 1978-January 1982; London - with periods at Sheffield University and West Berlin
in 1979.
February 1982 - August 1987; Harare
18 August 1987; Died in Harare
164