POLYGAMY: ETHICS, SPIRITUALITY AND MARRIAGE, A TRAGEDY

I am Joseph R. Alila, the author of Sunset on Polygamy (ISBN 1424166845).Sunset on Polygamy is the first of six novels and two collections of poems that I have written. This novel speaks to the sociological, spiritual as well anthropological underpinnings of governance, courtship, marriage, polygamy, remarriage, conflicts, death and disease among the Luo of East Africa. I have also addressed how these aspects of life affect the understanding and management of the New Disease epidemic (read AIDS epidemic) among my people (the Luo).

As a social critic, I believe that my role is to blow the horn, to warn, to praise, to mourn, and to ask questions whenever there is an emergent cultural problem. In this role, I have tried to be an innocent presenter (and sometimes an active presenter) of facts as I see them, and calling human folly what it is.It may come as a surprise to some of my readers that my female heroines (Felicia the Nyadendi, Nyapora, Megan and Gina) tend to influence the destiny of their homes and husbands and a whole people. But this is a natural consequence of the fact that, among the Luo, marriage is a spiritual institution, and the woman is at the center of worship within the home. When polygamy is factored into the marriage equation, marriage becomes one complex religious institution with its own dos and don’ts. Now, when the ethical references and goalposts are frayed and weakened by social decay, marriage in general (and polygamy in particular) becomes a complex deathtrap in the face of emergent disease epidemics such as AIDS. When the symptoms of AIDS are confused for that of chira (deadly curse), the tragedy of our human folly becomes immeasurable.

SUNSET ON POLYGAMY

By Joseph R. Alila

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COMING SOON!

WHISPER TO MY ACHING HEART (By Joseph R Alila)

Literature & Fiction

In Joseph Alila's "WHISPER TO MY ACHING HEART," a young widow (Apiny) finds herself to be the bearer of the damning "maritally untouchable" tag in the male-dominated Eighteenth-Century Africa. Ejected along side her widowed mother-in-law (Awino), and ridiculed by friends, Apiny must wait for fifteen years before she receives a man in her bed, but only after Awino(she is almost sixty) remarries and gives birth to a boy (Olan’go Otin) who marries her in his mid-teen. Even with all the handsome sons and beautiful daughters she wished for from her youthful lover, Apiny is not at peace in her heart. She mourns silently and struggles in her heart as her youthful husband is compelled by Luo customs to get his own wife. Finally, Apiny must let go the love of her life (Otin)and share his heart with a younger woman (Nyogola). In her senior years, she is motivated by the reality of her age and the powers of a widow to eject Otin and invite an older and more age-appropriate man into her company.


JOSEPH R. ALILA