In search of the better? The representations of Utopia and dystopia in Kofi Awoonor’s This Earth, My Brother…

Abstract

This paper is informed by the extensive corpus of African postcolonial critique that examines the after-effects of empire in ex-colonial societies. Thus, in the studied engagement of the Ghanaian ex-colonial state, this paper turns to Awoonor’s This Earth, My Brother..., read as one of such commentaries on the rusted, conscienceless ex-colonial nation and the tones of negative burdens laid on citizens’ existential quest for selfhood, self-actualisation and the assertion of identity. In such a circumstance, one may be lost between the real world and a wishful world; the real being the present state of affairs and the wishful being that for which they yearn. Through critical reading and analysis, we discuss the representations of utopia and dystopia in This Earth, My Brother..., in the light of the myriad features that these concepts offer. The paper argues that the extradiegetic Ghanaian nation has much to learn from Awoonor’s diegetic lifeworld.