44 pages • 1 hour read
Flora NwapaEfuru
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1966A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 13-15Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 13 Summary
Gilbert meets an old friend, Sunday Eneke, and they reminisce about their days in school. Sunday has since joined the army and is back on leave for the first time. They talk about how Gilbert used to tease Sunday’s younger sister, Nkoyeni, and call her his wife.
Sunday asks Gilbert if he has children, and Gilbert reveals that he has a son, though it is not his wife’s child. Gilbert says that he is afraid to tell his wife and his mother about it, though he must.
Nkoyeni comes out and greets Gilbert, saying that she remembers him from when they were young. When she leaves, Gilbert asks Sunday why he is sending her to school when it all ends “in the kitchen” (Chapter 13, Location 3586). Sunday defends the idea, saying that an educated woman can earn money as a teacher and that if women are forced to quit school in order to marry, it is the men’s fault.
Chapter 14 Summary
Omirima comes to visit Amede. She complains to Amede about her daughter-in-law, who went to school and acts like a white woman. The daughter-in-law does not wake up when the cock crows like the rest of the women do, but only when the sun has risen. This shocks Amede, and the women commiserate about how lazy and idle foreign women are. Amede says she pities the white women who live in big houses and have nothing to do: “It must be a difficult life” (Chapter 14, Location 3611).
Omirima asks how Gilbert’s new wife Nkoyeni is doing, and Amede says that Efuru is taking good care of her. Omirima then asks about how the family is handling the matter of Gilbert’s son. Amede is surprised that Omirima knows about this because the boy only visited for a few days before returning to Ndoni. Efuru was upset that Gilbert did not tell her about his affair, but she was happy to keep the child. Nkoyeni, on the other hand, said that she would not raise a “bastard” son and sent the child back to his mother.
Omirima scolds Amede for letting them send the boy back to Ndoni. She asks why Amede cannot control her family. Amede says that she is old, and besides, she does not want to interfere in her son’s life. Omirima tells her that her son’s life is her life, so it is impossible for her to interfere.
The chapter ends with Amede revealing that Nkoyeni is pregnant.
Chapter 15 Summary
Nwosu tells his wife that he had a dream about Nwashike Ogene dressed for a feast. Nwabata tells him that it is an omen that means Nwashike is dead or will die very soon.
Just then, they hear cannon fire, which signals that Nwashike is indeed dead. Nwosu and his friend Igwe travel down the Great River to town to see what has happened, passing through peaceful scenery as they paddle. The cannon continues to fire, which the men find disturbing. In the colonial era, Portuguese, Dutch, English, and French slave dealers gave people cannons in exchange for slaves. Thus, owning cannons signified that a wealthy family took part in slave dealing. This direct contact with white people distinguished these families in the eyes of the community.
Nwosu and Igwe arrive in town, and someone greets them to announce that Nwashike is dead. The chapter ends with a passage describing the cheap ornaments, cannons, and other objects that the Europeans traded for Black slaves.
Chapters 13-15 Analysis
These chapters are shorter than the others in the novel and serve as preparation for the novel’s climax. The significant events in this section are Gilbert’s marriage to Nkoyeni and Nwashike Ogene’s death. These chapters also give the reader a chance to see the world through the other characters’ perspectives. Efuru does not appear in these chapters, except indirectly when Amede tells Omirima that Efuru did not object to Gilbert’s son. Symbolically, Efuru’s absence from the narrative presages her distancing from the family. Now that Gilbert has a new, young, pregnant wife, Efuru is relegated to the background.
Interactions with Western culture dominate these chapters. Omirima and Amede do not understand the lives of white women who do not have to wake before sunrise to begin the day’s work. To them, this is a detriment rather than a privilege, and they pity the women for having nothing to do. This section reveals how integral work is to the concept of womanhood in Igbo culture. Efuru embodies this quality perfectly, but part of a woman’s “work” is childbearing, and in this she still falls short.
Chapter 15 uses Nwashike’s death as an opportunity to focus on the complex and problematic relationship between Africans and European slave dealers. The novel has established the respectability of the Ogene lineage and now reveals that the family owes that respectability at least in part to their association with white slavers. The cannon is symbolic in that it not only announces Nwashike’s death, but the death of the last member of a generation that directly participated in slavery.
