POST COLONIAL CONFLICT AND CULTURAL COMPLEXITIES: A READING OF MONGO BETI’S REMEMBER RUBEN, KING LAZARUS AND PERPERTUA AND THE HABIT OF UNHAPPINESS

Abstract

The French colonial government was quite different from the English, in francophone countries the policy of assimilation was used against the policy of association as used by Anglophone countries. As such literatures coming from these former French colonies were written in French. With the end of colonialism, the new trend of post colonialism afforded writers the opportunity, to represent themselves through literature. This paper aims to look at the francophone literature and representation of post colonial Cameroon, through the works of Mongo Beti.  An essential theme of Beti’s early novels, which advocate the removal of all vestiges of colonialism, is the basic conflict of traditional modes of African society with the system of colonial rule and the attendant cultural complexities. This paper attempts to bring out these features in Remember Ruben, King Lazarus, and Perpetua and the Habit of Unhappiness and establishes the intricacies inherent in the postcolonial Cameroon.