Manipulation of narrative paradigm in Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s Wrestling with the Devil (2018)
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This article evaluates Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s manipulation of the narrative paradigm in recasting his prison narrative Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary to come up with Wrestling with the Devil. Grounding the discussion on the theories of narratology, rhetoric and autobiography, this study argues that Ngũgĩ’s revision of his prison narrative serves both a political and rhetorical agenda. The study concludes that Ngũgĩ’s manipulation of the narrative paradigm advances his anti-imperialist ideology and anti-dictatorship agenda. However, it works against his rhetorical intention of advancing his political agenda since it compromises his ethos and evokes the reader’s mistrust of some of his claims in the text. The study recommends that this kind of criticism should be extended to other revised autobiographical writings to establish their writers’ rhetorical intentions of recasting their works.
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