Socialist Humanism in the Contemporary Anglophone Kenyan Novels

Abstract

This study entitled Socialist Humanism in the Contemporary Anglophone Kenyan Novels attempts to read different Contemporary Anglophone Kenyan novels through the lens of Socialist Realism aspect, Socialist Humanism. Socialist Realism appeared for the first time in a speech of 17th May 1932 by Ivan Gronsky [4], and gaining worldwide recognition with postcolonial literary works, has been a focal point of different scholarly studies. In Kenya, the author Ngugi wa Thiong'o wrote literary works which can be seen in Socialist Realist eyes. The motivation behind taking up this topic is to fill the research gap in reading different novels from Kenya in one volume and to be able to observe the trend in the practice and significance of using Socialist Realism. In doing so, the paper aims to show the re-emergence of Socialist Realism literary theory and Socialist Realist authors. After it was considered an outdated literary theory, and how different novelists from Kenya have applied the feature that Socialist Realism is known for. Three novels have been chosen for this study namely; Dust, A Journey Within, and Was Nyakeeru My Father?. All the novels were published after 2000 G.C. To read these novels, a theoretical framework is formed using Socialist Realism’s feature theorized by different critics. The study concludes that different novelists in Kenya used the Socialist Realism feature, Socialist Humanism associating it with their contexts, connecting it with their respective historical background, shared current statues, commenting on existing economic, social, and political situations.