Part One

Effia

Summary: Effia

Effia Otcher is born in Fanteland on a night when a fire tears a path through the woods all the way to a village in Asanteland. That night, Effia’s father, Cobbe, knows that the legacy of the fire will haunt his family for generations. Throughout her childhood, Effia is abused by her mother, Baaba, especially after Baaba gives birth to Effia’s brother, Fiifi. As Effia grows older, her beauty becomes apparent. Men begin delivering gifts, hoping to marry Effia once she begins menstruating. One of the village girls, Adwoa Aidoo, marries a British soldier and leaves the village to live with him in the Cape Coast Castle. Cobbe tells Effia that he has plans for her to marry the man next in line to be the village chief, Abeeku Badu.

Soon after Effia turns fifteen, she tells Baaba that she has gotten her period, though Baaba says she must not tell anyone. After the old chief dies, Abeeku is made chief. Effia learns from Fiifi that Abeeku is facilitating the slave trade between the British and the Asantes. While Abeeku is meeting with the British, Baaba devises a way for Effia to meet some of the men. One of the soldiers, James Collins, returns to the village to ask Cobbe for his permission to marry Effia. Cobbe is furious, as he has promised Effia to Abeeku, but Baaba convinces both Cobbe and Abeeku that Effia is infertile. Before Effia leaves, Baaba gives her a black stone pendant, telling her it is “a piece of [her] mother.”

Effia and James are married at the Cape Coast Castle. However, the soldiers have other wives and families back in Britain and so refer to their African wives as “wenches.” While James gives Effia a tour of the castle, she realizes there are people being kept in the dungeons underground. Effia at first begs to go home, having heard of the British slave trade, but then remembers there is nothing left for her there. Effia finds herself caring for James. However, as the months pass without a pregnancy, Effia worries that Baaba was right about her infertility after all.

Adwoa, who is now her friend, gives her roots to put under their bed that would help her become pregnant but warns her to not let James see them. However, after James and Effia make love that night, James catches sight of the roots and tells her he does not want “voodoo or black magic” in the castle as it’s “not Christian.” Effia realizes she is pregnant soon afterward. However, Effia receives word that Cobbe is sick and returns to her village. There, Fiifi tells Effia that Baaba is not her real mother. Effia’s mother was a house girl who ran away into the fire after Effia was born and left behind the stone pendant.

Analysis: Effia

The symbol of fire—which will recur throughout Homegoing—appears on the night of Effia’s birth, foreshadowing the suffering she and her family will face for years to come. That the fire burns from Fanteland to Asanteland shows how it will connect the two areas—which will struggle for power throughout the novel—and, eventually, two families. Effia later learns that her mother abandoned her in the fire. Even though Effia has a relatively prosperous childhood, she suffers at the hands of Baaba, the woman who took over the role of mother after the fire. Because of this, Effia is forced to marry a white man and live far away from her family. As a result of the fire, Effia is set on a path far from home, a home her descendants will strive to return to for generations.

The symbol of the black stone pendant is also introduced in this chapter. When Effia first receives it, she naturally assumes it is from Baaba. However, upon learning that Baaba is not her mother after all, Effia understands that this pendant is all she will ever know of her true mother. As Effia will go on to pass this pendant down to her descendants, the pendant becomes a symbol of connection to one’s heritage. The pendant will also serve as a reminder of the trauma and pain that is passed down with each generation.

Effia, both through her family of birth and through her marriage, becomes unwillingly complicit in the slave trade. Abeeku and the other villagers can only see the economic benefits of facilitating the slave trade. Similarly, the British officers use marriage as a political tool to make alliances with certain villages. Effia seems to be the only person who recognizes the human toll and suffering of the practice of slavery, as she nearly runs from the castle upon realizing what the dungeons are used for. However, Effia’s status as a powerless woman renders her unable to do what she wants. This shows how the system of slavery and colonization relies on the oppression inherent in traditional power structures, such as that between men and women.

While living in the castle, Effia experiences racism in ways she never has before. In Fante culture, it is completely normal for men, especially powerful men, to have multiple wives. However, because most of the British men have wives back home, they use the derogatory term “wenches” to refer to the African women they marry. This shows how the British believe their own customs to be superior to those of the Africans and how the British see African women as inferior to British women. Effia is also surprised by James’s dismissal of the roots as “black magic” and his comparison of it to Christianity. The British colonizers see their religion and way of life as the only right moral code. To deride some roots under a bed as “black magic” shows that James associates “black” with “evil.”