Homegoing Akua Summary & Analysis

Akua

Summary: Akua

Akua has been unable to stop her nightmares of a woman made of fire holding two babies. One night, Akua’s husband, Asamoah, wakes her from a nightmare, and she tells him that he shouldn’t have burned the white man in retribution for the British arresting and exiling the Asante king. This event was what started Akua’s dreams at the age of sixteen. Akua spends her days doing chores with her mother-in-law, Nana Serwah, and her daughters. Akua often stops on the way to the market to stare at the spot where the white man was burned, a traveler who was resting under a tree until children began shouting, alerting others to his presence. The villagers took out the rage that had been brewing for months by burning him as he begged for his life, explaining that he was not from the government. When Akua returns to the compound, she learns that the Asante are going to war with the British, and Asamoah leaves with the other men.

Akua recalls growing up in the Christian missionary school. The missionary told Akua that she was a sinner like her mother and that the British would help her and other Africans give up their heathenism and turn to God. The missionary wouldn’t let Akua leave the school to marry Asamoah and eventually revealed that Abena drowned while he tried to baptize her. The missionary burned Abena’s body and destroyed everything that belonged to her. After hearing this, Akua left the school.

Now, Akua, who is pregnant, continues to have nightmares of the woman made of fire. Noticing Akua’s fatigue, Nana Serwah assumes Akua is sick and sends her away to rest in her hut away from her daughters. Nana Serwah refuses to let Akua leave her hut for a week until Asamoah returns. Over the next few months, the war ends, and Akua is unable to sleep. The villagers have begun calling Akua “Crazy Woman” as she no longer speaks. A few weeks later, she gives birth to her son, Yaw, whom she feels will be okay. Akua begins talking more and sleeping some, though she wanders in her sleep.

One night, Akua falls asleep and dreams of being on the beach near Cape Coast Castle, breathing fire into the ocean, which turns into the fire woman holding two children. Akua reaches out to them, her hands turning into fire as she takes the children. Akua awakens to shouts of “Crazy Woman” as she is carried by a crowd and sees that her hands and feet are burned. Akua asks what is happening and is told that because she was raised by white men, she will die like one. The crowd ties her to the tree where they burned the white traveler. Asamoah pleads with the crowd, though they ask why he would side with the woman who killed his children. Akua is confused, and Asamoah explains that he was only able to save Yaw. Eventually, the villagers release Akua.

Analysis: Akua

Here it is revealed what happened to Abena after she left her village. Though Abena knew white missionaries were not to be trusted, the missionary school was the only place she felt she could bring her daughter. Even once the slave trade was over, white people attempted to colonize Africa in the name of religion, asserting the superiority of Christianity over the religions practiced by Africans. The missionary confesses to Akua that he had been trying to baptize Abena and cleanse her of her sins but ended up drowning her instead. The symbol of water reappears here, showing how, even when colonization is done in the name of something good or helpful, in the end, it will only harm the people it is claiming to help. The effects of colonization are also present in the British demanding the Asante Golden Stool. This symbol means nothing to them, though by trying to take it away, they are asserting their dominance over African culture.

Though Akua grew up without a sense of her own past, learning of her mother’s fate allows her to assert her own identity and leave the missionary school. However, after seeing the white man burned alive, Akua seems to have lost her identity. The symbol of fire plagues Akua from the time the white man is burned. Although the man was an innocent traveler, the Asante people saw him as an extension of the British slave traders. This shows how the slave trade harms not only those directly involved but all innocent people. Akua is so disturbed by the memory of seeing the man burn that she frequently stops at the spot where it happened to remember it. Akua continues to be harmed by her family’s past misdeeds, even though she is not aware of her ancestors’ participation in the slave trade. However, like her ancestors, Akua did nothing to stop her fellow villagers burning the white man, showing her family’s continued complicity in the effects of the slave trade. Yet unlike her ancestors, Akua is haunted by this memory in a way that will lead to devastating consequences.

The fire woman she sees in her dreams seems to be Maame, holding Effia and Esi as babies, still burning from the fire Maame lit the night she escaped. Akua is unaware of the fire or the existence of Esi, but her dreams show how she, along with all of Maame’s descendants, will forever be tied to that fire and its consequences. That the symbol of water appears in Akua’s final dream reveals the full connection between Akua’s ancestors and the transportation of enslaved people across the Atlantic. It is this dream that leads Akua to burn her family’s hut down in her sleep, perhaps subconsciously trying to stop the cycle of generational trauma that has existed since the night Maame set her own fire years ago. However, Akua finds herself in the same position as the white man who was burned, facing punishment for something she has no memory or awareness of. This again shows how being ignorant of one’s own heritage can cause not only trauma but the commitment of the mistakes of one’s ancestors.

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