This is the title piece for Achebe’s collection Christmas in Biafra and Other Poems, a joint winner of the first Commonwealth Poetry Prize (1972). The poem graphically depicts the suffering endured by civilians during the bloody Nigerian civil war (1967–70) (also known as the Biafran War), which began when the eastern, predominantly Igbo section of Nigeria attempted to secede and form an independent state. The ensuing conflict proved disastrous for the nation and led to great loss of life from Nigerian military attacks on Biafran civilian populations, disease, and famine.
The poem’s first stanza depicts a figure stumbling into a village on or near Christmas Day. The stanza portrays a nightmarish scene of warfare (bombs and gunfire are implied) that ironically is taking place during the festive Christmas season, when Christians are supposed to celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace.
The second stanza describes the meticulous detail with which a group of Catholic nuns has set up a traditional manger scene outside a hospital. Here the ironic contrast between the peaceful manger scene and the previous stanza’s description of the stumbling figure wandering into the village is further heightened.
The third stanza depicts the figure, now identified as a destitute mother. She is holding a starving child—quite the opposite of the plump Christ child depicted in the second stanza—and standing before the Christmas scene. She has nothing to offer—not even the practically worthless aluminum coins that other worshipers have deposited at the outdoor crèche. The Biafran child lies motionless on his mother’s shoulder, staring glassy-eyed into the distance.
The final stanza—in which the woman tries in vain to interest her child in his surroundings—strikes a symbolic chord. The child only glances at the Nativity scene for a moment before reverting to his former position and gazing into the distance. The mother, shrugging, venerates the religious statuary, then walks away with her stricken child.
Christmas in Biafra (1969) finds Achebe utilizing his poetic gifts to craft a complex signifying system from the few, well-chosen images he composes into the poem’s brief series of visionary scenes. For instance, the European-made Nativity scene, which features the serene Holy Mother and a well-fed Christ child, stands in sharp contrast to the real and despondent African mother and her starving infant. Additionally, the final two stanzas—portraying the mother’s failed attempt to interest her son in the Christmas scene and her subsequent departure—could well represent the evident failure of European ideologies to provide an adequate solution to Africa’s problems.
Categories: British Literature, Literature
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