I maintain that colonial Zimbabwe was a mixture of archaic Western culture (but barely the Modern variety of Western culture) and African traditional culture. Since both have created the uneven blend, it is hard to know where one culture stops and the other starts. In general it seems that Zimbabwean culture as a whole embraced fatalism.
Hear Marechera:
"[B]ut the brain only dies at its own behest and the body is a precious thing which, fading and knotting within itself, generates a new being who shimmers around the old body and does not die unless the great star comes down." [ p 80 The House of Hunger]
Similarly, in reading an article by a white ex-Zimbabwean author, I recently caught a whiff of the notion that "you do not die unless your time is up." This certainly explains how many white Rhodesian young men joined the army, trusting their fates into "God's hands". It is an ode to fatalism. They understood that they could take any risk imaginable but would not die unless their God had particularly set that time and place in advance for them to die. This explains why they did not read the sign of the times correctly, (seeing that the force of global opinion would not allow them to prevail). Instead, they continued to sacrifice themselves, believing in Providence to do the right thing by them.
And now? I see that a different mode of thinking prevails. It says, "You had a choice!" and "You are to blame completely for making the wrong choices!"
Could it actually be that I am now living in a completely different culture?
Hear Marechera:
"[B]ut the brain only dies at its own behest and the body is a precious thing which, fading and knotting within itself, generates a new being who shimmers around the old body and does not die unless the great star comes down." [ p 80 The House of Hunger]
Similarly, in reading an article by a white ex-Zimbabwean author, I recently caught a whiff of the notion that "you do not die unless your time is up." This certainly explains how many white Rhodesian young men joined the army, trusting their fates into "God's hands". It is an ode to fatalism. They understood that they could take any risk imaginable but would not die unless their God had particularly set that time and place in advance for them to die. This explains why they did not read the sign of the times correctly, (seeing that the force of global opinion would not allow them to prevail). Instead, they continued to sacrifice themselves, believing in Providence to do the right thing by them.
And now? I see that a different mode of thinking prevails. It says, "You had a choice!" and "You are to blame completely for making the wrong choices!"
Could it actually be that I am now living in a completely different culture?
