Half of a Yellow Sun : a experiência dos cronotopos no contexto da Guerra de Biafra

Abstract

Half of a Yellow Sun, a novel authored by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, features a narrative in which the experience of chronotopoi assists in understanding the context of the Biafran War (1967-1970). The plot, divided into four interdependent parts, enables at least two axes of critical observation: a) the perception of the formation of postmodern/post-colonial subjects in an African scenery and b) the fragmentation of the concept of space-time in those individual’s experience. Fictional figures in the novel are positioned in an epoch and place of change and transition, confronting the displacement of ancient African cultural traditions and the increasing presence of foreign, Western values. Therefore, the aim of our work is to analyze the construction of chronotopoi from a perspective based on characters such as Ugwu, Olanna, and Richard, as well as their respective nuclei of participation. In a post-colonial context of production, this novel allows the reader the opportunity to know the literary story of one of the major traumas in the African context witnessed by Nigerians and Biafrans and to feel the breath of the wind of globalization through the pages of the text.