Bessie Head and radical feminism

Bessie Head’s latter day work, a collection of dense short stories, The Collector of Treasures, published in 1977, is a work that approaches radical feminism. This is because in radical feminism, as seen in many of these stories, there is an inherent view that society is fundamentally a patriarchy where men dominate and oppress women.

Bessie Head who was born in 1937 and died in 1986, was a South African writer who, though born in South Africa, is usually considered Botswana’s most influential writer. She wrote novels, short fiction and autobiographical works that are infused with spiritual questioning and reflection.

Radical feminist literature, as these stories show, seeks, through intent and thought, tracks of the major character, to expose patriarchy as one front in a struggle to liberate everyone from an unjust society through challenging existing social norms and institutions. This struggle, as seen in these stories, includes opposing the sexual objectification of women, raising public awareness about such issues as violence against women, challenging the concept of gender roles.

Radical feminists argue that, because of patriarchy, women have come to be viewed as the “other” to the male norm, and as such have been systematically oppressed and marginalised. Radical feminism espouses the view that the primary element of patriarchy is a relationship of dominance, where one party is dominant and exploits the other for the benefit of the former.

Radical feminists believe that men (as a class) use social systems and other methods of control to keep women (as well as non-dominant men) suppressed. Radical feminist literature, such as Bessie Head’s The Collector of Treasures, seeks to abolish patriarchy by challenging existing social norms and institutions, and believe that eliminating patriarchy will liberate everyone from an unjust society.

Just a cursory reading of many of these stories will show that they are basically about female matters. The stories are based on female agency. The stories have women in society as the entry point. The stories are particularly seen almost all the way from their point of view of women, who try to actively and consciously offset male dominancy. That is a key characteristic of radical feminism.

In the title story, The Collector of Treasures, Dikeledi Mokopi of Puleng village murders her husband, Garesego Mokopi, by cutting his genitals with a sharp knife. He had molested her to the fullest. That kind of action by the woman is often a characteristic of radical feminism because it tends to support the view that if need be, the woman should actually eliminate the monster-man in her life. Only then can she move on in peace.

After having had children with Dikeledi, Garesego moves on to the next village and starts to cohabit with a concubine. Dikeledi fends for the children on her own. She also has to turn to a friend’s husband even for sexual satisfaction! In fact, Dikeledi’s friend sees her friend’s sexual frustration and suggests to her that her own husband could be loaned to her so that at least Dikeledi may also have moments of intimacy.

In what could be one of the most pleasantly shocking moments in all African literature, Kenalepe tells Dikeledi that she should try her husband, Paul, in bed and experience the real joys of sexual intercourse: “I sometimes think I enjoy that side of life (sex) far too much. Paul knows a lot about that…I can loan Paul to you if you like…I have never had a friend like you in my life…Paul takes care of that side…I wouldn’t mind loaning him because I am expecting another child…”

So, eventually Kenalepe is in hospital delivering her baby and Paul and Dikeledi become intimate. In the style of radical feminism, this strengthens the sisterhood between Dikeledi and Kenalepe. The two women are able to share that which is considered a woman’s most prized possession by traditional society.

However, in her heart, Dikeledi is grateful to be loaned a man for sex, but she becomes deeply hurt and unforgiving towards her absent husband, Garesego. When Dikeledi follows up Garesego for their son’s fees, he ignores her. He only writes to tell Dikeledi that he is coming back when he learns through rumours that she is being sexually serviced by the husband of her friend. In a letter, Garesego asks to come back just to sleep with Dikeledi after many years of having abandoned her.

The night Garesego returns to Dikeledi, he is pompous and shows no remorse for his long absence. He ignores the children whom he has not seen in years, he greedily eats the food that Dikeledi has prepared and crawls to bed naked, expecting Dikeledi to join him. As he waits for the sexual encounter, Dikeledi finds a knife from under her bed and kills her selfish husband by cutting off his genitals!

When Dikeledi is eventually taken to prison for the horrendous crime, she has no remorse. She actually finds four other women from across Botswana who have also slaughtered their abusive husbands. From start to finish, this one is a gradual story of female triumph. It is meant to awaken the reader to a new reality.

In the other story called The Special One, issues of female triumph are dealt with. A prominent teacher, Mrs Maleboge is very sad because after the death of her husband, she loses everything to her husband’s people. In her humiliation, she tells a younger teacher that, “I lost it because women are just dogs in this society.”

As if that is not enough, another younger woman, Gaenametse, almost dies from stress because the man she loves is running away with another woman: “He’s gone to her again!” she burst out. “I am at my wit’s end, Mma-Maleboge. My love for my husband has reached the over limit stage. I cannot part from him.”

So, Mrs Maleboge and Gaenametse are always praying hoping this man will return. Then six months later the narrator meets Gaenametse and discovers that she is no longer pining for a man who does not care for her. She has, suddenly, in radical feminist fashion, a way to atone for it and enjoy life regardless.

Gaenametse says: “Oh! Life isn’t so bad….I can tell you a secret. Even old women like Mrs Maleboge are quite happy. They still make love.” And more directly, Gaenametse says, “When you are old that is when you make love, more than when you are young. You make love because you are no longer afraid of making babies. You make love with young boys…”

So, these newly radical women, Gaenametse and Maleboge, appear to find an answer to their sadness. They appear to have decided that since men run away with younger women for sex, they would rather do the same instead of pining! It is part of the view that women should be able to do everything that men do.

Maybe that is why the co-founder of radical feminism, Ellen Willis wrote in 1984 that radical feminists “got sexual politics recognised as a public issue,” created second-wave feminism’s vocabulary, helped to legalise abortion in the USA, and they “were the first to demand total equality in the so-called private sphere” such as “housework and child care … emotional and sexual needs.”

It is also apparent that Gaenametse is having sexual affairs with various men, the old and the young and she is now happier than before.
In the story “Hunting,” the man Tholo is a very good and understanding man. You can see that he is created to be the perfect man who demonstrates that life between husbands and wives could be worthy living if men are prepared to be liberal and understanding in the home. Where Tholo’s people are worried that he is marrying Thato, an elderly woman who is experienced and has given birth to a child before, this is actually the reason that he falls for Thato. He wanted her experience that tended to calm her.

Thato is radical. Her reason for having her child out of wedlock: “I had waited long time for marriage. Then I decided to have the child because I might have grown old without having any children…” But when she sees Tholo for the first time, she does not wait for his proposal to know that she was dying for him. She is free and her love for him comes to her the way tradition expects it to happen to menfolk. She knows the kind of man she wants by merely watching him work and plough the land with a tractor.

An equally intriguing story in this collection is called ‘Life’. The modernised girl called Life is a new arrivant from Johannesburg. She comes due to the wave of Botswana’s independence in 1966 which saw migrants returning home. When Life returns to her village, she teaches her people liberal ways. Life Morapedi is not the typical village girl of Botswana: “The girl wore an expensive cream costume of linen material, tailored to fit her tall, full figure. She had a bright, vivacious friendly manner and laughed freely and loudly. Her speech was rapid…”

She tells people that, “Money flows like water in Johannesburg and you just have to know how to get it.” Soon she teaches her people to accept her open declaration that she is actually a prostitute. Men start to come from near and far to try her in bed. She sets tongues wagging! She also encourages massive brewing and selling of beer in the village and many villagers start to appreciate this commercial culture. At some point, a well to do man negotiates and decides to marry her regardless.

However, the man who marries her is still conservative and soon he fails the test as he cannot stand the fact that while Life is married to him, she still has the freedom to go to bed with other men! The horrendous violence that occurs at the end of the story is portrayed as men’s incapacity to accept that it is backward to try and rein in women’s sexuality. You learn painfully that ending patriarchy is the most necessary step towards a truly free society.

This view is also central to radical feminism.
These stories give us an opportunity to experience the internal capacity of women to love men something not common in male authored stories where we are constantly exposed only to the unfettered feelings of men in love.

In the story ‘Heaven is not Closed’ the woman Galethebege, who falls for Ralokae, is described thus: “It was the first time love had come her way. And it made the blood pound fiercely through her whole body till she could feel it’s very throbbing at the tips of her fingers. It turned her thoughts from God a bit…” Such descriptions are usually associated with men.

But, Bessie Head goes on and on about how a woman feels when in love.
Radical feminism is a perspective within feminism that calls for a radical re-ordering of society in which male supremacy is eliminated in all social and economic contexts, while recognising that women’s experiences are also affected by other social divisions such as race, class, and sexual orientation.

Bessie Emery Head was born in South Africa in 1937. Her mother was a member of a prominent family, suffered from mental illness, and was white, while her father was a black servant in her maternal family’s household. Their relationship was illegal in South Africa at the time of Head’s birth, and she was sent into foster care as a baby.

Head trained to become a teacher and taught for a few years, but her true passion was found in writing. Along with writing for various newspapers in Cape Town, Head developed an interest in South African politics, something that eventually led to her being arrested.

Head’s life was constantly in a state of flux. She suffered from a depressive personality, and she often experienced financial problems. Head married her husband Harold Head in 1961, and they had a son, also named Harold, in 1962. Soon after, her marriage was on the rocks, and when she and her son were given visas for neighbouring Botswana, Head left her marriage and South Africa for good to teach in Serowe.

There, Head taught and worked on a farm, gathering information for her books. She gained citizenship fifteen years after moving to Botswana, and was considered a refugee until that point. Towards the end of her life, she began to exhibit signs of mental illness. She died at the age of 48 as a result of hepatitis.

Many of Bessie Head’s works are set in Serowe, such as the novels When Rain Clouds Gather (1968), Maru (1971), and A Question of Power (1973). The three are also autobiographical; When Rain Clouds Gather is based on her experience living on a development farm, Maru incorporates her experience of being considered racially inferior, and A Question of Power draws on her understanding of what it was like to experience acute psychological distress.

Memory Chirere