Covenants

Author's name: Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood wrote "The Vows," the second part of her most famous novel, "The Handmaid's Tale," for which she shared the Booker Prize in 2019. In it, she answers questions that have long puzzled readers of the first part since its publication in 1985. She presented a novel whose events begin fifteen years after the end of "The Handmaid's Tale," when Offred faces her unknown fate. It is told by three different female voices, each revealing a hidden side of Gilead. * "Who are you, dear reader? And when are you? Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps fifty years from now, perhaps never. Perhaps you are one of Ardwa Hol's aunts, and your eyes have chanced upon this manuscript. And after the moment of terror that will overwhelm you at the sound of my sins, will you burn these pages to preserve my pious image pure and unblemished? Or will you succumb to the human thirst for power and run wild so that you can betray me?"







We learn with Thiong'o the value of knowledge, which colonialism withheld from the Kenyan people. He tells us about the emergence of formal education and independent, rebellious schools in Kenya. His dream, which he promised his mother he would spare no effort to achieve, was to learn. But how can a child cling to his dream amidst the shadows of World War II and his family crises? This childhood memoir serves as Thiong'o's testimony in defense of his right to dream, at least, despite all the difficulties, and of his mother's significant role in his life, which has led him to become one of Africa's greatest writers worldwide.