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Kenya Studies Review Volume 9 | Number 1 | Summer 2021
Humanity and Mother Nature: Ecological Reading of Ole Kulet’s Blossoms of the Savannah
Andrew Nyongesa
St. Paul’s University, Department of Social Sciences, P.O. Private Bag, Limuru - 00217, Kenya
Email: asp0816@spu.ac.ke
Abstract
In the recent past, literary critics have had varied readings of Henry Ole Kulet’s
literary oeuvre from radical feminism to ecocriticism. Although some underscore
Kulet’s focus on the nexus between humankind and nature, and the environmental
consciousness and responsible exploitation of natural resources, the general attitude
has been that the writer is a mouthpiece of the civil society and donor agents. Other
critics have dwelt on selective ecocritical studies of Kulet’s novels that leave out
Blossoms of the Savannah, which is greatly acclaimed for winning prestigious
awards. It is the contention of this study that whereas ecological readings of Kulet’s
other works of fiction has been exhausted, Blossoms of the Savannah has been
neglected. The focus of this analysis is on the nexus between humankind and the
ecological environment in Kulet’s Blossoms of the Savannah. The continued
association of the novel with radical feminism with scanty or no application of the
tenets of ecocriticism runs counter to its subjects. This analytical study is, therefore,
a close textual reading of the primary and secondary texts while L. Buell (2005)
serves as a theoretical framework for the interpretation. One major finding of the
study is that its feminist content, notwithstanding Kulet’s Blossoms of the
Savannah, occupies an essential place in ecocriticism.
Keywords: Kenyan literature, feminism, climate change, eco-criticism, Ole
Kulet
INTRODUCTION
[Ole Kulet] is a self-conscious modern writer who demonstrates that women who live
in cultural backgrounds that cause them suffering shall be their own liberators. (Muriungi
& Muriiki, 2013, p. 118)
Henry Ole Kulet is a Kenyan novelist whom some literary critics consider as primarily a feminist
writer with a craving to appease voices of the civil society. Such critics view this writer as a smart
aleck whose oeuvre cannot be placed alongside Kenyan classics’ authors, like Ngugi wa Thiong’o
or Meja Mwangi, owing to Ole Kulet’s obsequious attitude towards Western ideas that present
some Maasai values in the negative light. This is possibly why Muriungi and Muriiki (2013)
consider Kulet a writer whose principal concern is to elevate the position of a woman, particularly
in the Maasai community and African societies in general.
Kulet’s insistence on Western radical feminism has prompted literary scholars, such as
Migudi (2019), to investigate the influence of civil society and donor agents in his fiction. From
Migudi’s perspective, Kulet lacks an original voice in his attempt to dissuade African audiences
with regard to gender disparities, female circumcision and other outdated cultural practices. As
much as Evan Mwangi singles out “ethnocentrism” to account for Kulet’s relegation from Kenyan
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Kenya Studies Review Volume 9 | Number 1 | Summer 2021
literary scene (Lusinga, 2016, p. 3), Migudi’s assertion could suggest the major reason Kulet’s
works have not occupied the same rank with those of Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, Meja Mwangi and
Francis Imbuga.
Emerging voices, however, do not just exhibit divergent views on Kulet’s literary oeuvre,
but identify him with other literary canons aside from feminism. Kabaji (2013) writes:
If Chinua Achebe brought Igbo culture to the world [,] then Ole Kulet did the same to the
Maasai culture [;] he started by experimenting on the biographical mode and slowly and
steadily found his unique style. His subject is culture and he writes about it with the
sensitivity of a surgeon. (p. 22)
Kabaji challenges Migudi’s association of Kulet’s fiction with foreign voices and instead views it
as a representation of Maasai values. In other words, Kabaji crowns Kulet as the voice of Maa
subalterns in post-colonial literatures rather than previous identification with radical feminism
and Western voices that jeopardize Maa culture and African traditions. While Muriungi and
Muriiki delimit the cultural subjects to Kulet’s constant assault on patriarchal traditions and female
circumcision, Kabaji possibly takes Anderson’s (2009) definition of culture as what humans do
(p. 3), including their exploitation of natural resources and their effects thereof. Kulet does not
explore the social aspects of the Maasai people without their land, forests, rivers, and animals and
how they influence the destiny of characters. Lusinga (2016) observes that “Kulet’s works
celebrate the rich biodiversity of Maasai’s natural environment. He has a knack for knitting
powerful images of the community’s flora and fauna in his fiction” (p. 3). Whereas Lusinga’s
focus is on ecological representations in Kulet’s Vanishing Herds and The Hunter, the focus of
this analysis is on the impact of the natural environment on characters in Blossoms of the
Savannah. The choice of this text is based on the premise that literary critics have demonstrated
a dearth of works on ecological criticism in Kulet’s other novels, such as To Become a Man, Moran
No More and Vanishing Herds; however, most scholarship on Blossoms of the Savannah is largely
feminist.
Blossoms of the Savannah is the story of Resian Ole Kaelo, the central character and second
born of Ole Kaelo. Right from birth, Ole Kaelo is bitter because he had expected his wife to
beget a boy to perpetuate his family name given that his firstborn, Taiyo was female.
Disappointed, Ole Kaelo develops colossal distaste for Resian and constantly discriminates against
her in front of other family members. Taiyo takes note of her father’s tantrums in the presence of
Resian. When she sits down to study a book, he accuses her of laziness. When she trembles in his
domineering presence almost letting her glass fall, he calls her an idiot. Consequently, Resian
undergoes internal fragmentation and gradually becomes a grumpy and hypercritical child. After
being laid off at Agribix Limited in Nakuru, Ole Kaelo moves to Nasila, a village with conservative
dwellers at the heart of Maasailand and relapses to the practice of Maa traditions. Resian is also
surprised at his father’s decision to enter a business partnership with a despicable man named
Oloisudori. He becomes a guarantor to enable Kaelo take loans to invest in his business. When he
fails to pay his loans, Kaelo gives Resian to the man to get rid of her. Resian refuses and, in the
ensuing conflict, she flees from her Nasila village home with the help of an eccentric man called
Olarinkoi. During her flight from Nasila to Inkiito (Olarinkoi’s home), Resian is shocked to see
the dust, aridity and other aspects of environmental degradation. The place looks neglected without
roads and vehicles. Before their departure, Olarinkoi orders her to sit at the back of his pickup
truck. As the truck picks pace through the dusty and bumpy road, Resian realizes that the two men,
Olarinkoi and the driver, are very harsh and too absorbed in their troubles to notice her. When they
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Kenya Studies Review Volume 9 | Number 1 | Summer 2021
speak to her, they are terribly insolent. When they reach Inkiito, Olarinkoi’s village, Resian is
shocked at the poverty in Olarinkoi’s hut. Even the food he provides is not the kind Resian was
used to in Nakuru. Shockingly, Olarinkoi takes advantage of Resian’s desperate situation and
attempts to rape her. Resian fights back and bites Olarinkoi’s thumb. She is taken in by Enkaabani,
who cares for her and finds means by which Resian is taken to Minik Ene Nkoitoi, a female
manager of a sheep ranch and patron of a home that looks after girls fleeing early marriage and
female circumcision. The story ends after Minik Ene Nkoitoi saves Resian from a forced marriage
and makes arrangement for her to further her education at Egerton University, Nakuru.
Thus, in spite of having started publishing in 1971, Kulet has captured the attention of
literary critics belatedly. His first novel, Is it Possible, was released in 1971 and followed it with
six others: To Become a Man (1972), The Hunter (1985), Daughter of the Maa (1987), Moran no
More (1990), Bandits of Kibi (1999), Blossoms of the Savannah (2009) and Vanishing Herds
(2011). With his belated recognition on the Kenyan literary scene, Kulet won the Jomo Kenyatta
Prize in 2011 and 2013 with Blossoms of the Savannah and Vanishing Herds respectively.
Blossoms of the Savannah became the first of his works to be selected by Kenya Institute of
Curriculum Development as a set text in high school in 2017. He died on 17th February 2021 after
a short illness just after he had started making an impact on the Kenyan literary scene. Although
Blossoms of the Savannah has mostly been identified with the feminist discourse, this analytical
study adopts Buell (2005) trajectory to show how Kulet establishes the nexus between humanity
and the ecological environment. From Buell’s perspective, ecological texts demonstrate that “the
human interest is not the only legitimate interest, human accountability to the environment is part
of the text’s ethical orientation and the nonhuman environment is not just a framing device” (9).
This analysis will, among other tenets, ascertain these three attributes of ecological tenets with
reference to Blossoms of the Savannah.
Mother Nature and humanity: Culture and economic condition of characters in Kulet’s
Blossoms of the Savannah
Nature or ecosystem contributes to human well-being. Nature affects the physical,
mental, spiritual health, inspiration and identity. (Russell et al., 2013, p. 473)
It is quite conventional among some literary critics to analyze cultural context of works of art with
little or to no consideration of the ecological conditions from which they are set. The cultural and
economic practices among characters in Kulet’s Blossoms of the Savannah have been appraised or
condemned in equal measure with least attention to the role Mother Nature plays in their lives.
Muriungi and Muriiki, for example, single out female circumcision as oppressive to women with
least consideration to the connection between the ecological environment and the cultural practice.
This is the trajectory Russell et al. (2013) reject when they suggest that the environment
“contributes to human well-being” (p. 6) and by extension human suffering. In this regard, the
cultural practices that exacerbate the plight of women and children in literature should not be
condemned in isolation from the ecological environment as it affects the “physical, mental,
spiritual health, inspiration and identity” of people (p. 6). Indeed, in Blossoms of the Savannah,
the heroine, Resian, enjoys her life in Nakuru town, located in the Rift Valley. Resian tells her
sister, Taiyo, that she prefers Nakuru to Nasila village at the heart of Maasai land because cultural
rites, such as female circumcision common in the village, are not practiced in town. When Taiyo
praises Nasila village as quieter than Nakuru, Resian says, “I would rather live in the noisiest place
on earth than live anywhere near a vagabond who would accost me in the most quiet and serene
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Kenya Studies Review Volume 9 | Number 1 | Summer 2021
atmosphere with the intention of mutilating my sexuality” (p. 33). Resian’s comment refers to an
ordeal she and Taiyo experienced in one of their strolls in Nasila when a young man accosts and
insults them for being uncircumcised. Resian does not just detest infibulation, highly cherished in
Nasila, but also the callous nature of young men in this rural setting. Ironically, while Resian’s
father leaves his daughters uncircumcised in Nakuru, but insists on them being circumcised in
Nasila suggests the correlation between the ecological environment and the existence of this
cultural practice.
To understand the complexity of female circumcision in Maa culture, one must first
consider its origins. Based on the myth of origin of female genital circumcision, as told from the
perspective of Joseph Parmuat (a young man Ole Kaelo hires to teach Resian and Taiyo Maasai
culture in Blossoms of Savannah), Kulet suggests that there is a nexus between female
circumcision and the hostile ecological environment in which the Maasai live. Because most parts
of Maasailand are hot and dry, crop farming (as an economic activity) is non-existent, making
nomadic pastoralism and raiding the backbone of Maasai economy. Western and Nightingale
(2003) assert “[n]omadic pastoralism is [a] highly specialized system adapted to the harsh
ecological and social conditions of the dry savannahs” (p. 4). Thus, using the character of Parmuat,
Kulet suggests the impact of Ilarinkon raiders on the Maasai and how nomadism influenced the
community to introduce female circumcision. The hot and dry natural environment that promotes
nomadism also encourages communities to cherish patriarchy and the warrior system in their
defense against would be raiders. As an adaptation to survive in the harsh climatic conditions that
border the wild, nomadic communities elevate patriarchy and militarization. Njogu and
Orchardson-Mazrui (2013) observe that some African communities that practiced crop farming
embraced matrilineality, but patriarchy pervaded pastoralist communities (p. 4). This assertion
confirms that there is a nexus between ecological conditions and patriarchy in nomadic
communities such as the Maasai.
In communities that mainly depended on crop farming, such as the Agikuyu, women play
a central role such that their nine clans are based on the nine daughters of their patriarch.
Contrarily, nomadic pastoralists underscore the central role of the man to protect land, women,
cattle from the hostile environment, and raiders from neighboring communities. Raiders not only
steal cattle (perhaps to pay for bride price), but also girls and women from “enemy” communities.
Narrating the origins of the myth of infibulation in Maa culture, Kulet describes the militarized
nature of Ilarinkon invaders and their lewd motives:
As they (Maasai morans) descended lltepes hills, they could see files and files of tall
muscular Olarinkon morans resplendent in their red ochre-soaked shukas. Tall monkey
skin head gear swayed as they walked. They carried their heavy decorated shields while
their long spears gleamed in the simmering hot afternoon sun. The jingles fastened onto
their thighs made a terrifying clanging sound […]. It was obvious that the Maa warriors
were disadvantaged. (p. 84)
The above excerpt suggests that communities in the hot and dry savannah have bolstered patriarchy
through a formidable warrior system. Living is such a hostile natural environment, it would be far-
fetched for Maasai people to elevate matrilineality as some feminist scholars suggest. The
Ilarinkon invaders are a trained army of men who raid Maasai villages, abducting their women and
pubescent girls. Kulet indicates that in this hostile and wild savannah, communities have to
consider patriarchy because women are vulnerable against human predators. Olarikoi, the leader
of the invaders, is described as “more of a monster than human” (p. 85). He is eight feet tall and
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with a hairy body. Defeated and hopeless, the Maasai watch helplessly as their women and girls
are easily lured into sex by the Ilarinkon raiders. Although the women do not love the invaders,
Maa people believe they cannot control their sexual desires because they have within them “the
source of the salacity that caused the involuntary gravitation towards men when provoked” (p. 87).
Kulet, in this context and subtly, refers to the clitoris, which is assumed to ensure a high libido
among women in presence of men. Parmuat concludes that the women meet and appoint a female
circumciser, enkamuratani, giving her authority to circumcise them to have the ability to resist
advances of the Ilarinkon invaders (p. 85). On the surface, it appears women have a say by
appointing a circumciser to exact the practice, but patriarchy still remains its core. Henceforth,
Maasai women have always been circumcised, which confounds Resian because Ilarinkon reign
ended centuries before.
Kulet’s myth of origin on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), as told from Parmuat’s
perspective, gives a hint into the representative attributes of Ilarinkon invaders. They possibly
symbolize men from most, if not all, rival pastoralist communities that seek Maasai cattle and
women. Since the Maasai men are nomadic pastoralists, who travel far and wide in search of
pasture and water, their wives are easily lured into sex by men from rival communities because
they are uncircumcised, justifying the practice of FGM. A study by 28TooMany (2013) indicates
that FGM in Kenya is prevalent among the pastoralists, with 97.5% among the Somali in North
Eastern and 0.5 % in Western Kenya (p. 20):
FGM is often motivated by beliefs about what is considered appropriate sexual behavior,
with some communities considering that it ensures and preserves virginity, marital
faithfulness and prevents promiscuity/prostitution. There is a strong link between FGM
and marriageability with FGM often being a prerequisite to marriage. (p. 9)
The high prevalent rates of FGM among the pastoralists suggest the existence of a nexus between
it and the ecological conditions in which communities live. Contrarily, communities in cool and
wet weather conditions (e.g., Luo and Luhya in Western Kenya) have the least prevalent rates and
hardly practice nomadic pastoralism. Since they practice crop farming, the Luo and Luhya are
settler communities, in which men live with their wives without worrying about raiders who
might abduct their women and girls.
Aside from being one of the causes of infibulation, there is a nexus between the hostile
weather conditions and the behavior and destiny of characters in Kulet’s Blossoms of the
Savannah. Characters’ hostility and insolence is not necessarily derived from societal norms, but
the prevailing weather conditions. When Resian leaves Nasila with Olarinkoi to flee from a forced
marriage, she is confounded at the insolence of Olarinkoi and the driver as the narrator suggests:
At one point, the driver, a short thin man of forty or so with brooding eyes and a twitching
mouth–stopped the vehicle, glanced at the back and growled a rude remark at Resian. Like
Olarinkoi, he seemed callous and irritated for reasons she did not understand. ‘You
woman, the driver called rudely, would you want to stretch your legs?’ (p. 214)
Although at the face value one could associate the two men’s reactions with male chauvinism, the
hostile weather conditions are the most probable cause. Resian is honest to conclude that she “did
not understand” the men because she had not witnessed such behavior among the men in Nakuru.
According to Mullins and White (2019), “cold temperatures lead to decreases in the incidence of
negative mental health outcomes and hot temperatures lead to [their] increases” (p. 2). The hostile
ecological environment has exposed the driver and Olarinkoi in Blossoms of the Savannah to
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psychological stress, which results in anger and irritability towards Resian. In a psychological
study among desert workers in China, “12.54 % of the workers showed mental abnormality” (Ning
e t a l . , 2018: p. 1). The study concludes that although psychological stress exists universally,
it can be accentuated by certain “work and life environments” (p. 1). The choice of Xianjiang
Desert, as an area of study that mirrors the Maasai landscape, suggests the nexus between
ecological conditions and psychological stress amongst its inhabitants.
In the Blossoms of the Savannah, Kulet uses the hostile environment as a backdrop to
Olarinkoi’s irritability towards Resian, highlighting Buell’s assertion that the “nonhuman
environment is not just a framing device” (p. 9). Resian, in this context, can only contrast the
degraded environment in her new setting to that which she is accustomed in Nakuru:
The farther they drove towards Nasila, the drier the land became and the dust was appalling.
Instead of fresh green pastures that she looked forward to seeing, her eyes were met with
a sprawling limitless stretch of brown bare ground with patches of tawny grass. In the
distance were hillocks covered by desiccated bushes of Oleleshua and olkinyei and stunted
shrubs […] Resian saw a lonely and nearly desolate land that stretched as far as her eyes
could see […] By five o’clock, they were still on the road. The road by then had become
so rough that the driver had to stop […] Flies and mosquitoes crawled into her nostrils in
search of moisture. (pp. 213-214)
In this scene, Resian, like the men, is also irritated by the dust, heat, flies (insects), desolate land,
and the long journey in pick- up truck. The flies do not appear because of dirt, but in search of
water. The narrator associates their disturbing presence to the water scarcity arising from the
hostile ecological conditions. As much as Resian accuses the men of irritability, the narrator
clarifies that she, too, is affected by the “heat” (p. 214) being at the back of the pick-up truck. The
conspicuously absence of matatus (public service vehicles) like those in Nakuru is attributable
to the rough roads that only accommodate four-wheel drive pick-ups. Upon her arrival at his
home, Olarinkoi demonstrates irritability towards Resian typical of desert inhabitants when he
blurts, “[w]hat are you doing at the back of the vehicle? [...] alight quickly, the driver doesn’t have
the whole night to wait” (p. 216). This attitude is contrary to that which she is used from her parents
and neighbors in Nakuru and Nasila. Unlike the Nakuru young men Resian and her sister Taiyo
know as being romantic and communicative, Olarinkoi maintains a pathological relationship with
Resian upon arrival in his village. His attitude reiterates Ning et al. (2018) and Mullins and
White’s (2019) assertions that hot environments affect people’s mental health. Upon arrival,
Olarinkoi leads Resian silently, believing she is his wife (according to his mother’s prediction)
with least attempt to woo or persuade her. As a “wife,” Olarinkoi believes Resian has to cook for
him and flings a “piece of meat” her way (p. 218). When he realizes Resian is unwilling to take
his directions, since he has reneged on his promise to take her to Minik Ene Nkoitoi, he gets
irritated and snarls at her:
‘You woman, look here!’ […] ‘you can either cook or keep standing stupidly and die of
hunger. The choice is yours. Should you choose to, here is a piece of meat. The knife is
over there. Of course, you are not blind you can see the sufurias. There is a whole bag of
maize meal there and water in that container. There is paraffin in that can and you can
collect firewood from the stack outside the house. (p. 218)
After haranguing Resian, Olarinkoi, who now views himself as her newly-wedded husband against
a Maasai norm to marry an uncircumcised girl, goes out to drink. It is, therefore, probable that
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Olarinkoi is an alcoholic and pathological based on the perspective of psychological scholars.
Kohut and Wolf (1978) refer to this disorder as the understimulated self, a self-devoid of vitality,
boring, apathetic and is experienced by others the same way (p. 418). Both Resian and Taiyo
view Olarinkoi as boring and aloof (p. 74) from his first appearance in their home.
Desperate for happiness, victims of the understimulated self “stimulate themselves by
addictive and promiscuous activities, perversions, gambling, drug and alcohol induced excitement
and lifestyle characterized by hyper sociability” (p. 478). Olarinkoi’s perverted nature is evident
when he returns from the drinking spree and declares Resian his wife without any courtship:
You silly thing […] I tell you to prepare food and you refuse to do so, eh? Today you will
know who the owner of this home is. If you are still in doubt, let me tell you frankly that
from today you are my wife, hear that eh? You are my wife. For a long time, you have
been sneering at me, showing how highly educated you are. Today we shall see how highly
educated your body is. Yes, we shall see! (p. 221)
As much as Olarinkoi claims to be a Maasai conservative, his behavior in this instance
demonstrates a deliberate contravention of Maa traditions and pathological tendencies. Once again,
using the character of Parmuat, Kulet demonstrates how the Maa culture forbids premarital sex
and outlines traditional customary guidelines observed before a girl becomes a wife. Love
relationships, for example patureishi were platonic and those who violated these codes were
forbidden from marrying the betrothed (p. 125); however, after Olarinkoi snarls at Resian in the
above excerpt, “[h]e got hold of her hand and began dragging her into another room” (p. 221). He
unfastens the buttons of his trousers and when she tries to get away, he holds her down brutally
and in spite of her screams, he tears “her garments and begins to push her towards the bed” (p.
221). Olarinkoi is determined to rape her until she “thrust his thumb in her mouth and sunk her
teeth into his flesh” (p. 221). Olarinkoi’s behavior in this scene is consistent with what most recent
studies reveal that “mental health issues underlie sexual violence and offending, particularly rape”
(Sarkar, 2013, p. 1). Often, rapists experience “attachment and intimacy problems” (p. 2), which
characterizes Olarinkoi from his first appearance in the novel. He would appear in the house,
friendless and lonely and give Milanoi (Resian’s mother) a piece of meat (p. 74) without
introducing himself. He would disappear for two or three days and then reappear, intruding on
Parmuat’s lessons to the girls. His eccentric behavior is possibly derived from his mother’s
prophetic lifestyle and training in moranism. The latter refers to the warrior system, which is a
tenet of patrilineality that Njogu and Orchardson-Mazrui (2013) associate with pastoralist
communities in arid areas.
Enkoiboni is another character in the novel who exhibits irritation and mental health issues.
She is Olarinkoi’s mother whom Resian meets after surviving attempted rape at the hands of her
son. What perplexes Resian is Enkoiboni’s constant lamentations against her. Enkoiboni “[r]ailed
against Resian complaining that she was deliberately refusing to eat so that she did not gain
strength to enable her undergo circumcision” (p. 235). When Enkoiboni visits Resian, the temper
tantrums prompt her to violate Resian’s privacy. She had to “hold the hem of her tattered dress
[…] pull it up and then thrust and callous claw-like hands under it to feel her stomach” (p. 235).
Her intention is to confirm if Resian is pregnant following her son’s attempted rape. When she
realizes Resian is not expectant, she resorts to verbal abuse, “[i]t is even better so, for who wants
entaapai for a wife for her son?” (p. 235). Entaapai is a derogatory term in Maa culture for a girl
who gets pregnant before being circumcised. Furthermore, Enkoiboni rants against leaders and
those who are well-to-do in her society, especially those in urban cities:
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‘Tell me, are not people like those in towns?’ she would complain bitterly. ‘You saw the
rutted and dilapidated road that you travelled through the other day. Can you compare that
road with the roads in town? What about the hospital?’ (p. 236)
As much as Resian assumes her fury is instigated by the leaders’ tendency towards graft,
Enkoiboni is a victim of the heat stress arising from the hostile weather conditions of her
environment. It would, therefore, be unreasonable to exonerate her from similar challenges the
driver and Olarinkoi experience whose unpredictable temper tantrums emanate from the harsh
weather conditions of Inkiito.
Furthermore, while Enkoiboni utterly condemns the government and its leaders for
neglecting Inkiito without investing in its infrastructure, Berg (2015) affirms that construction of
roads is meant to link “producers to markets, workers to jobs, students to schools […] which are
vital to any development agenda” (p. 1). This assertion is an indictment of Enkoiboni’s observation
because neither schools, markets, industrial nor agricultural production can be traced to her village.
Berg further suggests that the economic viability of a region influences government policies (e.g.,
to build infrastructure); therefore, environmental degradation has delimited the economic potential
of Inkiito and averted government investments. In other words, the government finds it
economically viable to construct a road to a tea rich Kericho County to transport produce to
factories and to ferry workers to tea plantations than to Inkiito where desertification has dealt a
blow to its economic productivity. In a study in Saudi Arabia on road construction, Aldagheiri
(2009) observes that roads “bring direct benefits from their role in development of activities such
as agriculture, industry, commerce and mining and by bringing in indirect benefits from the
enhancement in the value of property and the change it sets in the way of life and thinking of its
people” (p. 277). Whereas Enkoiboni focuses on the benefits of roads, she negates the factors that
attract road construction, which conspicuously lacks in Inkiito. Aldagheiri enumerates these
factors as agriculture, industry, commerce and mining. The government may not build a
sophisticated road network to and in Inkiito, an arid region without agricultural potential,
commerce or minerals as in oil rich countries like Saudi Arabia. If the region were productive, the
government would have built infrastructure and benefited from the taxes emanating from the
economic activities from the area.
Kulet demonstrates Aldagheiri’s assertion through the character of Oloisudori, who
migrates from Nasila to Nakuru County, where the government has invested heavily in
infrastructure, bolstering commerce, and leading to the “enhancement in the value of property and
the change it sets in the way of life and thinking of its people” (p. 277). When Oloisudori takes
Ole Kaelo and his wife to his home, the narrator observes that:
Ole Kaelo and his wife were not prepared enough to behold the splendid buildings that
stood before them. They were humbled. They were in a cluster of red tiled houses whose
tall outer walls painted in brilliant white surrounded one large two storied building that was
also of the same color. A few meters from the fence that enclosed the homestead was the
expansive Lake Naivasha and across it was a scenic sight of hills and a forest that covered
them. (p. 189)
Kulet’s description of Oloisudori’s home illustrates that the quality of life and economic condition
of his characters is partly determined by their ecological environment. Oloisudori’s affluence is
associated with the ambience of Lake Naivasha and the forests, while Olarinkoi’s indigence is
associated with land degradation and desertification. The hostile weather conditions have
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contributed to the helpless economic condition that, to a greater extent, compel Resian to distaste
Olarinkoi. On their arrival at Olarinkoi’s home after tedious journey through the degraded land,
the narrator describes Olarinkoi’s hut as “a small mud plastered house with a rusty tin roof. Around
the house was a small wooden gate that was shut” (p. 216). Unlike their well-furnished modern
home, Resian takes notice of the furniture in Olarinkoi’s hut with “three legged stools that stood
next to the wall and a rough wooden rack that stood at a corner where the unwashed dishes,
utensils and pots with dried remains of food stared back at her” (p. 217). Burrow and Mogaka
(2007) contend that widespread poverty in Kenya notwithstanding, “instances of poverty are
particularly pronounced in Arid and Semi-Arid Lands –ASAL” (p. 13). This is accentuated by
“intercommunity conflicts over water and rich patch vegetation” (p. 13). Burrow and Mogaka,
therefore, establish a nexus between the economic condition of people and their ecological
environment.
Kulet creates a number of poverty-stricken characters living in the dry lands such as Nasila
and Inkiito, which bolster Burrow and Mogaka’s proposition. Enkoiboni is one of these characters.
Her first appearance in the story is associated with “flies, and mosquitoes [...] rats, lizards and
snakes” that are said to get “into the house at will from outside the fence” (p. 235). These insects,
cockroaches and crickets, represent the poverty and misery typical of Enkoiboni’s home owing to
her failure to exercise any control over the ecological environment. These insects further signify
the supremacy of the hostile environment over humankind, hence the rampant poverty. Enkoiboni,
in her earlier remarks, tells Resian that they “have looked for a silver spoon […] in the last few
days” (p. 228) without any success to demonstrate the extent of poverty in Inkiito.
Moreover, the new hostile Inkiito environment transforms Resian from the blossoming
beauty she was in Nakuru to what Enkabaani describes as a “poor thing” (p. 231). The old lady
proceeds to comment that “mosquitoes must have sucked your veins dry” (p. 231). One of the main
causes of her frailty is nose bleeding, which is a predisposing factor in hot and dry climate like
that in Inkiito. When she regains her consciousness in Enkaabani’s care (after Olarinkoi’s assault),
Resian is described in such a way that the reader infers another miserable and helpless self:
She was lying on a makeshift bed that was built into a corner of a room; in a desolate filthy
house. The bed was covered with dirty bloody rags. And she was naked. Her head throbbed
with excruciating pain that nearly blinded her. There was a trickle of blood in her nostrils,
indicating that she had nosebleed. (p. 222)
The condition of the makeshift bed and the bloody stained rags (possibly from Resian’s nose
bleeding) further illustrates Enkaabani’s impoverishment. One can infer from the above scene that
Resian’s constant nose bleeding in Inkiito is something she has not experienced in either Nasila or
Nakuru. Indeed, studies have established a nexus between nosebleeds and dry, heated indoor air.
Comelli (2015) observes that there is a strong correlation between nose bleeding and “indoor
heating…” (p. 4), which might lead to the bursting of blood vessels in the nose. Therefore, it is
probable that the hot and dry air of Inkiito is the sole cause for Resian’s nose bleeding while her
nakedness represents her vulnerability, destitution and misery. In this context of harsh climatic
conditions in Inkiito, Enkaabani undresses her to fast track recovery from illness. The headache is
a symptom of both dehydration and Malaria, which are prevalent in hot and dry weather
conditions. The ecological conditions, therefore, contribute to Resian’s poverty and misery in
Inkiito.
Finally, the three young women Resian meets in Inkiito are victims of abject poverty in an
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environment ravaged by Mother Nature. The narrator states that the women live in a homestead
“three to four kilometers away” (p. 239) to demonstrate the sparse settlements in the village. This
suggests that Mother Nature’s constant onslaught on the land has turned it into unwanted
wasteland; therefore, people have no use for it. One of the women aged eighteen is married to “a
seventy-five-year old man with a four-year-old” (p. 239), with an infant that cries incessantly with
“swarms of flies” crowding around its eyes. Of the women, the narrator notes:
The other two women were even younger. They were probably fifteen or sixteen, but they
had all prematurely aged due to poor diet and hardships. Resian was glad to meet them for
solitude had bred loneliness in her heart. (p. 239)
As much as most feminist literary scholars single out patriarchy as the cause of early marriages in
girls like those described in Blossoms of the Savannah, the prevalent indigence arising from hostile
climatic conditions cannot be ignored. Buell’s assertion that in ecological texts “human
accountability to the environment is part of their ethical orientation” (p. 9), applies to Kulet’s
novel. Unless the inhabitants of Inkiito adopt environmental conservation, they will continue to be
victims of Mother Nature’s wrath. Since there is no single school in Inkiito (due to government
neglect of the arid wasteland), the girls cannot acquire formal education perceived as a deterrent
to early marriages. Even the hardships and poor diet Kulet’s narrator describes are a consequence
of environmental degradation. The high temperature and breeding rates of mosquitoes, and
obstruction to crop farming in Inkiito accentuate people’s hardship. Most only survive on animal
products, making them vulnerable to conditions arising from high cholesterol. Their use of shukas,
which Resian embraces, is dictated by the hot and dry weather unlike the skirts, blouses and
dresses women wear in urban areas. When Oloisudori and his friends from Nakuru pay Resian’s
home a visit, the narrator describes them:
Right from the designer shoe thrust out of the high–sided vehicle, the blue pin-striped
designer business suits, the golden watch that dangled from his hand, the golden bracelet
matching cuff links and the golden chain that adorned his neck, all were flaunted in a show
of opulence. (p. 177)
The way these individuals described passage is significantly different from the way people in
Inkiito dress. Given their gold adornments, the narrator illustrates that Oloisudori and his friends
are wealthy unlike most Inkiito residents who live in abject poverty.
CONCLUSION
From the foregoing discussion, literary scholars who associate Kulet’s Blossoms of the Savannah
solely with radical feminism negate his arguments on the role of the ecological conditions in the
lives of his characters. The plight of women, such as Resian and those from Inkiito, can be
attributed to the hostile ecological environment. Importantly, current analyses of patriarchy and
female circumcision in Kulet’s works, outside ecological conditions from which they emerge,
could potentially misrepresent the Maasai culture. Furthermore, readers need to consider the total
setting of Kulet’s Blossoms of the Savannah, especially the hot natural environment, which paves
way for nomadic pastoralism and the warrior system that encourages cultural practices such as
female circumcision.
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