Rory Kilalea's Mea Culpa: Politics or The Ordinary?

I confess to almighty God
and to you, my brothers and sisters,
that I have greatly sinned,
in my thoughts and in my words,
in what I have done and in what I have failed to do,
through my fault, through my fault,
through my most grievous fault;
therefore I ask blessed Mary ever-Virgin,
all the Angels and Saints,
and you, my brothers and sisters,
to pray for me to the Lord our God

There exists within literary circles, debate on whether literature from Southern Africa has been unduly saturated by politics. Rory Kilalea’s short story, Mea Culpa, presents a framework in which to engage in this discourse. Kilalea who is of Irish ancestry was born and raised in Zimbabwe.  He is a writer and filmmaker.  His short stories have twice been nominated for the Caine prize.

Mea Culpa is a story told in the third person narrative voice of Luke, a twenty-something, white, first year university student in the former colony of Rhodesia (present day Zimbabwe). Luke is battling with his sexuality, racism, religion and patriarchy. Ironically, his father is the one who initiates him into a world of confused sexuality. Luke’s father not only sexually assaults Luke he is also physically abusive towards his mother.  In Luke’s first year at university, he has a sexual encounter with an older black friend named Munya. The aftermath of the act prompts flashbacks to events that preceded that night with Munya.

The action in Mea Culpa shifts between the physical domain of Luke’s university room, which is the primary scene, to mental scenes (flashbacks) where the reader gets intimately acquainted with Luke’s internal struggles. The flashbacks offer an insight into his background and events that marked and defined his formative years.

Mea Culpa is a Latin phrase meaning “through my fault”. It is an acknowledgement of having done wrong. The phrase comes from a prayer of confession of sinfulness intoned by Roman Catholics at the beginning of mass or when receiving the sacrament of atonement. The expression is also used as an admission of having made a mistake that should have been avoided.

Writers make deliberate choices in the selection of words and phrases they use in their stories. By choosing Mea Culpa as the title, Kilalea possibly uses the phrase as a ruse for readers to reach for the story with the preconception that they are about to delve into the world of religion and confession while in actual fact the story is an unexpected revelation on two major levels; levels referred to here as the ordinary and the political.

The ordinary:  there is general agreement that Southern African literature has been saturated by politics. South African academic and literary scholar, Njabulo Ndebele, in a paper entitled “The Rediscovery of the Ordinary: Some New Writings in South Africa”, notes that South African literature “has largely been the history of the representation of spectacle”. In other words, Southern African literature by nature seems to be defined and characterized by features of the dramatic. Images come to mind of mass shootings and killings witnessed in Sharpeville in 1960, the mass removals of people, detention, separation, and the economic exploitation of the black community- the ultimate symbol of which was and still is to a degree, the mining industry. These features are all spectacular.  They evoke feelings of indignation, injustice. Other scholars have referred to Southern African literature as, by and large, Protest literature; its form and content being a remonstration against political injustices.

Taking cognizance of Ndebele’s views therefore, where does Kilalea’s Mea Culpa fall: is it Protest Literature or an exposition of everyday concerns encountered by people in society black and white alike?

On one level, it can be said that Kilalea’s concern centres on the morality or otherwise of sexuality from the point of view of religion. There is an interesting use of biblical allusion captured simultaneously in the title and theme which serve to highlight the need for a spiritual centre. Tied in with biblical allusion is the hypocrisy often found in religion.  Luke’s father’s actions provide a basis for this. He sexually abuses his son after which he (the father) takes Luke for confession. The priest who takes Luke’s confession appears to derive a perverse pleasure in coercing Luke to confess to the sin of masturbation. Even good old Reverend Dube who preaches liberation theology is revealed by Munya to be a person who “loves men too” and not in the sense that Jesus was a fisher of men!

On another level, same sex relationships are interrogated on a moral level; in the context of society and society’s reaction to it.  There is, of course, the view and reaction of society to same sex relationships in Africa and more specifically in the milieu of this short story set in Zimbabwe, where the President has likened homosexuals to being no better than dogs and pigs. Is the President’s abhorrence for homosexuals a political or moral stand?

On the personal front Luke battles with intense guilt over his sexuality. In a particularly poignant flashback Luke is in the confession box before his priest. The priest is hounding him to confess to the sin of masturbation. The priest’s persistence causes Luke to reflect on two events that drive his guilt.  One; when he remembers he experienced “surges of joy when the lights were out…….the rush of awful blood to sinful places, to places that were more exciting and warm in the dark” and two; his constant worry about what people would think if they knew he was homosexual. The feeling of guilt that Luke experiences in trying to understand his sexuality is akin to what other people, the world over, struggle with irrespective of their race.

Njabulo Ndebele argues that when literature takes a dramatic stance, very little effort is taken to understand the motives for specific actions – with the dramatic; it is either that people are very good or very bad. What pushed Luke towards homosexuality? Munya, the black man Luke had intimate relations with, tells Luke that the act they had committed was not sanctioned in their culture. He says gay men are called “ngotshane” in their local dialect. The fact that Munya says there is a word for gay in an indigenous dialect, is indicative that homosexuality is not exactly an alien or western concept to indigenous peoples. Does this make same sex relationships ordinary or political phenomenon?

Placing homosexuality on the back burner for a while and referring back to Ndebele’s argument on the ordinary. Mea Culpa tells a story of abuse: the incestuous abuse of Luke by his father and the physical battery of his mother at the hands of his father. The abuse occurs in a dysfunctional white family. Worthy of note is that domestic abuse is not unique to a particular race, it cuts across racial lines.  Further, it is generally recognised that the abused partner will often try to cover up evidence of abuse by presenting to other family members and society at large the image of normalcy.  Luke recalls times he had seen his mother with a blue bruised eye following a run in with his father; however; not once did she apportion blame on her husband rather, she praised him, terming him a romantic and the only man for her.  

The Political - conversely, Mea Culpa can be interpreted within the political and historical context of Zimbabwe’s colonial past under British rule especially during the reign of Ian Smith, the fight for independence and later post-colonialism under the rule of Robert Mugabe. 

It has been posited that literature emerging from Zimbabwe is of a comparatively more sophisticated nature in relation to nuance and language. Therefore, while Mea Culpa may be classified as protest literature, the language and style is subtle in its allusion to politics.  Parallels can, for instance, be drawn between the title, Mea Culpa  and its religious connotations with the prayer of penitence and the formation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa which presented the oppressor with a platform to confess or seek absolution, as it where, for transgressions committed under white rule. Similarly in Zimbabwe the land reclamation programme introduced after independence has been justified on the grounds of reparation for wrongs against the black population pre self-rule. How genuine were these initiatives in redeeming wrongs; were they for selfish political gain? How sincere is the prayer of penance?

With regard to language, Luke vividly describes the contrast of his body against Munya’s thus “bodies of different colours……the brown-pink of Munya’s skin not touched by the sun, the blue-pink of his. The blue-black of Munya’s lips, the grey pink of his, the blue eyes, the brown eyes…….” This detail to colour is symbolic of how conscious one is of the colour divide in colonial Rhodesia.  While the obvious focus is on sexuality, the political stance may be lost to the less astute reader.

There is no doubt that Luke suffers immense inner turmoil over his sexuality, in the same breath however, he displays greater concern over the fact that he had had intimate relations with a black man. He cannot contemplate the horror that those close to him would experience if they knew what had happened between a white and black man.  He did not want anyone knowing that a black man had slept in his room. He was desperate that it should remain hidden.

The reader encounters both the demoralizing subjugation of the black man and the role of patriarchy in the story.  The portrayal of Luke’s father as a tyrant is symbolic of the white and black political divide in the former Rhodesia where the white man asserted tyrannical authority to subdue the black man.  The black man’s subjugation is captured in one of Luke’s flashbacks. His father lashes a young black man for uprooting flowers from Luke’s mother’s garden. When he was done lashing the boy, the boy turns to Luke’s father and says “Thank you, Baas”. The exact same scenario plays itself out towards the end of the story when roles are reversed and it is Luke who is in a position of dominance over the black man when he beats Munya.  Like the boy, when the lashing is done, Munya turns to Luke and says “Thank you, Baas”.

Luke struggles with his identity as a white man in a country where colour determines one place in society. His association with the black man Munya is testament to this. Munya introduces him to the black township where Reverend Dube talks about liberation theology and urges Luke join the struggle.  Dube assures Luke that he understands the struggle and dilemma that white students go through in trying to justify their position in a black country. 

Rory Kilalea’s biography stimulates interrogation.  First, his place as a white writer born and raised in Zimbabwe presents an interesting perspective to the political and/or other dimension of Southern African literature. Does his colour influence an African readers mind because he is a white man writing about a same sex relationship? Is there credence to the assumption that the concept of homosexuality is associated with western decadence and yet, contentious though it is, there is evidence that suggests homosexuality was practiced in Africa even before the coming of the white man?  Following their night of passion, Munya “jokingly” tells Luke that if he (Munya) was a freedom fighter, he could very easily turn around and claim that Luke was trying to ruin the morals of a black man. Munya’s “joke” has echoes of what African leaders claim when seeking to demonstrate how the West corrupts African values. Paradoxically as Munya teases Luke, he appears to have lost sight of his earlier statement to Luke regarding Reverend Dube liking other men.

Second, why has Kilalea taken the African sounding pen name of Murungu? Is it a bait to lure people into thinking he is black? As a white writer in Southern Africa does his whiteness expose him to political and social disadvantage? Is his writing to be viewed as being part of the oppressive machinery of apartheid in Zimbabwe or is evidence required that he participated in some way in Zimbabwe’s liberation struggle for critiques to take both the quality and concerns of his work seriously?

Mea Culpa being a short story is probably an inadequate basis to extensively examine the subject of protest literature from Southern Africa. It is, however, precisely because it is a short story that Kilalea is compelled to advance his themes in a more forceful way. Further, it is illustrative of Zimbabwean literature being a form of Southern African literature that is not blatant.  Kilalea does not make an overt reference to politics instead references to politics are couched in language about struggles of a seemingly personal nature.

Njabulo Ndebele  observes that in talking of a new society (post-apartheid/colonial society)  direct concern should be on “a range of complex ethical issues involving man-man, woman-woman, man-nature, man-society relationships”. He argues that these concerns are destined to find their way into our literature thereby making it more complex and richer. Kilalea’s Mea Culpa in many ways departs from the norm of what is categorized as strictly Protest Literature, however, in subtle ways there is no denying that the story is weighed down with the conflict between white and black. It is also true that the legacy of the past has a strong bearing on the present thereby limiting how far writers can go in divorcing their narratives from the past which has influenced the ordinary in the present.