Alain Mabanckou - Black Bazaar

I was wondering where Mr Hippocratic was heading with these random musings. I couldn’t get a word in edgeways. So I decided to let him pour his heart out, given it seemed full to bursting.

He ordered another glass.

“I know what’s going through your head right now. You’re thinking: ‘This man’s completely crazy!’ Well, don’t be so quick to judge me, I’m only saying what I think and what I see. Colonisation was all positive, I’m telling you. Without colonisation, would you have had the Senegalese soldiers? Would you have known what a pith helmet was, eh? I’m not as ignorant as you think. I know a bit about Africa, I buy books from the Rideau Rouge. And what do I remember from what I’ve read? A dazzling truth: it’s thanks to colonisation that the Cameroonian Ferdinand Oyono wrote The Old Man and the Medal and Houseboy ; it’s thanks to colonisation that another Cameroonian, Mongo Beti, wrote Cruel Town and The Poor Christ of Bomba ; it’s thanks to colonisation that the Guyanan René Maran wrote Batouala and for the first time a Black won the Prix Goncourt which is meant to be the reserve of Whites, that’s right! Do you think if it wasn’t for colonisation we would have given as prestigious a prize as the Goncourt to a Black writer who, in addition, criticised us in his book even though he was working in our colonial administration? Which only goes to show the settlers were very generous, that’s fair play for you, but while they accepted criticism no dialogue is tolerated by your dictators. If colonisation hadn’t existed, your Shaka Zulu would have invented it. And he wouldn’t have overlooked the whip, derision, rape, pillaging, the exploitation of man by animal and the extermination of the tribes of the Belgian Congo. Shaka Zulu would also have decreed that the whole of Zaire be his private property, just as the Belgian Leopold II did! Oh I know, I know, yes I know there’s that other one, that Aimé Césaire, he wanted to ruin everything for colonisation in his book which I’ve also got at home and which only has fifty-nine pages in tiny print and which was published in 1955 by Présence Africane over there, I mean in the 5th arrondissement, 25 bis Rue des Ecoles, Métro Cardinal Lemoine or Maubert-Mutualité, depending which side you’re coming from and what you’re looking for. Discourse on Colonialism , that’s the title of the book I’m talking about! I never want to read it again or all my anger against those negroes will come back when I’ve decided I don’t want anything more to do with them. I mean it really wasn’t very nice of Césaire to hold forth like that for fifty-nine pages in tiny print making all the Whites who read it shortsighted. Why, it’s even ungrateful to write the sort of things he wrote. Do you realise that he wrote, black on white, the following — I’ve memorised it: ’What am I driving at? At this idea: that no one colonises innocently, that no one colonises with impunity either; that a nation which colonises, that a civilisation which justifies colonisation — and therefore force — is already a sick civilisation, a civilisation that is morally diseased, that irresistibly, progressing from one consequence to another, one repudiation to another, calls for its Hitler, I mean its punishment’. Stuff and nonsense! Where did he find those turns of phrase? That Césaire won’t make me change my ideas. Colonisation was useful. Let me talk to you about it in my own words! You didn’t have any Blacks commanding you back then. Which was better than being commanded by those black Kings who burped and farted after eating. The African salaries of functionaries were paid on time. The White man was carried to the next village on a chair made of animal skin. It was the most comfortable method of transport. Why condemn the poor man, eh? In his place, I’d have let myself be carried on a chair by a dozen muscular negroes too. A vehicle? Let’s be level-headed about this! How were vehicles going to get through those jungles, eh? Between two rutting hippopotamuses? Don’t give me such rubbish! Drink your coffee, or it’ll get cold …”

Sure enough, my coffee had gone cold. Mr Hippocratic noticed my attention waning, I was more interested in a girl who was sitting out on the terrace.

“That is the drama of the African!” declared Mr Hippocratic, pointing to the girl.

He stood up and went over to say something to her. He stayed for more than five minutes, doing all the talking.

When he came to sit back down again, he seemed vexed.

“Did you see what she was about to do, that halfcaste? Well, she was going to light a cigarette! I told her not to do it or else to leave the premises. I mean, who does she think she is? Right, now where was I? Ah yes, colonisation … You were beaten about a bit, but it was for your own good. At school you were banned from speaking your barbarian languages in the playground. Civilisation or barbarism, you had to choose, because black nations and culture were incompatible. You were being offered civilisation! So Jules Ferry’s free primary schooling was copper-bottomed. It marked the end of pidgin grammar, for example: ‘the banana me is eating’ was replaced with ‘da banana me eat’. Enough was enough, thanks to colonisation. Your forefathers had become Gauls too. And those Gauls made their magic potion with the help of your oil, seeing as you were stupid and gullible. So the settler took that black gold to refine it. Well, come on, wasn’t this in your own interests? And, between you and me, life working as a houseboy for a settler was better than a strange destiny as a hunter or a fetish man. The colonial town wasn’t as cruel as all that. You shouldn’t believe what your intellectuals have told you. And not only that but when you people grew old and you’d given up your children to go and fight for France in Europe, you were eligible for a medal which you received from the Cercle Commander. Do you think medals are just given out willy-nilly? It’s all positive, I’m telling you. The negroes didn’t have anything before the Whites arrived. It was empty, chaos, anarchy, nothing in Timbuktu, no Malian Empire, no soul, no culture, no Gods, no religion, no political or social structure! They had to choose for their survival: a black skin or a white mask. And the cleverest among them chose the white mask because black skin is the curse of Ham. Do you see the problem? I’m going to stop now, but you need to know that I’m not railing against you, I don’t like people who are ungrateful, I’m just saying things the way they are. Afterwards, you can take my words or toss them into the bins down in our basement where we often run into each other, it’s up to you. It was all positive, I’m telling you. From now on, since you’re going to die soon, let us bury the hatchet, come and see me if you want to discuss some of these issues before your death, but let us live in peace. I know everything about you, your woman, your child and that man who played the tom-toms. That’s not a problem, that’s life. Find yourself another woman, preferably a white one instead of clinging to your original colour …”

He took out a note from his wallet and put it down on the table. The waiter gave him ten centimes in change, which Mr Hippocratic immediately pocketed:

“I made it clear there would be no tip for you, so why are you standing in front of me like a moron?”

* * *

As we were leaving the café Mr Hippocratic said to me:

“I remember now: the name of that African who wrote Bound To Violence is Yambo Ouologuem. You should read it, he at least was a proper gentleman. That’s why everybody ganged up against him …”

It happened at Jip’swhen the other pals hadn’t showed up yet. I wasn’t in the mood to talk because I was on my way back from Porte de la Chapelle where I’d done a Western Union to pay the maintenance allowance to the home country. I ordered a beer and a man who was sitting at the back of the bar got up and made his way over to me. He said he was Breton, that he liked Africa, that in fact all Bretons liked Africa. He was a fan of B-sides too, so we watched the girls going by and I explained to him how to tell the character of this or that girl just by watching her backside move. All of a sudden we switched topics and landed on politics instead of getting a nice eyeful, as groups of Italian and American girls passed by.