"God's Bits of Wood is a fictionalized account of the Dakar-Niger train strikes which took in the 1940s. The novel looks at both the political and personal sacrifices the strikers and their families made. The political power is portrayed here as the strikers try to win back pensions, annual paid vacations, and family allowances from the Europeans. The novel can be seen as a shift of power between the African strikers and their European bosses. The Europeans have the political process and violence as a leverage of power, which they use both insistently and mindlessly. One of the European delega... continue
"Ousmane's satirical fable tells of the downfall of El Hadji, a member of the African elite who have taken the place of white businessmen in Francophone Africa. The protagonist is stricken with xala--impotence--in a racous bedrroom scene with his new young wife. The novel subtly traces the interplay among his three wives as El Hadji desperately tries to over come the affliction. In his obsession he resorts to primitive incantation, and his unscrupulous business associates cynically reject their former friend."--Cover