Aborted Illusions By Zaynab

like a huge burden of aborted dreams until she is able, at thirty, resolve to dream dreams that “would not be stillborn” (105).
Zaynab usually touches on the theme of shattered illusions symbolised by Li, Awa (her sister) and Faku (Li’s childhood friend). The three young women are all traumatised by their marriages. This is due to the fact that each of their husbands turn out not to be quite the right choice. They (the husbands) are seen to be, in their different ways, both unlovable. Only Li eventually realises at the end that her husband, Habu, has seemed unlovable precisely because he had not been the dream lover her childhood fancy had decorated so elaborately with illusion. Her desire for freedom and gaiety suddenly seem fulfilable when
Now, Faku was on the way to becoming a social welfare worker herself” (102). It is then, she is said to have at last found a meaning in life and becomes successful. At this point, one expects Li to have been fulfilled, but instead, she felt empty. She also felt that the emptiness at this point is not just the fact of bereavement, but one that went beyond that. Having accomplished the goals which she had struggled to attain for the past ten years, she wished they wassomething else to struggle for.This goes to show that the satisfaction one craves for in life is not material satisfaction only. Emotional or psychological satisfaction is one very important aspect of human life that is required to make satisfaction complete. But this is still missing in her life in the sense that from the very beginning, God did not create man or woman to live alone.It is therefore not a surprise when Li eventually takes a bold step to return to her husband (Habu) in spite of the numerous fresh suitors who availed themselves to her. We had earlier been informed that Habu Adams is still in hospital with badly crushed legs resulting from a car accident. According to Li, “it seems as though he has lost the will to live. The doctors say they have done everything they can and that the rest depends on him” (92-3).Li is returning now knowing full well what her mission is: and that
She further argues that history has documented the fact that pre-colonial Nigeria saw more women than men in the forefront of the nation’s socio-political and economic struggle. History also recorded that women were actively involved in the arts of government, military skills, politics, commerce, general social life (Alkali “Feminity, Transcendance...”159). In line with this argument, Alkali agrees with Mba’s argument that “The likes of Queen Amina of Zazzau, Moremi of Ile-Ife, Inikpi of Igala, Daurama of Daura and Nana Asmau Dan Fodio were not only wives, mothers and princesses but military generals, diplomats, teachers, merchants, warriors, political and religious leaders” (162). In view of this assertion, it has become impossible for Alkali to write from the perspective of western brand (radical) of feminism as some critics would have had her do. She is also very conscious of the fact that the African environment is different as a result of