The Amputated Memory

Translated by Marjolijn de Jager. Afterword by Michelle Mielly.

"A fascinating text by a major African woman writer, poet, performer, celebrating female strength, the joy and pain of being a woman. Resonantly titled, a must read for students and scholars of African and postcolonial literature, and of or general readers of classic and world fiction."

—Ketu H. Katrak, University of California, Irvine, author of Politics of the Female Body: Postcolonial Women Writers of the Third World

“Werewere Liking’s novel or ‘chant-roman’ is a truly remarkable achievement illustrating the potential of African literature to renew and regenerate its forms. Through innovative and fully successful use of traditional songs, praise-naming, lullaby, letters and myth, the novel is unique in its form.”

—The 25th Noma Award for Publishing in Africa

“With The Amputated Memory, her fifth novel, francophone Cameroonian artist Werewere Liking confirms her great lyrical talent while still probing into a collective and familial past…Like its multifaceted author, the saga…stands at the crossroads of genres and traditions…[and] takes on the destiny of an entire nation through the life of the heroine.”

—Michell Mielly, from the Afterword

“Weaving together history and memory…Liking recaptures the Cameroonian anticolonial resistance movement in the late fifties. And she does so very compellingly through women who have refused to remain victims and who heal both their public and personal trauma.”

—Odile Cazenave, Boston university, author of A New Generation of African Writers in Paris and Rebellious Women

"Fascinating…Liking's writing can be gorgeously lyrical and full of wisdom and humor . . . evoking a musical flow from one chapter to the next."

—Multicultural Review

"Liking's grand goal—creating a literary purgative meant to heal Africa—results in an expansive, eclectic, and innovative novel."

—Women's Review of Books