In the following essay on Ngugi's Petals of Blood, K.L. Godwin examines the genre of Commonwealth literature and the politicization of fiction in the quest for a balance between "national affection and intellectual pan-Africanism".

Commonwealth literature is not everyone's notion of a viable or useful category, and some may think that it smacks of postcolonial cultural imperialism, but it is a wider (if less precise) category than 'world literature written in English' and has the advantage of admitting regional and national literatures that would otherwise have to find shelter under the notnecessarily appropriate umbrellas of the 'third world', 'black', 'Asian', or 'Pacific' writing. One does not have to approve of British (or Australian, New Zealand, or United States) colonial rule to recognise that its effects on education, legal systems, writing, and culture generally continue to be evident, so that there are still useful comparisons to be...