Serowe: Village of the Rain Wind

by Bessie Head

Serowe Offering your students stories, poetry, biographical writings and essays from across Africa, this series includes work from nearly 40 writers from 19 different countries. Full description

Genres: Africa, Nonfiction, Botswana, African Literature, Travel, South Africa

245 pages, Paperback

First published June 29, 1981

About the author

Bessie Emery Head, though born in South Africa, is usually considered Botswana's most influential writer.

Bessie Emery Head was born in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, the child of a wealthy white South African woman and a black servant when interracial relationships were illegal in South Africa. It was claimed that her mother was mentally ill so that she could be sent to a quiet location to give birth to Bessie without the neighbours knowing. However, the exact circumstances are disputed, and some of Bessie Head's comments, though often quoted as straight autobiography, are in fact from fictionalized settings.
In the 1950s and '60s she was a teacher, then a journalist for the South African magazine Drum. In 1964 she moved to Botswana (then still the Bechuanaland Protectorate) as a refugee, having been peripherally involved with Pan-African politics. It would take 15 years for Head to obtain Botswana citizenship. Head settled in Serowe, the largest of Botswana's "villages" (i.e. traditional settlements as opposed to settler towns). Serowe was famous both for its historical importance, as capital of the Bamangwato people, and for the experimental Swaneng school of Patrick van Rensburg. The deposed chief of the Bamangwato, Seretse Khama, was soon to become the first President of independent Botswana.

Her early death in 1986 (aged 48) from hepatitis came just at the point where she was starting to achieve recognition as a writer and was no longer so desperately poor.

Reviews

[Kavita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bessie Head takes on a mammoth task of recording an ancient way of life by simply talking to old people about their lives and that of their ancestors. She interviews a large number of people about different facets of life in a village called Serowe, Head's home as well as that of Seretse Khama, Botswana's first president and the man who kept the country out of civil wars, banished polygamy, and passed a bunch of social justice measures.

People talked a lot about their daily lives, including the old way of life (cattle herding) as well as when people began to go to school and got different jobs, progress made with women's rights, healthcare, and education - everything was outlined by the interviewees themselves. This felt a lot like Junichi Saga's books on Japan, where he does the same - talk to old people. But Head takes it farther and connects it to the wider history and politics of Botswana. People talk about how colonisation changed Botswana, how Christianity helped / hindered development, apartheid, clan-based loyalties, etc.

One interesting aspect of Serowe is the use of communist-style work regiments and co-operative work units, which seem to have resulted in progress and a lift out of poverty at a crucial period of Botswana's history. Of course, everyone was not happy about it but it offered opportunities to many people, especially women, who would have had no other options without these overly organised work units. Some of the older people appear to be proud of their free work for the community while others criticise it while accepting it gave them a life out of the traditional lifestyle. Whatever the case, it allowed everyone in the region to prosper and get educated, which fuels future generations.

Seretse Khama is KING in Botswana. He committed the unthinkable act of marrying an Englishwoman, and yet he is still revered. The first president of independent Botswana, Khama brought peace and prosperity to the nation by avoiding civil wars and the resource curse. It's interesting to see how almost everyone Head interviews has only positive things to say about the man.

Serowe encapsulates a wider African journey and gives us a glimpse into a culture and history that is no longer relevant in many places. It's a very African book with a huge emphasis on the recording of oral historical narratives, though Head also provides readers with the wider history of Botswana. Very interesting read, and I would highly recommend.

[Sincerae Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Serowe in the southern African nation of Botswana has been called Africa's most famous village because it is the home of one of Africa's most renown and honorable kings (chief) Khama III (the Great) (1837?-1923) of the Bamangwato people. He was a reformer, a converted extremely devout Christian, and a man determined to protect his land and people from the colonialists. Ian Khama who is the current president of Botswana is the great grandson of Khama III. Serowe is the capital of the Bamangwato. Bessie Head, the author of Serowe, Village of the Rain Wind, who was an exile from South Africa made Serowe her home. She is also one of Africa's most famous and respected writers. I've also visited Serowe briefly on a weekend back in the early 1990s when I was teaching in Botswana through Peace Corps. Today Serowe is no longer a village, but a town.

Serowe, Village of the Rain Wind is Bessie Head's celebration of her adopted village. It is a mixture of the history of the Bamangwato and their king Khama the Great, his successors, and interviews of various citizens of the village, some who are very old and others who are middle aged or in their 30s. Batswana and even a few European and white South African inhabitants of the village are interviewed. This book presents a picture of what the old history and customs of their community were like up to the time that Bessie Head wrote her book.

At the end of the book Head includes a brief history of Botswana and Southern Africa starting in the 1880s when the Western powers of Great Britain and Germany along with the Afrikaner (Boers) settlers started to attempt to carve up, settle, and exploit the land, working diligently to steal it from the native peoples.

I like and recommend this book. As in all of Bessie Head's works whether fiction or non-fiction the writing is quietly elegant.

Video of Serowe, a drive through the town (July 2013):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2lE1...

A very short video of the life of Khama III (the Great):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkcvc...

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was beautifully written, and sort of all-encompassing in the story of its main character's life. On the other hand, the story is incredibly dry and the character's existence is a bit mundane. I honestly can't remember there being any major events in this novel, though I assume there had to be something going on that might warrent the name of "plot".

[Keatlaretse Sepheko]

This is the best book ever..it uncovers the history of one of the biggest villages in Botswana. I am a mongwato from the village of serowe but there were things i ddn't know that i learned from this book, for instance,the great Khama embraced christianity and abolished things like polygamy which in the past was a major practice. This is a historical book and a must read...

[Mariana · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book recounts hundred years of life in a village in Botswana told to the author by the people themselves. This predates and complements Alexander McCall Smith's series The #1 Ladies Detective Agency. I'm reading everything by Bessie Head I can find.