Paper no.14 The African Literature Prepared by:- Vaidehi Hariyani

2. Prepared by
Vaidehi Hariyani
Semester 4
Batch – 2015-17
Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University
The role of Memory in “A Grain of
Wheat” and “The Sense of an Ending”

3. New

4. “A Grain of Wheat” “The Sense of an Ending”

5. the ability of the mind or of a
person or organism to retain
learned information and
knowledge of past events
and experiences and to
retrieve that information and
knowledge
Memory

6. • First Person Narrator
• Memory Novel
• It also begins with the
present day
• Based on personal
history of Tony Webster
(Protagonist)
• Multiple Narrators
• Use of Flashback
Technique
• Begins with the present
day
• Contains historical
background
NARRATIVE TECHNIQUE
A GRAIN OF WHEAT THE SENSE OF AN ENDING

7. Mugo
• All is well
• No trace of anything
wrong
• Severe damage to his
friend Adrian
• Probably due to him,
Adrian does suicide.
• Realizes the damage done
by him
• Something disturbing
• Listens to conscience
• Betrayed his friend
Kihika
• Due to him, Kihika is
killed by the Britishers.
• Accepts his mistake
Tony

8. Remembers his
Childhood and his past
including his mistake
According to the narrator

9. I remember everything.
But
“I remember, in no
particular order”

10. • Here it is not Mugo’s
memory, but the memory of
the omniscient unreliable
Narrator.
• May be the narrator is
telling us the events
according to his/her
memory.
• In the first part, Tony is
sharing events recalling
from his memory.
• We find that he himself
deconstructs what he tells
the readers.
HOW FAR CAN WE RELY ON THE MEMORY OF
BOTH THESE NARRATOR?
What you end up remembering isn’t
always the same as what you have
witnessed.

11. • “History is that certainty produced at the
point where the imperfections of memory
meet the inadequacies of documentation.”
QUESTIONING HISTORY

12.  Like both the narrators, our memory is also unreliable.
 The role of memory in both the text also makes us questions the
reliability of history.
 Something remains deep within us. We do not allow our own
self to visit that place.

13.  We tend to think that memories are stored in our brains
just as they are in computers.
 But neuroscientists have shown that each time we
remember something, we are reconstructing the event,
reassembling it from traces throughout the brain.
 Psychologists have pointed out that we also suppress
memories that are painful or damaging to self-esteem.
We could say that, as a result, memory is unreliable.

14. WORKS CITED
• Microsoft® Encarta® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation.
All rights reserved.
• Barnes, Julian. "The Sense of an Ending". New York:
Alfred.A.Knopf, 2011.
• Eisold, Ken. Psychology Today. 12 March 2012. 29 March 2017
<https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hidden-
motives/201203/unreliable-memory>.
• Thiongo, Ngugi wa. "A Grain of Wheat". Rev Socialist, n.d.
• Google Images

15. THANK YOU
vaidehi09hariyani@gmail.com
For Questions and feedback : CONTACT ME