The Concubine

By Elechi Amadi

A novel by Elechi Amadi. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 147863460X
• ISBN13: 9781478634607
• Release Date: April 2017
• Publisher: Waveland Pr Inc
• Length: 216 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.0" x 0.5" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

Simply brilliant and beautiful!!!!

A combination of brilliance and beautiful writing. Elechi Amadi is at his best in this book. The plot, the character development, and the conflicts are superbly developed. Any reader of quality fiction, irrespective of culture, will appreciate this book for its simplicity in language and vision. A true African masterpiece and world literature classic. Amadi has given us a memorable work that transcends time. --Dike Okoro Milwaukee, Wisconsin USA

magnificent piece of writing

I like reading, especially the African novels but there is nothing compared to 'the concubine'. the book truly revealed the true African village life as I know it. Amadi is a terrific writer as he took you to the superstitious african society. 'Concubine' is the book that grabs your attention from the first page and hold it right up to the last page.

Elechi Amadi's "The Concubine": A rare Classic

People often ask me: "Can any good come out of Africa?". My answer is yes: Elechi Amadi's "The Concubine" is one of the best things that ever came out of Africa. In high school in Nigeria, "The Concubine" was one of those few literature textbooks students from all works of life (myself included), cherished. Ihuoma (who was the unwitting cause of all the tragedy in the book,) did not understand why all who loved and tried to marry her, died suddenly and mysteriously, until it was revealed that she was simply subject to her own fate (just like Oedipus in Sophocles' "Oedipus the king", and Achilles and Agamemnon in Homer's "the Odyssey"). Elechi Amadi captivates with his writing talent. Just when you think you know what is coming, he outwits you with a manificently conceived twist to the story that makes you want to keep reading ....and reading... It is my utmost ambition (God willing), to bring this magnificent story to the big screen. "The Concubine" is a classic, belonging in the group of great stories like "Oedipus the king", "The Iliad", "The Odyssey", James Hardley Chase's "You're dead without money", G.P.Sippy's "Sholay" (a Bollywood-Indian movie) and Akira Kurosawa's "Kagemusha" ( a Japanese movie). Buy this book my friend, add it to your collections, read it and tell your friends, children and grand children this magnificent story.

Beautifully and dramatically done.

We studied this book in Kenyan High school and upto now,I am yet to find a book that encompasses various styles of writing as Mr Amadi has done. From Onomaetopia to simple irony, this book captures ones attention. As a child who grew up in post colonial times, the description of a village and practices yet untouched by the white man serve to help me understand more about those times. The book is dramatic and is quite interesting. Ihuomas life and tribulations make for very good reading. The practices in the book of those times are so vibrantly described that they seemed to leap off the page and into my soul, giving me a bit of insight on how life was before colonisation. 'The Concubine' is a book I would read over and over again. It surprises. It teaches. It entertains.

Great Imagination. Writing at it's magical best.

I am there in the African village. I am a part of the customs though they are different from my own. I see the men who compete or wrestle to show their strength, and not to kill, because they love each other as brothers. I see the women who have petty jealousies, though they respect the village and help with each other's kids and families. I feel the pain of the main heroine who keeps losing the men she loves to death. I feel the pain of the man who truly loves this woman, but is forbade to marry her because an African man who has not been married before must marry a virgin specially chosen for him. I am most impressed with Amadi's writing when I find out through this man's quest for answers from the river, why the men in this woman's life are taken away from her.