The M'errie Wives of Mustapha

The M'Errie wives of Mustapha is a memoir which explores the subject of polygamy through the voice of a child narrator - Rali. It reveals the precarious nature of the subject and how it relates to the children entrapped in it - showing how the events and behaviours of the matriarchs almost subvert the childrens's emotional development. The plot revolves around the protagonist - Khaliat, main antagonist, Mahirat and Mustapha the patriarch of the family.

The story begins summation by telling us how mustapha’s marital journey began, and evolved The title is deliberately dialectical, and sets the tone of encapsulating the irony of relationships within this partnership. Are the wives merry or miserable? This is what drives the plot in the story. The plot reveals ‘a mosaic of conflicts, motives, dreams, proclivities, dishonesties, vanities, insecurities, desires,…virtues, and mindsets that make up part of the context of fictional characters’ as well as non-fictional characters. It reveals the labyrinthine activities of Mahirat. The story follows a trajectory path from the beginning and ‘through the combination of imagery, description, inner life, scenery and language ‘ the reader is engaged to ‘see’ the progression of Mustapha’s marital status. The anticipation of conflict is embedded in the narrative from the onset and is slowly released. The plot reveals how the ‘skirmishes’ among the wives, through the collusion of their personalities and events, became the crescendo and eventual turning point of events.

Rali Ikiebe is an author based in the UK with her husband. She is a mother and grandmother.