KARABO KGOLENG

Anita has a good life by South African standards. She came from humble roots and was rewarded by the promises of liberation. She has a permanent job at a university in Cape Town and owns her home. Although her life is one that millions could only dream to have, it’s not perfect. Her academic career is stagnating; after reporting her superior for sexual harassment, he stonewalls her attempts at furthering her research. Anita muses that she learned the hard way:

“Part of the induction of every woman here is to whisper to the others, the new ones coming in: which man is safe, which man can be trusted. But as the first black woman recruited to the department, this courtesy was not extended to me by my white woman colleagues”.

She also longs for intimate companionship. Her marriage ended many years ago when she couldn’t conceive a child. Despite the sisterhood that her best friends Claire and Thandiswa provide, she still yearns to have a lifelong witness to the innermost parts of her life. This coupled with the encouragement of her friends, leads her to an online dating app. She is wise to the game and avoids the red flags – men posting pictures with children, other women, or expensive-looking cars.

Soon enough, she comes across Neill, a handsome, discreet, generous man. What might be a problem is that he works for the ruling party. Even though he espouses progressive ideals and they both had to work hard to escape poverty, can a match work between a feminist social scientist and a politician? Or, as Thandiswa quips,

“They’re liberal until they’ve taken you to bed”.  

Power and solidarity are the dominant themes in Barbara Boswell’s second novel, The Comrade’s Wife. Boswell is an Associate Professor of English Literary Studies at the University of Cape Town. This latest work is art imitating life; to avoid lawsuits, the reviewer can’t publish many real-world instances of what happens to Anita. However, a lightly theoretical take on this “instant classic” as the blurb reads is worthy of an attempt to examine and evaluate how different texts portray power dynamics and mutual support.^{[1]Farrelly, 2019.}

In its social commentary, The Comrade’s Wife speaks to popular texts; for example, when Anita visits Neill’s house, she muses, “It’s as if I’ve stepped into the pages of Architectural Digest.” His twin children’s bedrooms are well-decorated, but they carry an air of emptiness. They live with his ex-wife although he has unfettered access to them. The demands of his job make it difficult to see them as often as he would like, he says. African literary scholar Ode Ogede’s commentary on the politics of love offers an intertextual reading of Chinua Achebe and Bessie Head by stating regarding the former that: “Part sentimental novel and part socio-political chronicle of the explosive issue of inequality, while training a sharp lens on the hugely disempowering effects of relationship crises induced by fractious identity politics, No Longer at Ease memorably extends the reach of the narratives of coupling”.^{[2]Ogede, O., 2011, p.123.}

Boswell also does this in her treatment of Anita’s relationship with Neill. She silences the alarm bells that ring at his opulent lifestyle as he gently manipulates her into a gilded cage. Soon enough, the feminist scholar recedes and having been emotionally battered by an institution that pays lip service to decolonial research she seeks comfort in the arms of a generous, intelligent man. She rationalises the situation; her career has hit the ceiling and Neill has offered to use his political and business connections to help her start a potentially lucrative consultancy. 

It’s easy for an educated observer to deride Anita (and by extension, her creator) for her naivete but that’s the catch; even the most educated among us are not immune to being scammed. For example, a professor of clinical psychiatry who wrote a book about financial scams also fell under Bernie Madoff’s spell.^{[3]Boddy, 2024.} Neill’s influence is no different as he has almost the whole country captivated. He has carefully crafted his persona as ‘one of the good guys’. The flush of early romance also spread its contagion to Thandiswa and Claire—they are thrilled that their friend has found happiness. 

As Boswell demonstrates, coercive control isn’t limited to intimate relationships. It exists at varying intersections of society and is a powerful impediment to justice and positive social change. The hurdles Anita faces at her workplace are echoed in popular culture, particularly in The Chair, a TV series on Netflix that comedically follows the drama that faces the first woman of colour appointed as the head of a failing English Literature department at an American university. For many feminist scholars and media critics, one had to try not to think too much if they sought entertainment from the show. Imposter syndrome and anxiety induced by structural racism in academia (and other historically hegemonic workplaces) is no joke.^{[4]Esposito, 2022; Warner, 2021.} Women report being coerced into kowtowing to the boys’ club.

There is a sense of frustration in The Comrade’s Wife at how the subaltern carries the burden of decolonising and dismantling the patriarchy.^{[5]Spivak, 2005.}

The key takeaway from Boswell’s novel is that solidarity is probably the most powerful tool in overcoming the many forms of oppression facing marginalised people. And that you should make Excel your friend. Thandiswa and Claire come to her aid when her fairytale turns into a nightmare and they loyally walk with her, battle-weary as she is, into a hopeful future.