Black Gold of the Sun: Searching for Home in England and Africa

Ostensibly a travelogue about a second generation black briton's journey to his parent's birthplace, Eshun's Black Gold Of The Sun is at heart a meditation on belonging and alienation.

It has been said that the Twentieth Century was the century of the homeless man - with an unprecedented number of human beings travelling both within countries and across national borders. The concepts presented in Black Gold are relevant to anyone who has ever grown up in one place and lived in another. In these times of flux the themes are universal. You don't have to be exclusively black+british to understand the book or to identify with the narrator.

As he travels as an adult to what should be, on the surface, his "homeland" to trace his ancestry the writer reminisces on his early childhood in England, his relationship as the youngest of 4 siblings, his family and his formative years.

Many will know Eshun from his time as the editor of Arena [when it was still an independent magazine and separate in form and content to other men's magazines of its time] and also as the recently appointed, high profile Creative Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts. In both these roles he has stressed notions of personal empowerment, inclusiveness and choice: so it is interesting to see in his book that he is most powerful as a writer when he is at his most powerless and excluded: in the several passages where his emotional exhaustion is manifested as physical exhaustion, i as a reader found myself [meta]physically slumping in my chair in recognition.

Eshun captures the nastiness of the ubiqitious racism of 1970s England perfectly, as he recounts growing up in that dark and hostile time. Vivid too are his descriptions of the various pre-teen battles of two brothers sharing a bedroom carpeted by an ocean of marvel comics and other 70s paraphernalia. The closed yet complete universe of the child - whether it be the ice cream parlour after a science fiction film on your birthday or the strangeness of seeing your parents cry for the first time - is captured perfectly.

While most contemporary british literature falls into the "thesaurus trap" - the use of obscure words which presumably make the writer and the reader both feel intelligent because they learn a new word everyday - Eshun's use of language is simple and direct. The reader is never lost or left behind. Communication is a priority. Combined with an elegant and lucid prose style [the book, I think, can be read aloud as well as digested silently]- the overall effect is one of honesty and clarity.

ps the cover of the hard-back was done especially by the artist Chris Ofili and is one of the best book covers - in respect to its sympathy to the prose - since Brett Eston Ellis's American Psycho.

An enjoyable & fascinating book...and must read for all. (3/3 people found this helpful)

I truly loved this book & highly recommend it. Although it's an intimate and moving journey of a man's quest to find his true identity in England by way of Africa, I, an American female of non-African decent, could totally relate to & was fascinated by Eshun's experience...and that is the truly magical & beautiful thing about this book...it's unexpected accessibility. Heartfelt and sincere, Eshun's Black Gold of the Sun is an important and much needed voice in modern literate. Fantastic.

Brilliant (3/3 people found this helpful)

You do not have to be black or British to enjoy this book. The experience of duality and not knowing where you belong applies to the modern, urban existence. Eshun's book is beautifully written, fully of telling stories and explains complex ideas in a simple elegant manner. This is a must read for anyone who likes to look beneath the surface of things. Black Gold of the Sun will take you across continents and back in time. It is a heartfelt tale which both will move you to tears and make you chortle with recognition. Brilliant.

Getting to the heart of the matter (3/3 people found this helpful)

As a black Londoner, I share similar feelings of double-consciousness that Eshun describes and I think most black Brits have pondered their answer to the same question "where are you from", that his memoir explores. His journey to find his own answer to this question is interesting in the way it illuminates facts about his personal history and ancestry. However, the emotional distance that his lifelong sense of 'homelessness' has created, is reflected in his writing. BGOTS reads like a journalist's account of his trip to his parent's country and down memory lane without any real emotional depth. He seems to scratch only the surface of his feelings - his relationship with his brother, his childhood dislocation, his experience of Ghana - these accounts are lacklustre and self-conscious. I got the impression that this was an intellectual who still had a journey to make in order to connect his head with his heart. The book is good commuter read though - the narrative is unambiguous and there are interesting facts. It also had me taking my own wander down memory lane as I grew up around the same part of London, attended the same university (not at the same time), and am very familiar with the London he describes. I do not, however, know Ghana, and despite the fact that the book being set mostly in that country, I'm not sure that I learnt much about the place from Eshun - who seems to have travelled without connecting with the people or the soul of the country. Well, perhaps he did... he just didn't manage to capture these insights in his book. But read it if you want an insight into the identity crisis that pervades in black Britain and want some interesting facts about Ghana and the legacy of slavery.

Refreshingly honest (1/1 people found this helpful)

Insightful memoir. Eshun's story in many ways reflects the experiences of numerous young Africans who were born in the UK in the postcolonial period. His predicament is therefore far from unique. His narrative voice and writing, however, is. A good read. I finished it in two sittings.

Black Gold of the Sun: Searching for Home in England and Africa

Ekow Eshun

Reader Reviews:

Generation Star Wars (4/4 people found this helpful)

An enjoyable & fascinating book...and must read for all. (3/3 people found this helpful)

Brilliant (3/3 people found this helpful)

Getting to the heart of the matter (3/3 people found this helpful)

Refreshingly honest (1/1 people found this helpful)

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