The Joys of Motherhood

“Oh, how torn she was between two men: she had to be loyal to her father, as well as to her lover Agbadi.”

Through Ona’s experiences, Emecheta explores the tensions and contradictions of living as a woman in a patriarchal society. This passage illustrates how Ona is accustomed to seeing herself not as an individual but rather as an accessory to the men in her life, particularly her father and her lover. When the interests of those two men come into conflict, Ona finds herself caught in the middle, trying to fulfill two contradictory duties while dismissing her own desires.

“Please don’t mourn me for long; and see that however much you love our daughter Nnu Ego you allow her to have a life of her own, a husband if she wants one. Allow her to be a woman.”

Ona’s final plea to Agbadi constitutes a tragic commentary on her own life. She begs Agbadi to allow Nnu Ego to make life choices for herself, even if doing so requires her to leave him and start her own family. This contrasts with the way her father treated her, as he prevented her from marrying Agbadi in the hopes that she would produce a male heir for him. This also foreshadows Nnu Ego’s later expression of hope that her children will have better lives than she did, suggesting the possibility of marginal improvements from one generation to the next.