Book review: Francis B. Nyamnjoh (2017), Drinking from the Cosmic Gourd: How Amos Tutuola Can Change Our Minds

Abstract

Nyamnjoh’s insightful book offers an original, nuanced, and penetrative interpretation of the late Nigerian writer Amos Tutuola, whose true value and influence were mainly recognised only after his demise. According to the writer, the book is about “the epistemological dimensions of how research is conceptualized and practiced in African universities caught betwixt and between the tensions and possibilities of interconnecting global and local hierarchies” (1). While the above captures a key focus of the text, I believe it really diminishes the extent and breadth of issues tackled in the book. The book criss-crosses orthodox disciplinary divides; represents a commentary on literature, on history, and more critically on the sociology of knowledge and serves as a critique of contemporary African intellectualism.