Postcolonial Critique

Half of a Yellow Sun expresses the Nigerians as silenced to the rest of the world during the Biafran War. In the novel, some chapters end with a section titled "The Book: The World Was Silent When We Died," describing the brutality of the war on the Igbo people through one of the characters. The character adds to the novel as the book progresses.

Adichie placed this novel-within-the-novel to describe how history is written. The World Was Silent When We Died is not a published novel; therefore, the story has never been heard by anyone. The Biafran War was only written by its victors who published their side of the story.

No other countries, especially postcolonial white countries like Britain, help the Nigerians supply food or promote peace. Africa in the past was a victim of European land superiority, and the scars remain in the continent. Here, Britain has hegemony in Nigeria due to Imperialism with hybrids like making English one of Nigeria's official languages. However, Nigerians did not appreciate this pressure of another culture when the language was considered "formal and cold" (272). Nigerians realized the power-hungry English only used Nigeria to promote their empire and to become a "thorn in France's eye" (195). 

Richard, an English writer, was the only character in the novel that was white. Postcolonialism is described to Richard as if "'Europeans took out the insides of an African woman and then stuffed and exhibited her all over Europe'" (137-138). He is viewed by other characters throughout the novel as ignorant or not fully understanding the war because he was not one of them. Nigerians were definitely shocked when Richard opens his mouth and speaks fluent Igbo.

With the novel's viewpoint of the other, the Igbo people were tortured by the northern Nigerians out of their territory city by city until there was nothing; however, they remained hopeful and refused to give in. Olanna, an Igbo, describes how she "could not believe how easy it had been to deny who they were, to shrug off being Igbo" (168). Ethnocentricity caused the Igbo to remain united during the war. 

When a single identity is mentioned in the novel, their pessimistic responses for uniting the southeastern Igbo with the northern Nigerians are considered "'impossible, impossible'" (177). Uniting Euope and Africa is viewed in the exact same way: "'the African and the European would always be reconcilable'" (143). 

Finally, Half of a Yellow Sun has been referred to by a critic as "Nigerian Gone with the Wind," a novel that is found in the canon of literature. The novel definitely stands tall with views on Igbo people and Nigeria through a postcolonial standpoint.