Chairman of Fools

Chairman of Fools (2005) by Zimbabwean author Shimmers Chinodya has a very wobbly start. Coming from the high of the previous book (Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries), perhaps a book hangover, I found the thin prose in Chairman of Fools quite off-putting. Despite being a little fast paced, I grew frustrated by the lack of a substantive plot early on, whose effect is that one senses a rambling of sorts.

A little research online explains the book’s lack of plot—it is loosely autobiographical. It reveals the crisis in the life of Farai, a popular and well-known literary writer and academic who has just returned to Zimbabwe from the United States on leave. An alcoholic, he suffers a mental breakdown and is diagnosed with the bipolar syndrome. Upon his admission to a psychiatric facility, he becomes the chairman of the patients there—or the “chairman of fools”. Through his reflections and experiences, we learn that he is troubled by a combination of factors—a creeping lack of confidence in his literary career, an increasingly assertive and independent wife, the deaths of his mother, father and brother in rapid succession, and competing pulls of modernity, Christian faith, and traditionalism.

Chairman of Fools is rich in portraying Zimbabwean society, and uses Farai to provide a microcosm of middle class life in Zimbabwe. A number of themes are infused into this short book—just over 180 pages long—such as loneliness and dislocation in exile; traditional practices (such as a proposed visit to a traditional spiritual healer to “cure” Farai’s mental instability) juxtaposed against Christian faith (which his wife espouses); materialism and consumerism; a slowly unraveling Zimbabwean economy (passing references to the effects of land reform and a weakening currency are made); and the effects of all these on marriage and family.

To this extent I think Chairman of Fools is a worthwhile read, although I would have been much happier if it was stylistically and aesthetically richer. Chinodya is able to reveal the tensions and dilemmas in Farai’s life in a convincing and dramatic way, but is let down by the disjointedness and thinness of plot and prose. I would however still like to read more of Chinodya, especially his award-winning novel, Harvest of Thorns.

Picture credit: Goodreads