‘A Bend in the River’ reads like an updating of Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’, taken 60 or 70 years forward into the post-independence period. As with ‘Heart of Darkness’, ‘A Bend’ is set in an unnamed African country in the interior of the continent. The setting is not the only similarity between these books – both have colonialism as their principal themes, and both are pervaded with a sense of impending danger and disaster. Continue reading →