Of Water and the Spirit: Ritual, Magic, and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman

#187
Title: Of Water and the Spirit: Ritual, Magic, and Initiation in the Life of an African Shaman
Author: Malidoma Patrice Somé
Publisher: Penguin Compass
Year: 1994
Country: Burkina Faso (Upper Volta)
318 pages

As a child, Somé was kidnapped by Jesuits, to be trained as a priest and used as an intermediary with his people. He escaped as an adult (after assaulting a teacher, he fled the Jesuit school) and returned to his village. There, he was out of place and unable to assume an adult role. He was both lacking in local knowledge and had been taught a different way to see the world. Much of the memoir recounts Somé's grueling initiation and transition to cultural adulthood. Even after initiation, however, Somé remains a man of two worlds, charged by his elders to bridge his culture and the Western world.

Like many memoirs and narratives from non-Western cultures, magic and symbolism abound. This is not how I understand the world and its workings, so it is interesting to read Somé's descriptions. He addresses the worldview differences, but I would have wished for more commentary on the contrasts. Also like many memoirs from countries affected by colonialism and war, the questions of identity, identification, and multiple cultures are pervasive, critical, and ultimately unanswerable.