Lynn, Thomas Jay. "The Trauma of Loss and the Loss of Self in Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun."

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun (2006) dramatizes both traditional forms of gender discrimination and Western influences that precipitate the emotional and physical trauma suffered by its protagonist, Olanna Ozobia. Factors that assail Olanna and other African literary women are family loss and marital abandonment. While Adichie and other African authors critique these destructive pressures on women’s dignity and very well-being, they also celebrate the ability of women to surmount violation and injustice. While females make essential contributions to the health of their communities, as Olanna repeatedly does in Half of a Yellow Sun, their own health is routinely undermined by contradictory and demeaning pressures and expectations. These norms of behavior may have an adverse impact on the psychic wholeness that the women naturally pursue and can result in depression and sometimes despair and pathology. Olanna’s situation has its unique features, due in part to her experiences of the Nigerian Civil War, but we may discern in the family and societal ordeals that she faces, the depression they trigger, and the fortitude that enables her to survive and even lead, a vital bond with other women portrayed in African literature.