Metafiction in Mpe's Welcome to our Hillbrow - African Literature ...

a common society and a common future” (278). The idea behind global
citizenship emerges as the narrator follows Refilwe in her travels. Mpe makes
it clear, for example, that it is not only in South Africa, or even Africa as a
whole, in which xenophobia plays a driving force but also throughout the world.
In England, Refilwe soon learns what international xenophobia is like. The
narrator explains, “Our Heathrow strongly reminded Refilwe of our Hillbrow
and the xenophobia is engendered. She learnt there, at our Heathrow, that there
was another word for foreigners that was not very different in connotation from
Makwerekwere or Mapolantane. Except that it was a much more widely used
term: Africans” (102). As Tiragalong treats those from Hillbrow, so England
treats those from Africa. Ironically, xenophobia is a universal fear.
In spite of global xenophobia, Mpe illustrates how it is still possible for
people to amek connections on a global level. Of course, he does so by calling
attention to the literariness of his novel and creating characters who make
connections with each other while discussing literature. Refilwe’s favorite bar
in Oxford is called Jude the Obscure. In the bar, there seems to be a universal
bond over literature:
There were many fellow students. . . mixing easily and happily
with non-students, many people who discussed books while
simultaneously indulging in beer. . . Posters and cartoons of
James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw, Seamus
Deane and others lined the walls. . . The owner of the pub. . .
was willing to listen and be informed on literatures from other
parts of the world. He bought Zakes Mda’s Ways of Dying
after Refilwe had recommended it very strongly. (107)
It is in this literary environment, created in a work of
literature, that people from around the world connect over literature.
From Refilwe’s first walk into Jude the Obscure, Mpe establishes
a setting that is open to outsiders. The posters on the wall are all
Irishmen, as opposed to Englishmen, and include a man put on trial
for sodomy and a socialist. Then in a great literary allusion, including
to South Africa’s Zakes Mda and England’s Thomas Hardy, Mpe
writes, “Here was Refilwe herself, bringing our Ways of Dying, ways
of mourning, and ways of wondering to our Jude the Obscure” (108).
Like the posters on the wall, these selections are not incidental, but both
works play into themes running throughout Welcome to Our Hillbrow.
In Mda’s novel Ways of Dying, his protagonist, Toloki becomes a
professional mourner in order to grieve for those who have been taken
by AIDS. In Jude the Obscure, Hardy writes about a working class
man, Jude, who strives to become a scholar, in addition to themes
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