Andrew Hurst- "The Shivering"

Andrew Hurst

At the end of “The Shivering,” Ukamaka, the Nigerian student living in America, attends Mass and thinks:

how much more subdued Catholic Masses were in America; how in Nigeria it would have been a vibrant green branch from a mango tree that the priest would dip in a bucket of holy water held by a hurrying, sweating Mass-server . . . how the people would have been drenched; and how, smiling and making the sign of the cross, they would have felt blessed (166).

The conflict that is the focus of Adiche’s story “The Shivering” is the conflict between religious cultures, from which comes the conflict between Westernization and maintaining one’s foreign identity. These conflicts are textualized through the dialog of Chinedu, a Pentecostal in a “particularly Nigerian” (143) way, and Ukamaka, an Americanized Nigerian student who struggles with her faith and who balks at Chinedu’s fervent prayer: “He prayed in that . . . way that made her uneasy (145).  Furthermore, Ukamaka’s inadvertent shivering at Chinedu’s prayer on page 144 symbolizes her native Nigeria’s pull on her subconscious.

The quoted passage, especially the last line, the diction and the imagery therein, speaks to the aforementioned conflicts. The last line, “In Nigeria . . . They would have felt blessed,” contains the main idea of the passage. Through this line, the author concludes that there is a genuine enjoyment of religion in Nigeria that is different from the notion of religious obligation in the West. This is also shown when Ukamaka remarks that she has brought Chinedu to “the dungeon of Catholicism” (165). This seems disingenuous, but in reality it reflects the feelings toward religion in the West. The Thanatonic, ascetic image of a “dungeon of Catholicism” starkly contrasts the vitalic, fecund image of a Nigerian priest waving a “vibrant green branch” in the quoted passage.

Despite these contrasts between the two religious cultures, there is a hint of irony in “In Nigeria . . . They would have felt blessed.” The line implies that Ukamaka, although aware of the power of religion and the vibrancy with which religion is celebrated in Nigeria, still believes that God’s blessing is only a matter of being “felt” and not a matter of actually being. Therefore, Adiche suggests that religion is essentially and beautifully Nigerian, but inherently manufactured.  This may be a way for the author to show that she values all parts of Nigerian culture without wholeheartedly considering them infallible.