Of Masquerades and Mimicry: Performance, Identity, and Tradition in Chris Abani’s <i>The Virgin of Flames</i>

Abstract

This article considers the interaction between mimricy and masquerade in Chris Abani's 2007 novel, The Virgin of Flames, viewing this play of performances as a means of destabilizing the notion of tradition in the construction of an idea of African subjectivity. Focusing on the protagonist, Black's use of cross-dressing and white-face, this article considers the ways in which the of drag-as-masquerade, engaging in the liberatory discourses of perfromativity in identity construction, is re-routed through the intrusion of drag-as-masquerade, read as a deferred desire for ontological stability. Through the rooting of performance in tradition and the routing of tradition through performance, The Virgin of Flames, this article agrues, creates a vision of tradition in African literatures which escapes a singular conception and challenges polemic notions of "authenticity" and "authority", while also presenting a rebuttal to critical dismissals of the novel as one with little to say about Africa and African experience.