Brief Summary Of The Story 'The Return By Thiong' O

In the story “The Return” by Thiong’o, the main character Kamau overhears a conversation between two of his fellow detainees about their families and how they feel about having to leave their families behind. The detainees, although far from home, think a lot about their wives and children. Their work is hard and strenuous, but even in the middle of breaking stones, they find their minds drifting back to their loved ones. Leaving home is a common human experience, and it is hard enough to do when one does so by choice, let alone being arrested by colonizers and forcefully taken away to prison camps. The detainees never had time to wrap their head around the thought of leaving, so they feel a slew of emotions: homesick from being so far away from their homes, guilty for ‘abandoning’ their …show more content…
Their coping mechanisms are thinking about the things, people, or places, that they left behind, although many of them are left with questions about what happened to the life they left behind. One man wonders how his pregnant wife is, and says, “‘I have no idea what has happened to her,’” (Thiong’o 137), which leaves him with a feeling of helplessness. The detainees in the camp have mixed experiences regarding their homes and families that they left behind, which leads them to have different emotions, but the common emotion between them all is the feeling of nostalgia for their past life.

6. In “The Return” by Thiong’o, the reason Kamau and other men like him are sent to the prison camps is because they revolted against the British colonial rule of their native land. Being set after the revolt is done with, the author never says outright the