Imagined States: Law and Literature in Nigeria

Examines representations of the law in colonial and postcolonial fiction from and about Nigeria

• Examines representations of the law in British and Nigerian high-brow, middle-brow and popular fiction and journalism between 1900 and 1966
• Draws on rare archives of Nigerian newspaper reports and local government papers from the period
• Explores how ethical issues of late colonial and early postcolonial law in Africa were played out in the pages of highly diverse texts
• Draws on the political philosophy of Agamben, particularly his interpretation of the state of exception and the homo sacer, to illustrate the paradoxes of the colonial and postcolonial legal systems wittingly and unwittingly uncovered by these texts

Imagined States examines representations of the law in British and Nigerian high-brow, middle-brow and popular fiction and journalism. Drawing on a rich range of examples, the book focuses on the imaginative role that the state of exception played in the application of indirect rule during British colonialism and in the legal machinations of the postcolonial state. It reads works by Chinua Achebe, Joyce Cary, Cyprian Ekwensi and Edgar Wallace, together with a range of Nigerian market literature and journalism.