THE DRINKER OF HORIZONS

Couto’s epic trilogy about colonial Mozambique concludes with a harrowing trek from the conquered land.

The first book in Couto’s Sands of the Emperor series, Woman of the Ashes (2018), turned on clashes between rival Mozambican tribes before Portuguese forces claimed power in the late 1800s; the second, The Sword and the Spear (2020), focused on the unlikely romance between Imani, a young Mozambican woman, and a Portuguese sergeant. In this story, the deposed emperor, Ngungunyane, is being forcibly removed along with his court from the country and into exile, paraded in public on their way. (“Portugal needed such a display in order to discourage new uprisings on the part of the Africans,” Couto writes.) Imani, who’s pregnant, is attempting to serve as a neutral translator on this trip, but she finds herself buffeted by competing interests—Ngungunyane wants to claim her as another one of his wives, seditionists want her complicity in undoing the Portuguese colonists’ plans, and sailors subject her to various assaults, sexual and otherwise. There’s a plainspokenness to the prose (via Brookshaw’s translation) that belies the fact that, as in the prior two books, colonialism is a carnival of horrors, destroying families and wrecking folkways. The twist here, as the narrative makes its way to Lisbon, is that the degradations more fully expose the cruelty of Portugal’s press, diplomatic corps, and royalty, as Ngungunyane’s arrival provides an opportunity for moral posturing and power plays. Imani increasingly recognizes how untenable her position is: As her lover tells her, “The same narrative that paved the way for our encounter made our love impossible.” And it’s Imani and her child who fall under the greatest threat. The closing pages fast-forward the story into the 20th century and Mozambique’s path to independence, ending the saga on a more positive note. But the scars are lasting.

A careful and affecting conclusion to an ambitious saga.