Veronica - Why Doesn't Veronica Leave For The City?
Uploaded by kevin_a_goodwin on Nov 22, 2000
The city is an elegant place to live. It calls to the people from the inferior village life. The well led life followed by the city people offers many opportunities compared to the hopelessness of village surroundings. It offers hope, the chance to be independent, the chance of a job. In the story Veronica by Adewale Maja-Pearce, Okeké the ever lasting friend of Veronica is drawn by the attraction of the city for the opportunities he sees for himself. Veronica on the other hand does not desire to leave their decomposing village for the city. She decides this for a number of reasons.
One of the reasons why Veronica decides not to go to the city is due to her lack of education. She feels that the city has nothing to offer her and her place is the village. She says,
'What will I do when I get there, I have no qualifications not even a standard six'
She is aware that she needs qualifications to succeed in the city and without them, she sees no point in going.
Another reason associated with this is to do with Veronica's expectations. If Veronica's expectations were not so low, she may have gone to the city with Okeké. Veronica says,
'They are my family that is enough'
This line is an example of Veronica's low expectations. She feels her family is enough and she needs nothing else. Another example of Veronicas low expectations is when Okeké comes back after ten years to find Veronica with a child a husband. Another example is,
'God has blessed us with a son. Is that not enough?'
This show's Veronica is still the same after the distant period that the two had been apart. She is still surviving in the squalor of a village of which Okeké had once lived. Her expectations had always been the same. The low expectations Veronica has for herself, compared to the high expectations Okeké has for himself throughout the story, show that it is a male dominated society.
If Veronica had gone to the city the opportunities open to women are very different to the opportunities open to men. Okeké says,
'You could go to night school and become a secretary'
A secretary has a feminine job as where a doctor, which Okeké became, is a masculine job.
This leads to a very important point about the difference between the roles of men and women. This is a...