Characters

Beatrice (Wanjiru) – a young, poor and black woman. She admired the life and culture of the whites (or people that had come from Europe). In the beginning of the story, we can see this in the shame that she feel of her own name. She chose a most beautiful and Christian name and hide her true name (Wanjiru), probably an African name. This obsession by the white culture was so strong that she used a cream that became the skin most white. Beatrice represents all black nation, and your feeling of inferiority, insecurity and shame arised with the colonization promoted by the whites. She represents too, the hope transformed in despair and disillusionment.

Nyaguthii – assure, indifferent, admired.  In spite of to be in the same condition of Beatrice, she appears like a strong woman. But after, the reader discovers that she is different of Beatrice because she didn´t accept the Christian culture. She left home to run away of the laws and rules of her Christian family.One interest point of the story is that she waited for a moment of glory without to forget her scrupulous and always trying behaved according to rules of the colonization.  Then she realized if she remain with this behavior she never wouldn´t be what she wanted, and she gave up her scrupulous and became a thief, and only this way, she has your minutes of glory.  Other irony is that the driver of the lorry, that had almost the same desire of Beatrice and having become one type of ´´friend´´ of her; he won glory of him, thanks to her misfortune. And Nyaguthii, who was envied by Beatrice, ended in the only one that cries for her.

Theme: the story talks about the feeling of inferiority of the colonized, in which the Christian culture (also Europe culture or white culture),

quote: Not that she was ugly; but she could not be called

beautiful either. Her body, dark and full fleshed, had the

form, yes, but it was as if it waited to be filled by the

spirit. And, you're absolutely right about that first line

representing her difficulties. 

Wanjiru finds herself trapped in an urban setting and is a victim of her situation and low self-esteem. The story is a poignant and touching study of this young woman who is battling with an identity problem and is seeking acceptance in a post-independence setting where women are exploited by men of the New Africa elite. She is regarded as "a wounded bird in flight: a forced landing now and then but nevertheless wobbling from place to place ..." The story affirms female self-realization rather than perpetual self-alienation, and that validates the persistence in attaining her desired goal.