So Long a Letter

Rama carefully considers her next move. Daouda, she knows, is a very good man. She “appreciates the man” (69) but her “heart does not love Daouda Dieng” (69). In another time, she knows, she might have accepted the offer. He would be a good husband, a suitable father to her children. He would care for her. But Rama cannot accept the offer without truly loving him. She sends a friend of hers with a letter for Daouda, and instructions to deliver it only to him, not his wife or children. In her letter, she explains that she does not agree with polygamy and does not romantically love Daouda, and so cannot marry him. She offers him her continued friendship, and says she hopes to see him again. He scrawls a reply for her on scrap paper that says, “All or nothing. Adieu” (72). She never sees him again.

Rama refuses all suitors, young and old, gaining a frosty reputation in town. She and her eldest daughter, Daba, divide Modou’s estate. Daba herself buys the compound Modou built for Binetou, throwing Binetou and her grasping mother out with nothing. Rama’s period of seclusion is coming to an end, soon, she will be free to move about, to leave her home and see the world again.