In this sense, “we” refers directly to the reader it is not just the text’s characters who suffer from blocked brains and cluttered views, but the individual who turns these pages is also seemingly guilty of this distorted perspective. Her usage of “we,” without any narrative detail to contextualize this language, establishes a link between the unidentified speaker and the individual consuming the text. Here, Aidoo immediately establishes a relationship with the reader that is fundamental to understanding how the entire text functions. Dramatically formatted with no discernible pattern, Aidoo writes: “Things are working out… towards their dazzling conclusions… ….so it is neither here nor there, what ticky-tackies we have saddled ourselves with, blocked our views, cluttered our brains” (Aidoo 3-5). Our Sister Killjoy is not only a condemnation of the cultural values and social structures the narrative explores, but it is also a damning depiction of an eloquent protagonist whose own impotence is ultimately representative of the reader’s.Before delving into social issues that are firmly situated in a specific cultural moment, Our Sister Killjoy opens with an enigmatic collection of sentences spanning multiple pages. Yet while the lack of narrative cohesion and the disparate depictions of Sissie’s time abroad does not culminate in any dramatic resolution or simplistic final meaning, it is this inconclusiveness that powerfully exemplifies Our Sister Killjoy’s inability to extricate Sissie from the ideologies she so vehemently rails against.
As Aidoo’s story floats from reflections on Sissie’s sexually charged relationship with a Swiss woman to the emotional letter she pens as her plane hurdles back toward Africa, Our Sister Killjoy is a complex literary mosaic brimming with social commentary. Ama Ata Aidoo’s Our Sister Killjoy: or Reflections from a Black-eyed Squint follows a young Ghanian woman known as Sissie and her experiences in Europe.
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