Janus-Faced Madness in Bessie Head’s A Question of Power

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to discuss the concept of madness and its different<br />causes and functions in Bessie Head's semiautobiographical novel A Question of<br />Power. It aims to explore the multifaceted insanity of Elizabeth the exiled colored<br />protagonist in terms of different theories. We will see how once a devastating<br />trauma turns out to be a habilitating schizophrenia. Head challenges the readers'<br />normalized responses with this controversial concept (i.e. madness) and throws a<br />new light on the capability of apparently silenced and insane people. Withstanding<br />the long preserved devastating epistemology of the institutionalizing power, she<br />clarifies that one can avoid being inside a power archive through insanity like<br />Shakespearean fool.