Book excerpt: Author Samuel Ndogo offers an understanding of the autobiographical genre in contemporary Kenyan literature. He draws attention to life-writing as a form of cultural re-imagination in post-colonial Africa. Taking into consideration contradictions and paradoxes of referentiality in life writing, this book examines the autobiographies of Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, Ngugi wa Thiong'o, Wangari Maathai, and Bethwell Ogot. The analysis dwells on self-representations in correlation with imaginations of the 'Kenyan nation' in these works. Thus, the study gives a critical account into the modern memoir: the forms and styles it takes, the ways in which these authors tend to understand and present their lives. (Series: Contributions to African Research / Beitr�¤ge zur Afrikaforschung, Vol. 63) [Subject: African Studies, Literary Criticism]����