In Yvonne Vera's The Stone Virgins and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Purple Hibiscus the hibiscus flower serves as a potent symbol of resistance of violence toward women. Both novels are set during post-colonial periods of unrest; Vera's novel takes place in Zimbabwe in the 1980s, during the civil war between the ZANU-led government and ZAPU guerrilla forces, while Adichie's novel is set in Nigeria during the turbulent 1990s. Though both novels clearly take place after independence, and both are "domestic" novels, dealing with the repercussions of violence within a family group, both novels clearly indicate that the causes of the violence are rooted in colonial past, and both turn to a natural symbol as an antidote to the history of violence.

Though the intimacy of the violences and their aftermaths differ radically, both novels focus on a native African flower, the hibiscus, as a symbol of both the memory of violence and the protagonists' refusal to be determined by that violence. In The Stone Virgins while the red of the hibiscus reminds Nonceba of the blood spilled in the attack, it also represents regrowth, something crucial for Nonceba both emotionally and physically as she recovers from reconstructive face surgery. In Purple Hibiscus, the flower of the title is a hybrid which represents the changes Kambili must undertake if she is to survive the abuse in her family and the corruption in her country. As Wangari Maathai insists, women's rights and environmental justice are part of the same project, one which empowers women "by educating them on the linkage between their own survival and that of the environment in which they live, helping them to meet their needs and thereby promoting sustainable development." Both novels end with the women attempting to chart a new life for themselves, easing the fractures of violence in the renewal of flowers.

Jonathan Highfield is an Associate Professor of English at Rhode Island School of Design, where he teaches a wide range of courses in colonial and postcolonial literatures. He received his BA from Transylvania University and his MA and PhD from the University of Iowa. His publications include "The Dreaming Quipucamayoq: Myth and Landscape in Wilson Harris' The Dark Jester" in Atlantic Studies, October 2004; "Archaeology of Reconciliation: Ciaran Carson's Belfast Confetti and John Kindness's Belfast Frescoes" in Canadian Journal of Irish Studies, Fall 2003; and "'Relief Data Unreliable': Mapping Amazonia" in Passages: Interdisciplinary Journal of Global Studies, Volume 2 Number 2, 2000. He spent 2001-2002 on a Fulbright Award in Ghana.