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Ms. Tia’s Mother
Labake is Morufu’s first wife. Morufu took Khadija as a second wife after Labake failed to give birth to a son, and Adunni as a third wife later on. Labake takes out her frustration at being replaced on her junior wives. Her bitterness is a misguided attempt to gain the upper hand in an oppressive, patriarchal system in which all three wives are victims of Morufu’s misogyny. Labake has one daughter, Kike, who is Adunni’s age, and with whom Adunni used to play in the village. Labake constantly harasses Adunni while they live together in Morufu’s house, and in this way, she serves as a foil for the kind and motherly Khadija. Both women are victims of an unjust system in which their worth is determined by their usefulness to men. But whereas Khadija recognizes that Adunni is just another blameless victim of Morufu’s tyranny and resolves to help her, Labake fails (or refuses) to make this connection and treats Adunni as the villain, thereby missing out on an opportunity to help another woman and perpetuating the very system that oppresses them both.
Labake Quotes in The Girl with the Louding Voice
The The Girl with the Louding Voice quotes below are all either spoken by Labake or refer to Labake. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 5
Quotes
Sometimes, I want to be just like Kayus, to have no fear of marrying a man, to not have any worry in this life. All Kayus ever worry about is what food to eat and where he can kick his football. He don’t ever worry about no marriage or bride-price money. He don’t even worry about schooling because I been the one teaching him school since all this time.
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Chapter 7
Quotes
“Your dead mother and me, we are age-mates. God forbid for me to share my husband with my own child. God forbid that I am waiting for you to finish with my husband before I can enter his room. Ah, you will suffer in this house. Ask Khadija, she will tell you that I am a wicked woman. That my madness is not having cure.”
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Chapter 10
Quotes
“When you begin to born your children, you will not be too sad again,” she say. “When I first marry Morufu, I didn’t want to born children. I was too afraid of having a baby so quick, afraid of falling sick from the load of it. So I take something, a medicine, to stop the pregnant from coming. But after two months, I say to myself, ‘Khadija, if you don’t born a baby, Morufu will send you back to your father’s house.’ So I stop the medicine and soon I born my first girl, Alafia. When I hold her in my hands for the first time, my heart was full of so much love. Now, my children make me laugh when I am not even thinking to laugh. Children are joy, Adunni. Real joy.”
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Chapter 12
Quotes
She open her eyes, give me a sad smile. “I wish I am a man, but I am not, so I do the next thing I can do. I marry a man.”
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Labake Quotes in The Girl with the Louding Voice
The The Girl with the Louding Voice quotes below are all either spoken by Labake or refer to Labake. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 5
Quotes
Sometimes, I want to be just like Kayus, to have no fear of marrying a man, to not have any worry in this life. All Kayus ever worry about is what food to eat and where he can kick his football. He don’t ever worry about no marriage or bride-price money. He don’t even worry about schooling because I been the one teaching him school since all this time.
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Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7
Quotes
“Your dead mother and me, we are age-mates. God forbid for me to share my husband with my own child. God forbid that I am waiting for you to finish with my husband before I can enter his room. Ah, you will suffer in this house. Ask Khadija, she will tell you that I am a wicked woman. That my madness is not having cure.”
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Chapter 10
Quotes
“When you begin to born your children, you will not be too sad again,” she say. “When I first marry Morufu, I didn’t want to born children. I was too afraid of having a baby so quick, afraid of falling sick from the load of it. So I take something, a medicine, to stop the pregnant from coming. But after two months, I say to myself, ‘Khadija, if you don’t born a baby, Morufu will send you back to your father’s house.’ So I stop the medicine and soon I born my first girl, Alafia. When I hold her in my hands for the first time, my heart was full of so much love. Now, my children make me laugh when I am not even thinking to laugh. Children are joy, Adunni. Real joy.”
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Chapter 12
Quotes
She open her eyes, give me a sad smile. “I wish I am a man, but I am not, so I do the next thing I can do. I marry a man.”
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