Two Thousand Seasons by Ayi Kwei Armah.

The novel opens with a lyrical prologue in which the narrator, who assumes the role of a griot, the poet-historian of the village, calls out to other gifted voices to realize their proper “vocation.” They must understand that the past one thousand years (two thousand seasons) in Africa have been, first, a movement toward death, and then, a movement away from death, that Africa has been following alien ways—which are death to the black culture. The prologue announces the purpose of the novel: to retell the story of Africa, in particular the story of Ghana, from the moment in history when the people first abandoned the “way” to the coming of the Europeans at the end of the nineteenth century.