Abstract: In their studies of A. Tutuola's masterpieces The Palm-Wine Drinkard and My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, scholars have noticed that mythological writing is full of the writer's criticism of colonialism. With a close reading of the two novels from other perspectives such as history, folklore, and gender studies, this article further argues that Tutuola, was a writer with acute historical consciousness and a keen concern about the fate of African women. In these two novels, he offered both a realistic representation of the fear within the precolonial Nigerian society toward the slave trade and an objective depiction of the living conditions of the Nigerian women who used to enjoy a relatively high social status in early years. Although Tutuola did not attempt at a conscious and systematic of history construction, his mythological writing is a significant deviation from the construction of history by Nigerian and even by African nationalist writers, for it not only resurfaces the historical traumatic memory that has been deliberately veiled by them, but also repudiates the explicit patriarchal inclination in their construction of history.

Key words: Tutuola, The Palm-Wine Drinkard, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, slave trade, sexual relations