39. DIVINING THE THREAD: FĀ, TEMPORAL FUGITIVITY, AND COUNTER-NARRATIVE IN KIESE LAYMON'S LONG DIVISION (2013) Auteur: ADJOVI Wilfried Espoir, AZON Senakpon Fortuné  

This paper argues that Kiese Laymon's Long Division (2013) uses a novel-within-a-novel structure to enact principles of fā (Ifā) divination, a West African epistemology. The novel rejects techno-scientific time travel, framing it instead as temporal fugitivity that challenges racist, linear timelines which erase Black trauma. Laymon uses fā cosmology to model narrative as a tool for reclaiming agency, interpreting destiny, and resisting historical erasure. The embedded novel acts as a divinatory Odu sign the protagonists interpret to navigate crises. This approach situates Long Division within Afrofuturist and African American literary traditions, subverting Western time paradigms and highlighting African cosmologies as tools for liberation and self-recovery