Love, Loss, and Survival in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s ‘Half of a Yellow Sun’

This paper examines the interconnected themes of love, loss, and survival in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun (2006), a novel set against the backdrop of the Nigerian–Biafran War. This paper examines how personal relationships are shaped, tested, and transformed by the violence and instability of war. Through characters such as Olanna, Odenigbo, Ugwu, and Richard, Adichie presents love not merely as romance but as emotional commitment, care, and moral responsibility in times of crisis. The paper argues that loss in the novel operates on multiple levels, personal, cultural, and national, reflecting the destruction of lives, ideals, and collective memory caused by the conflict. At the same time, the narrative foregrounds survival as both a physical and psychological process, highlighting resilience, adaptation, and the will to endure amid trauma and displacement. By blending intimate domestic experiences with historical realities, Adichie humanises the Biafran War and challenges dominant historical silences surrounding it. This research paper adopts a close textual analysis to show how the novel balances private suffering with public history, revealing how ordinary individuals negotiate identity and hope under extreme conditions. Therefore, this paper demonstrates that Half of a Yellow Sun portrays survival not as triumph but as a fragile, ongoing struggle shaped by love and marked by irreversible loss.