Nehanda's visions are supernatural and she communicates orally to her indigenous people, ideas diametrically opposed to Western and colonial social and cultural norms. It is because of this that they desire to have words continuously spoken and kept alive. The paper is the stranger's own peculiar custom. Among ourselves, speech is not like rock. Words cannot be taken from the people who create them.
People are their words.
If Nehanda represents the typical post-colonial resistance figure, then Mr. Browning represents the typical colonial oppressor. Vera sets these characters at opposite ends of the post-colonial spectrum. Mr. Browning represents the oppressive white man ignorant of the struggles and the plight of Zimbabwean people. Vera does not mention his first name and he is referred to by a Western classification, mister. He grows tired of listening to his colleague Mr. Smith talk for he is not able to appreciate the verbal nature of humanity, a trait embedded within the indigenous culture.