I find myself drawn to African Literature recently. Happily seeking it out even as I struggle with the acute awareness I am late to the party. Yes, at the risk of being asked to return my African card, this wasn’t always so. There were various reasons for this avoidance but mostly, I felt the books available to me suffered from a general lack of appeal.
As I sat in on a meeting recently I was aghast at how limited my knowledge of African Literature (with the exclusion of book titles and authors made popular by Western media) was. This lack was made glaringly so by the enthusiasm of the gentleman seated next to me. As he rattled off name after name and story after story that had made an impression on him, you could tell he wasn’t faking it. This was not a man trying to impress the room but one in love and the object of his affection was/is African Literature. As he sang the praise of one African author and the next, one play or poem and on to the next it was easy to become enthralled. And to question why my interest had not been allowed to blossom into a similar deep fondness and appreciation for the literary works of my continent. Walking out of that room I was confident I wanted more of what he had been drinking. My attraction to African Literature, however, isn’t limited to this encounter. Nor to my current work through which I interface with emerging African writers on a regular.
During the time my love for books and reading was taking root, the African Literature available to me was from the African Writers’ Series. While it appealed to the adults around me my parents included, it wasn’t my cup of tea. I would go on to encounter this same literature during English Literature classes and as part of assignments. The books we studied spoke of a time that felt separate from mine, in an expression of language that was foreign. Yes, the characters in the books I read were African, with African sounding names and from countries I knew to be on the continent but they were quite removed from my daily experience, behaved differently from me and the people around me. While I understood what they represented was important, that time was before my existence, definitely not my present nor future or so I thought. Nonetheless reading about Okonkwo or Ihouma and others made for fun characters in class discussions and teasing of one another.
Like Okonkwo, several African Literature stories I had access to had predominately male protagonists. Older Male at that. They were dealing with societal changes in their communities brought on by colonialism. European and American Literature on the other hand, which was more readily available, had an array of female protagonists with several of these featuring stories of teenage girls albeit in countries far removed from mine. I could settle back and “enjoy” these books more easily than I did the African Literature which was littered with riddles and existential themes I struggled to relate to.
Finally, there was the issue with the graphics of the cover pages which were for sure a turn off when compared to say the Agatha Christie collections or Chronicles of Narnia making my choice for the latter easy. But that was then.
For this article, I would like to maintain a broad definition of African literature, as literature of and or from Africa. That is literary works of the African continent across different genres, in the languages representative of its people and cultures and including those in the Colonial languages. I acknowledge the differences in definitions that exist as well as the arguments that this “categorization” is a misnomer. Allow me to skirt around these as I am afraid I would fall over myself trying to get into it. I will, however, point out that I agree the term “African Literature” is constrictive in that it generalizes the diversity of creative literary works of and from writers of the continent as well as bands our diversity into “one being”. While we share many themes the Ugandan is not Kenyan not Nigerian, not Algerian, not Malawian. Even within our countries, there remains diversity in our cultures but you get where I am going with this.
As I have gotten older I find myself reaching for the history of my people, to know and better understand my immediate families. Currently, my knowledge of my family roots is hinged on oral narratives. For example on my patriarchal side I know we came from the far west across borders several years ago of an indeterminate number. There was a difficult birth involving a life-saving type of grass that we as a clan are now known for. Not so interesting when I was a child definitely more so right now. That fewer and fewer people exist to corroborate this narrative is alarming. It’s also frustrating to me that during the “re-telling” of this story some elements are often disputed. None of this does anything to assuage the conflict I feel around who we are as a family and nor who am I especially in this large constantly changing cosmos. It’s discomforting to reach for these truths to my identity only to come up to the abyss that is my ancestral heritage.
Years ago I used to watch a British genealogy documentary series, “Who do you think you are.” The Show still runs, my interest however waned. In it, the host guides a celebrity through their family tree. It was interesting to watch these famous persons as they reacted to discoveries within their family stories. The unknown scoundrel, the long-forgotten aunt, wealthy ancestor or new family branches previously unknown (if we are to believe their reaction) now opened up to them. With excitement or trepidation as new names were mentioned, down the years they went, the 1800s, 1500s and so on. Watching this I often wondered how far back I could trace my lineage. Sadly not so far. Some of my lines go further than others true but I keep hitting a wall, an emptiness. My frustration with this is only exacerbated by how easy it is for me to find the words said by some Englishman as far back when as opposed to those said by my ancestors 4-5 generations back. I often wonder what their aspirations were. What prompted them to leave their initial dwelling? Though I might know parts to the collective story, I yearn for the individual family stories. Perhaps this void is the greatest motivator for my recent pursuit of African Literature.
In the 2019 feature film release of the popular English show, “Downton Abbey”, the characters Bertie and Edith Pelham, the Marquess and Marchioness of Hexham talk about Bertie being invited to join the Prince of Wales on a tour of the African Colonies. Edith is understandably upset that this trip would coincide with the birth of their first child. To be asked was an honor but to say yes would be a disruption to their happiness. An inconvenience. This little moment in the plot was a jolt. Watching on I was struck again by the realization that the disruption to this place I call home, through slavery, colonialism, and neo-imperialism was and is small talk at far-away dinner parties, its purveyors surrounded by glitz and glam, opulence even. But this is not about that nor about the ones that presently feed only their interests while the nations they lead bleed dry. It is not.
I find that while we might argue form or medium, oral or written, native language use or not perhaps we can’t dispute African Literature’s ability to facilitate the amplification of our personal stories and having these reflected through a collective understanding. Literature broadly but African Literature, in particular, helps us curate our existence as Africans. If not for the present, then definitely for the future. I wish I could say we are a long way from the narratives that spoke of darkness in hearts, forms, and landscapes, sadly not yet. But it’s nonetheless wonderful to have available to us works that aim to preserve our value and help us re-define our futures. Works that tell our stories perhaps in the way Wainaina Binyavanga’s satirical essay, How to write about Africa demands happens.
I could go on about the joy of re-discovering Things fall apart, grasping at the fortitude of its characters or of those in No sweetness here as they face up to a sense of displacement, of being un-homed, caught between the old world and new world. That these protagonists were female was a delightful surprise. Then there’s my renewed respect for A month and a day highlighting the seemingly inescapable antagonism between the writer and injustice. What is the role of the writer in a given society? To see one’s willingness to pay the price for the better good is riveting. In Dust I am reminded of the cost of Nation-building, these new boundaries that were set in far off lands, whose secrets those caught up in the flow of events, the schemes of others, are forced to keep. But mostly, Dust reminds me how grief opens up the ground threatening to swallow you up whole in its unrelenting clawing at your senses. My grief, my loss found a voice. My recent find is Kunda written by Rachael A. Z. Mutabingwa, a Ugandan author. The cover art and print are done in Uganda which delights me immensely, proof of how far productions from my country have come. I could go on. But this really isn’t about specific books. Another time maybe.
Even as I celebrate this rich diversity in African Literature, I acknowledge that this wouldn’t be possible without the voices and hands ensuring it is produced and availed to us. I think of Kwani and StoryMoja in Kenya, African Writers Trust and FEMRITE in Uganda, the Cassava Republic in Nigeria and the many more keeping our shelves lined with new and interesting works, keeping our hearts alight with stories of us, for us and by us. We celebrate the authors, editors, and publishers bringing us all this wonderful African Literature.
So, as you go out or online to buy that new book, stroll over to the African Literature section ─one day Bookstores and producers of books will display and promote books by African authors not by race but by genre and craftsmanship─ and get sucked into this wonderful world. I hope you will be pleasantly surprised to learn that African Literature doesn’t just include non-fiction works of socio-economic, political or historical recounts or religious and self-help books but glorious works of fiction and in the genres of your choice.
Happy discovery!