Emma Dawson: Putting new Nigerian writing on the world map

Can you give us some background into your work?

My role as an Editor at CCC Press, UK came after I had finished my Ph.D.

Some years before I’d studied French and German for my first degree then left the UK to live in the Gulf state of Qatar; I was teaching. I often feel at my best when I am ‘The Other’ and at first, in Qatar, I was ‘The Other’. It is a hugely challenging position to be in, it can be rewarding and life-touching but it can also floor you, bring you to your knees, you can feel betrayed and peripheral. But you know, there are people who live their whole lives as ‘The Other’ and it is that fact that inspires me. I left The Gulf to go back to the UK for Post Graduate studies. I completed my MA and Ph.D at the University of Nottingham; the object of my study during this time was literature, identity and culture. On completion of my Ph.D, I wanted to somehow explore the idea of being ‘beyond the postcolonial’ – I just felt that postcolonial literature had ‘nearly’ had its day and I wanted to know what was next. The anthology research project that Daughters of Eve and Other New Short Stories From Nigeria belongs to, started in 2008 with travels to Cameroon and Nigeria and with this objective of finding out what was next, what was after ‘postcolonial’ literature.

Daughters of Eve and Other New Short Stories From Nigeria is the second in a set of eight country anthologies of emerging Anglophone writing from around the world. The Spirit Machine and Other New Short Stories from Cameroon was the first anthology to be published in the set. From the outset, the anthology project has been about ‘listening’ rather than ‘telling’ and thus I am led from the beginning by what happens. I travel to the country to meet with writers and to ‘listen’ so, in a sense, the finished product, that of the anthology, is the tangible manifestation of the ‘listening’; I suppose in that sense the stories are ‘data’.

In developing the call for submissions, it was rationalised that anything more than the straightforward concern of the respective country, (I used the country name, i.e ‘Nigeria’ on the call for submissions) would be leading and would therefore potentially direct the writers to tackle themes dictated by the UK-based editor; ‘the Western Armchair’ as I like to refer to it. The focus of the anthology project is to learn about the emerging new writing in English, if ‘leading’ submission calls are issued, then the project would be invalid, as it will not have been about ‘listening’, rather it will have resulted in ‘telling’.

What have you found interesting in the Nigerian anthology, Daughters of Eve and other new short stories from Nigeria, you are currently working on? And what should readers of the forthcoming Nigerian anthology expect?

New Voices for sure, many of the voices in Daughters of Eve and Other New Short Stories From Nigeria are exactly that, ‘new’. But when I say ‘voices’ I mean that in different senses; there are ‘new’ authors that readers may never have heard of before, but there are also new voices in the sense of new themes, new genres and a new sense of ‘Nigerianess’.

Yes, there are certainly new departures in genre and theme. There are stories which are thrillers for example. The title story Daughters of Eve by Peter Ike Amadi takes the reader to the darker side of Lagos, a Lagos of crime, gangs and underworld. Both The Discovery and Night Calls are also thrillers. The Discovery by Ikeogu Oke is an eerie tale. Having lost their close friend a matter of days before in a nasty accident in a car workshop, Emeka finds his friend Amaechi on the side of the highway with his mini-van, broken down. The rain pours and they jump into Emeka’s car to let it pass, and they fall asleep, only to be woken by strange noises and the sound of a creaking tree. They run from their car to watch wide-eyed from the other side of the road. They return to find that the tree has fallen exactly where they were sitting and that Amaechi’s mini-van is on blocks. What then happens changes lives forever.

And readers need to be prepared for Alpha Emeka’s story too. Haunted House because it is true to its title; a family saga that sees a daughter travel home on her father’s request to celebrate his sixtieth birthday, only to find that her father has taken Kate, one of her former classmates, as his wife. Kate has a dubious past and the daughter’s memories of Kate’s time at college are all bad. But the time back in Nigeria reveals links between people that turn things far worse than anyone could have ever imagined.

But it’s not all about crime and gangs and trouble, the anthology includes some beautiful stories about the human condition. Fragile, a haunting tale of the reunion of two childhood classmates in unexpected circumstances by Uchechukwu Peter Umezurike, tells a difficult narrative about the injustices of time and the many things we are unable to forget. Lightless Room by Jumoke Verissimo explores the unspoken and the unseen in a carefully woven tale about a woman and her visits to a troubled academic; visits which are always conducted in the dark. Out of curiosity and personal desire, she goes to visit him to see if the rumours are true. Has he gone mad since his return from prison? Why doesn’t he leave the house? Will he ever turn on the lights? Moreover, will she ever ask him if the lights can be turned on?

And finally, there are stories which play with language and theme, Payday by Ifeanyi Ogboh and Road Rage by Rotimi Ogunjobi are both innovative narratives taking Nigerian Anglophone short fiction in different directions.

So in summary, I suppose your Sunday Trust readers need to come open-minded; there’s a story in this anthology for everyone I’m sure.

When exactly will it be available?

From April 1st 2010. Daughters of Eve and Other New Short Stories From Nigeria. CCC Press, UK. www.cccpress.co.uk . CCC Press would be interested to work with a publisher in Nigeria to make the book more available to Nigerians in Nigeria, we’d be very happy to hear from anyone interested. Please email: cccpress@gmail.comThis e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

You also worked on a Cameroonian Anthology, The Spirit Machine and Other New Stories From Cameroon, how would you describe it?

The stories featured in The Spirit Machine and Other New Short Stories From Cameroon do something different from what I think has come before in Anglophone writing in Cameroon. There are stories that deal with themes that are not, shall we say, directly linked to being a postcolonial nation or the legacy of colonisation. The stories are about living, about surviving this world, about hoping and aspiring, about dealing with grief, about personal journeys. The Cameroonian situation for Anglophone writers is much more difficult than that of the situation in Nigeria – they are often fighting for their ‘Anglophone’ voice to be heard not simply trying to get published.

What else can you tell us about the other anthologies you are putting together?

The anthology to follow Nigeria is the Ugandan anthology which in turn, is followed in Autumn 2010 by the Kenyan anthology. We then shift continents and the anthologies for late 2010 and early 2011 are from Malaysia and Singapore; I was in these two countries in early 2010 meeting writers and researching. India and a Caribbean nation are scheduled for 2011.

As I work with authors in all of these countries I can see differences but also similarities. For example, when I was in Malaysia listening to the experience of Anglophone writers there, I could see that they had much in common with Anglophone Cameroonian writers. In Malaysia, Anglophone writing and publishing houses are on the margin because the national language per se is not English. Curiously though, Malaysian English is spoken, (at least in Kuala Lumpur) all the time, you hear it everywhere. I realised that this language situation is not dissimilar to that of Anglophone Cameroonians. With this in mind I have created a Forum for people to discuss similarities and differences in their own Anglophone contexts – from Nigeria to Singapore, from Nairobi to Kuala Lumpur! I’d like to invite your Sunday Trust readers to keep the debate going, go to: www.worldenglishesliterature.com, create a username and password and then you’re into the discussion. It would be great to see what conversations people could have.

You have been traveling the world for this project; can you share the experience of your travels with us?

Crossing the border at Busia from Uganda into Kenya - I nearly got lost amongst all the coaches! And of course I couldn’t really remember if my coach was blue or red or …

Then there was the time in Yaoundé, Cameroon, picking up the phone in my hotel room and not knowing whether to speak French or English! You know, I woke up late and was unsure of whether I could still get breakfast downstairs at the hotel I was staying at. I picked up the phone and rang reception to ask, I paused, then stuttered – I thought to myself do I speak French or English – and then said, Désolée Madame mais je ne sais pas si je devrais vous parler en Français ou en Anglais… the response was: ‘On parle Français ici’. So the answer was clear and I continued to ask about breakfast in French.

And in Nigeria … well, I’ll never forget trying to get to the airport in Lagos to get my flight back to the UK – arrghh the traffic! (See the story ‘Road Rage’ in the anthology!) Well, with the brother of a friend from the UK (he had been asked to get me to the airport on time!) we took three separate modes of transport: we dumped the pick-up, we grabbed two (suspension-suspicious) okadas and then hailed a taxi at the airport limits and all this with luggage - but I did make it - just! Thanks Afam!

Malaysia gave me the chance to taste the famous stinky regional fruit – the durian. Apparently you can smell this fruit from metres away and for ages. You either love it or hate it I was told. So I had to try it. It did smell – a lot! And I couldn’t help but bring a small cardboard notice from my hotel room that said ‘Strictly no durians’! I’m afraid I wasn’t polemic on this occasion – I neither loved it nor hated it, I’d definitely try it again.

Oh, and I can’t help but mention – I made it on to Kenyan National TV. It was the breakfast show with Misiko Andere. Doreen Baingana and I were invited to come on and talk about writing in English; it was a great experience even if I did have to get up at 5 am!

From your experience and what you have observed from your project, what do you think is the future of African literature?

This is a great question but one that I can only attempt to answer in part. ‘African literature’ is a huge, multifaceted, multilingual, various and living entity. I can offer only some slight insights into Anglophone writing in the African countries I’ve been in I’m afraid.

The future of African literature is exciting and some of this I experienced in Nigeria. There is a greater confidence in being what it is, in all its different Nigerianesses (can you see how much I love plurality – I pluralise everything – Englishes, Nigerianesses!) but seriously, there are many different Nigerian stories to tell and without sounding too much like Chimamanda’s ‘the single story’ speech, I don’t wish to speak of one ‘experience’ of the Nigerian narrative. What Daughters of Eve and Other New Short Stories From Nigeria does tell us is that its not writing Achebe or Soyinka any more. It’s telling stories of ‘now’, stories which are using new ways and means whether that is through language variety, genre or theme. And this is echoed elsewhere. The scripts I have read from Uganda, Kenya and Cameroon are all writing new stories to a greater or lesser degree – I’ve already mentioned some of them. The Lost Art by Job Fongho Tende is a wonderful futuristic tale of society in Yaoundé, 2150A.D. questioning morality, religion and The State. On the other hand, the Ugandan anthology takes a lighter look at life (the male readers may disagree here!) by showcasing a funny story about a couple about to get married. Two weeks before the big day, the groom-to-be and his fiancé are on their way to organise the wedding dress, suddenly he is struck with an excruciating pain in his left testis; he cannot walk. They call his friend and the trio attempt to get to hospital; Mairikiti is in more and more pain. Will they make it in time to save Mairkiti’s left testis? How will his wife-to-be react to this news given that he also reveals (under pressure) that his right testis does not ‘function’ as he lost it to mumps in his twenties!

The success of more ‘home grown’ publishing houses will certainly help the future of African literature to be as bright as it can be and once again Nigeria is leading in this area with the advent of presses like Farafina and Cassava Republic.

Which writers have fascinated you in the emerging generations of African writers, particularly those whose works you encountered in the anthologies?

Abubakar – I prefer at this stage not to ‘name’ names of the anthology authors.

Outside of the anthologies: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Doreen Baingana, Monica Arac de Nyeko, Tolu Ogunlesi, Nii Ayikwei Parkes, K.A. Ozumba, Kaine Agary (I really enjoyed ‘Yellow-Yellow’), Pravasan Pillay.

What have been the areas of convergence and divergence in the themes and treatments of the short stories you have encountered in the World Englishes project?

I suppose there are ‘degrees’ almost, of a sense of World Englishes literature and a notion of being ‘beyond the postcolonial’ as you move through different places. I gave a paper at the Department of Literature at the University of Nairobi and we had a wonderful discussion about whether Nigeria was actually more beyond the postcolonial than Kenya or not… Don’t misunderstand this, such discussion is not a judgment on the state of where nations are in this journey – I mean where is this journey going anyway? So why talk about what stage Kenya or Nigeria is at? But on the other hand you can’t help to notice that what is happening in Nigeria for example is happening to a greater or lesser extent in Uganda or Cameroon and vice versa. In this regard, there is almost a sense of ‘degrees’ of post-postcoloniality but I’m still working on this thought and I think as the research moves out of Africa and into Malaysia and Singapore and soon into India, it is going to be fascinating to see how peoples are living this ‘moment’ whether we wish to call it beyond or ‘post’ postcolonial or whatever it is.

What have been the challenges in this project?

Communication – reaching out to people, it’s been a challenge trying to get out the calls for submissions. I’ve been so conscious about getting the calls out beyond the usual suspects. I’ve worked hard to contact authors and ‘writing people’ (because not everyone considers themselves as an ‘author) so through universities, writing groups, community groups, the British Council, cultural and Arts-based organisations. The Internet has been central to the whole project. It would not have happened without it – just like this interview now. Email can be viral, we all know that and that has actually been a real help in this project. But yes, overall, trying to get the call out to as many different people as possible has definitely been the biggest challenge.

Another challenge emerged whilst in Singapore. The call for submissions states (as it did for all calls) that the author should be a Singaporean, living and working in Singapore. The reason behind this was so that the anthologies did not become works of Diaspora writings. But I was quick to learn that in Singapore, due to their immigration laws and work laws, being ‘Singaporean’ per se is complicated, not so clear-cut. Many people came to me to say that they had lived twenty years in Singapore, more than in their country of ‘origin’ were they not qualified to ‘write Singapore’? I revised certain elements of the ‘call’ because I listened.

All things considered, would you say your literary odysseys have been worthwhile, has it been intellectually rewarding?

Absolutely! I wish I could do it all the time!! But seriously, more than that – more than simply being intellectually rewarding, I have met wonderful people and despite what this world says about differences, I have found many senses of ‘sameness’ in these literary adventures. So when I switch on the World Service every morning as I wake up and hear mostly bad news in this world, I like to remember this endeavour, because with it, I have hope for better futures and people coming together in peaceful ways – after all, how often are we told, the world is getting smaller?

Written by Abubakar A. Ibrahim