In documenting and displaying the intricate cultures of wrapper tying and wrapper wearing in Rivers State, Aleruchi Kinika, the photographer behind the series, ‘Wrappers of Rivers’, says she ‘wanted to tell the story of the wrappers and Rivers people as one.’
Nigerian architect and designer, Tosin Oshinowo, believes that, now more than ever, the growing awareness of the climate crisis makes it imperative for architects to rethink building practices: ‘The next generation of practitioners will likely be better equipped than mine, as sustainability is now a fundamental part of their training and practice. With the right encouragement, we can expect to see meaningful change.’
Nigerian poet and author of ‘The Last Time I Saw My Father’, Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto, believes many African stories are underappreciated: ‘The literary landscape is vast, and countless voices and stories have yet to receive the attention they truly deserve. It is not always about a single book but rather the collective body of work from diverse regions, cultures, and languages.’
Romance writer and author of A Very Gidi Christmas, Tomilola Coco Adeyemo, says her debut novel was an attempt to rewrite the love stories of her loved ones: ‘In my head, I was writing a universe where the things that were wrong in real life became right.’
Ghanaian writer and author of The Rest of You, Maame Blue, says her debut novel, Bad Love, was inspired by own dating experiences at the time of writing: ‘I wanted to explore how first love shapes who we are for everyone else we meet afterwards, and what it means to navigate a relationship for the first time.’
The producer and director of Ebrohimie Road: A Museum of Memory, Kola Tubosun, discusses the making of the documentary and the significance of the setting to Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka’s life.
In our past First Draft interviews, we asked leading African writers to share the books from their countries that everyone should read. Here’s what they told us.
Nigerian writer and author of God’s Children Are Broken Little Things, Arinze Ifeakandu, holds the Nigerian government responsible for the anxiety experienced by queer Nigerians in the country: ‘I believed that our ruling class was largely responsible, by entrenching such avoidable hardship, for much of the intimate fractures around us. And that the people’s (and the state’s) obstinate homophobia was to blame for what I considered the “nervous condition” of gay youth.’
Liberian novelist and author of She Would Be King, Wayétu Moore, wants Africans to tell their own stories: ‘A recent book I read portrayed Africa as a uniform experience—overly simplified and stripped of nuance. It reminded me of why it is so important for Africans to tell our own stories, showing the plurality of our voices, our struggles, and our triumphs.’
Nigerian novelist and author of The Girl with the Louding Voice, Abi Daré, reveals that writing her latest novel, And So I Roar, demanded a different approach: ‘This time, I allowed myself to embrace the unknown and let ideas simmer between drafts. It was a journey of letting go of immediate expectations and growing comfortable with exploration.’
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