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Nigerian writer and author of Allow Me To Introduce Myself, Onyi Nwabineli, is against using children as social media content: ‘I wondered how I would feel if parts of my childhood were showcased online for the amusement of strangers. I started to feel uneasy about it. Kids can’t consent.
Nigerian writer and author of Allow Me To Introduce Myself, Onyi Nwabineli, is against using children as social media content: ‘I wondered how I would feel if parts of my childhood were showcased online for the amusement of strangers. I started to feel uneasy about it. Kids can’t consent.’
First Draft is our interview column, featuring authors and other prominent figures on books, reading, and writing.
Our questions are italicized.
What books or kinds of books did you read growing up?
Once I understood that I loved words and books, I could not get enough. I read everything: Bible stories, Enid Blyton, comic books, smuggled copies of Mills & Boon, Goosebumps, Sidney Sheldon and Roald Dahl. My parents were subscribers to Reader’s Digest, and they sent books every few months, which I loved. My dad also made sure I read Nigerian literature, so I was introduced to Chinua Achebe at a pretty young age, and I could not be more grateful.
If your life so far was a series of texts, which text (fiction or non-fiction) represents you at this moment?
I feel like I have been sending a variation of the text ‘I’m doing my best’ to all my people over the last few weeks. It has been a bit of a time of emotional upheaval here and they are all concerned about me. I am surrounded by love and hold on to that when I’m feeling particularly tired.
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About the Author
is a Nigerian-British writer living in London. She is the cofounder of Surviving Out Loud, a fund that provides fiscal support for survivors of sexual assault, and the founder of Black Pens (black-pens.com), a writing retreat for Black womxn. Her debut novel, Someday, Maybe was a Good Morning America book club pick. Her latest novel, Allow Me to Introduce Myself, was longlisted for the 2025 Jhalak Prize for prose.
Nigerian novelist, poet and author of Graceland, Chris Abani, does not believe ‘Nigerian literature’ exists as a category: ‘It is a common misconception that there is a fixed category that can be read as essentially “Nigerian literature”. Nigeria has 500 nations, 500 languages and about 2,000 dialects. While culture and language can overlap, the level of diversity is such that Nigerian literature cannot be easily narrowed down.’
For the co-founder and publishing director, of Cassava Republic Press, which marks its 20th anniversary this year, Bibi Bakare-Yusuf, it is telling that African literature is often pronounced dead in recent years, when more women and queer voices are becoming more prominent: ‘The loudest obituary writers about African literature tend to be men. These elegies seem to come from a tacit sense of personal or generational displacement rather than from the actual state of the field.’
Nigerian poet, novelist and author of Madame Sosostris and the Festival for the Broken-Hearted, Ben Okri, argues that Nigerian literature doesn’t always have to be about Nigeria: ‘Nigerian literature limits itself to Nigeria and then limits even the ways in which the country can be written about. What we want is a vast literature, a great literature…that speaks to all humanity.’
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