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In our latest First Draft interview, we asked ten African writers, including Fatima Bala and Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ, about the books that inspired them to become writers. Here’s what they told us.
Photo Collage from Original Book Covers by Ijapa O / THE REPUBLIC.
Writers are, first and foremost, readers. That is how they become, and remain, writers. But beyond understanding this in a general sense, we wanted to get more up close and personal, to discover the specific books that sparked some African writers’ desire and determination to become writers themselves. The books that moved writers so much that it pushed them from mere consumers to producers of literature.
In our First Draft column at The Republic, we asked writers about the books that inspired them to become writers. These writers shared why and how books such as The Kite Runner and Half of a Yellow Sun inspired them to tell stories. Additionally, we learnt that while books are indisputably central to a writer’s formation, many writers also draw inspiration from other forms of art. Nana Sule, for instance, was inspired to become a writer by movies, newspapers and oral stories told by her father. Ama Asantewa Diaka found inspiration in a standalone poem. By asking these writers about the books that inspired them to write, we have found that if the factors are right, just about anything can make a writer.
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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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