The Voice Diary: October 17, 2012

The symposium started at 10 am with the Director of the Garden City Literary Festival, Mrs Koko Kalango introducing the guests who took their seats on the podium. The writers, Chibundu Onuzo, Doreen Baingana, and Veronique Tadjo.  His Excellency, The Governor of Rivers State, Rotimi Amaechi was also around to give his brief comments on women and literature. 

Veronique Tadjo, writer and academic, gave the keynote address on "Women in Literature" where she raised several questions about literature, about women in literature. The address dealt with many issues:  the history of women in African literature; feminism in its many coat of African colours; the effect of globalisation on writing, and reading; and the writer's commitment, to mention a few. 

Some of the questions that the address* roused include: Is there such a thing as “Female writing”? What is the role of writers in Africa today? Who is an “African” writer?” Indeed, what makes an “African writer”?  Is it the fact of being born in Africa? Or is it rather the fact of living and writing in Africa? Is it the subject matter, i.e. Africa-centred? Or is it, the nature of a writer’s readership (whether read more at home than abroad)? And what about the location of the book publisher (s) (whether they are based on the continent or not)? To the latter part of the question, she responds: " This is a contentious question which stirs up all sorts of mixed feelings because any answer that one gives has a potential for exclusion. But in the end does it really matter whether you consider yourself, or people consider you, as an African writer or not?"

Tadjo concluded, that the history of female writing in Africa is always changing. She said "I will say that African women writers are continuing the path opened by their male and female predecessors. Our expectation is that their increased visibility and scope will allow for new readings of history and the elaboration of new thinking about Africa today." This was met by a round of applause from the audience.

The moderator used most of the issues raised by Tadjo to engage the guest writers. They had different things to say on the different issues. Here are excerpts** from the conversation:

Chibundu Onuzo on commitment and writing

"I do feel that it is hard not to engage with the society when you write about contemporary Africa. Just describing a street in Lagos becomes a political exercise. You describe the streets, the children hawking, you point your fingers at government. The pinnacles of writing cannot be forgotten even as you engage. 

I think that the main thing has to be the art. It is not selfish to think of art for art sake. If you go for the message alone, the art suffers and the message suffers. If you start with the art, the message will always be there. That's what Wole Soyinka says every time, the particular will then become global."

Doreen Baingana on Canonisation, Social Commitment and Art 

I am not sure who the judges were who chose the books of excellence. I think a lot of the criteria does not necessarily come from us.  A lot of it comes from outside. Who is to determine what is a good book? That has always changed over time. I do believe that there was a lot of style in oral literature. Even the writers who write for social transformation, what makes their style effective is that the issues do not bring attention to themselves. The two go together. The more women go together with the two things, the more they will write. I do not want to be put in a box as a woman writer. The majority of women may write in the first person, you may want to say, this is who I am as a woman; and it does not mean that this is the way all women write and this is the way all women should write. I think we have to be very careful of the dangers.

The event was opened to the members of the audience who engaged the panel in an interesting way. 

There was also the master class for fiction writers that was handled by Veronique Tadjo. She introduced the young writers to the basics of fiction writing; point of view, plot, style and setting. She told them "you can create your own style."

After the workshop, there was an autograph session with her, where she signed copies of her book for book lovers. After the thought provoking conversations and the master class on fiction, Day 3 of the Garden City Literary Festival ended with books bearing the owners' names in the author's hand writing. 

*This address will be posted here in coming days.

**We will post a more updated version of the symposium soon, so watch out.