HAUNTED BY THEIR SHADOWS, PART ONE


In telling this story, I must first admit to having failed woefully at presenting a straightforward sequence of happenstance that birthed the [that] desire to put pen on paper. This flaw is partly due to a personal defect I have with order- being I am often caught battling perpetually to straighten out muddled chronology and reorder misplaced priorities; thus I plead [beg] to be condoned, for only through these inadequacies shall the seriousness of the subject matter herein be successfully breached.
I wish I had written elsewhere that what our fore-bears did for us (Toddlers) in this Business of Letters is unparalleled [unequalled] by what Martyrs did for their diverse [various] believes- then it would have been easier to cite such references without stirring Blasphemy-themed controversies. I am not as afraid of answering questions about faith related heresies as I am of being torched on stakes of criticism for failing to correctly convey the original intent of a literary work as this, so I have faith to proceed.
Honestly, I am intrigued by Achebe's ability to conjure unparalleled themes and plots in a purely africanized setting; the copious diction in Soyinka's plays as well as the craftsmanship and wordplay deployed by Christopher Okigbo (of blessed memory) in his Poems- so imposing was this Giant Fennel that even a youthful grave could not dwarf the blossoms of his poetry.
These pioneers championed the cause for the evolution of a true African genre, more specifically in the Nigerian Literary terrain. No gain saying that with Sweats and Bloods have their names been inked on the caves of Word-smiths, thus I call them “The Elite Literati”.
Thanks to them, the valiant Chimamanda Adichies have a benchmark, the adventurous Onyeka Nwelues have stepping stones and the Naive Neophytes- me inclusive, cannot scribble a sentence without stopping to reflect on whose guardian angel is fluttering, sophisticatedly over our thick skulls- Achebe's or Soyinka's. Its a terrible humiliation.
In explaining what their multi-faceted successes at the books have done to us, diminishing our hopes and prospects is an understatement; and that takes me back to the purpose behind this elongated preamble.
Some days ago, I was compelled to journey to Owerri from Uyo (both Southern towns of the ill-fated and short-lived Biafra) for a matter very slight that it should skip mention [pass unmentioned].
As a revered member of the existent but unrecognised “Read en route” book club and having need for a trip boost, I sought succour in the shelves of my local bookstore before the trip. Fortunately, my fleeting eyes caught its interest: “There was a Country” by Chinua Achebe. Considering it a must-read (for it is the latest addition to Mr Achebe's literary coffers), I paid the rather exorbitant price and proceeded with it to the bus station to board a bus to the Orients*.
Skimming through the preliminary pages, I was so enthralled by the ingenuity of the narratives- typical of all Achebe's Classics, that in my mirth I snapped the cover-page with my mobile device- a fairly used BlackBerry smartphone I had luckily bought off the road stalls few months back; and installed same as a BlackBerry Messenger Profile Display Picture (commonly called a DP). Under this new Display Picture, I wrote:
“@There was a Country: an Igbo story told by an Igbo-man”.
I would love to unequivocally state that although the literary essences in the narratives were so vivid, the effort was aimed at exonorating his clime of its complicity in the series of events that culminated to the Civil War by painting a very pathetic picture of the igbos only, in the War. I have always doubted the ability of even the well-trained minds to rise above ethnic sentiments and without fear of reprisal criticisms; I would say that he (Achebe) proved it.
Moreover, categorizing the pogroms (borrowed from him) of the Biafran War as only directed on Igbos undermines the various ethnic minorities occupying the estuaries and creeks of Southern Nigeria- mine inclusive; thus indirectly labelling them as “Quislings” and drowning their travails before, during and after the war, systematically in a manipulated account of Igbo targeted ethnic cleansing.
In true Comradeship, I rather agree with Elechi Amadi's account in Sunset in Biafra.
However, this is Dr. Achebe's idiosyncrasies and his story, therefore, I shovel-up my personal sentiments till I write mine (ours).
Few minutes after putting up this BlackBerry Messenger display, I received a chat notification- what we Nigerians popularly call a PING. This is where my Palaver started.
Quickly I fumbled with my device and its pouch, unabashed by the occasional hard stares attracted from fellow passengers- typical affections generated from fiddling with this coveted device. As I eventually freed the device from its pouch and came upon the message, it became clear that by flaunting the aforesaid DP, I had attracted the attention of one of my numerous online friends, who demanded to know how and where I acquired such an invaluable book. I pinged back explaining with all sincerity where, how and even the price I paid to keep it.
But being shrewd in the manner of his people- I judge, he disagreed on the price and relegated to the opinion that instead of purchasing it at that high price, he “will rather wait till his brothers made adulterated copies” (his exact words- whatsoever that meant). In subsequent pings, he drove his point home by reminding me that in the end, be it first rated or adulterated, we would benefit equally in terms of knowledge gained.
First, I broke a sweat trying to let him understand that unlike a box of milk or some pharmaceutical effects, a book cannot be adulterated- the semantics didn't add-up. In trying to expand his diction to accommodate more suitable terms like pirated or copyright violated issues, I had unintentionally bruised his already inflamed ego.
If I knew about order and when to stop, I would have still saved the day at this point; but being me- my pride went into overdrive. Though I didn't directly question his rationale, I piqued him the more by arguing with his opinions. I even furthered by pointing out that unlike him, I wanted to be fully in-the-know when the first sets of critiques and literary re-evaluations began to trickle in.
In saying all these, I had assumed the air of a “would-be author”- a custodian of the book culture to my peers, believing this stance will effectively substantiate my reasons and make him agree more pliantly. But there, I miscalculated.
He advised mockingly, “your kind should not hope to be called authors, and it is grave for you to refer to your hopes in public for such will make you to be unjustifiably looked upon in the light of the renowned Kings of the Pen”- the Elite Literati. Needless recount his comments about me posting book themed profile pictures- this I was guilty of. He warned “don't ever go DP-happy about books till yours is in the market”
I might have been unsure of the mockery in his voice, but presently, I realized he was basking in the euphoria of having put me where I truly belonged. His last comment confirmed it.
“Atleast keep writing poems if the book idea is unattainable, for if you don't do any, I will not stop taunting you”.
I was devastated; so I pulled out the only companion that endures through my occasional devastation- my jotter and started scribbling.
I could clearly see his perspective. His stereotyped mind could not handle a picture of me or any other neophyte in this Business of Letters walking the same aisle Wole Soyinka, John Pepper Clark- bekederemo, Chinua Achebe, Cyprian Ekwensi and many other literary giants- too numerous to mention had walked. We were blind younglings learning to acquaint our fingertips with the bristle- points of this literary Braille. It was clear that he understood the genuflective power-beam of books and letters, but he could not see beyond the heavyweights who stood tall, obscuring such beams from reaching us. He had read of their achievements, built demigods out of their images and believed there were no more medals to be won in the literary genre.
Literally, he saw the whole of my efforts as Futility.
<Part Two coming soon>....

Nice Piece bro..... I believe the "haunting" is not only on you writers, We sef dey suffer am (now don't ask me who the "We" are). I also suggest you thank your "critique friend" who poked you to, thus, inspiring such an interesting article/essay or whatever you writers call this.
Advice: Watch out for die hard Igbo boys and Achebe fans for Brimstones!
;,

#MODs: My Humble Suggestion - FRONT PAGE PLEASE!

I already said so!!! I said without fear of counter criticisms and reprisals! So let them jab!!

HAUNTED BY THEIR SHADOWS, PART TWO.

<Continuation>
.....So here I sat in a hot, noisy, Owerri-bound bus, drenched in sweats and sinking with the weight of these thoughts. I felt like making a declamation about how wrong his opinions of me and my literary endeavours where, but the bus made that inappropriate.
I felt ashamed. Not because he was able to break me; a dozen unreplied letters, e-mails, manuscripts and downright pleas sent to a sizeable number of publishing firms or their PRs could not break my valiant spirit. Nor did I regret the turn-out of a simple mobile phone conversation- infact I was grateful for it enlightened me.
Conversely, I was disappointed at the magnitude of his ignorance, realising that even in a “have- a-little-knowledge [idea]-about-everything” generation like ours, he was in “total-darkness” about the fundamentals of the book craft.
The Similitude between he and I is not lost in this, for not until recently have I been sufficiently schooled on the intricacies of Book Authorship.
I had believed that a book is purely the product of a very good story. To make a good story requires a lot of craft and talent portraying the author's intent in its wholeness, and whenever such intent is sufficiently portrayed- justified by a strong conviction in the writer that a status of pious-ness has been attained with regards to the story; then in less than no time, the machines would be set into motion by the publishers and thousands of hard copies would be milled into the vendor's shelves.
I bet numerous potential writers/ authors and the overall reading populace share same convictions.
However there is a certain level of deception associated with being coaxed into this believe pattern. It's like working with a theoretical flow-chart. The unit operations are usually enumerated but one would face certain difficulties practicalising them for there is a failure to elucidate certain inert factors that could impede its flow as well as dimensions that could foster the fluidity of such process. Yet, it is a flow chart.
The dilemma of the inexperienced writer is akin to this, for they being incomprehensible of the complicatedness of writing and publishing, are drawn into an intricate maze of circumstances. They spend long seasons knitting, entwining, unweaving and re-threading the components of a literary piece to a near perfectness; only to realize at the end that there is more to the Book craft than having a neat story. They would have understood the writing elements (genres had to be rightly chosen, target audience needed to be mapped before commencing to write, and while writing, the themes, plots, settings as well as tone of language had to be naturally conjoined) but they will not expect a looming shadow to confront them thereafter, so when they eventually meet these Shadows, they are haunted for as long as fate permits- for it is not only about literary Pulchritude.
Thus, it suffices to say that facing the ordeals of book-publishing and authorship requires perseverance and pure pride. Publishing authorities, copy editors and pre-publishing critics say a lot of discouraging things about unpublished works that if a writer is easily perturbed by derogatory remarks, he/ she might be forced to bury the book dream and migrate to more flourishing arts.
I recall Achebe, recounting a similar experience where after submitting a short story for a competition was told by one of the judges that he lacked “form”. That honourable man spent many years afterwards chasing after and trying to unravel the “elusive form”.
In our generation, publishing executives, while appraising a writer's manuscript often launch into worse tirades of unexplainable grammar just to expose how disconnected the writer was from the mainstream. My poems have been severally accused of lacking vigour. Loose Characterisation and Weak Alignment (whatsoever those mean) have been other literary crimes committed by me through these poems. I stand undaunted, learning from most, but not discouraged by others for none of them can deracinate me from the Poetry genre.
This problem is complex and generational and many publishers are only responding to it in a manner that will keep them in business.
Our generation has been accused of being too lazy and materialistic. This is true. The search for totalled comforts has rendered us “lazy-to-the-core”. Often times, we seldom have the bone to pick up a book nor do we posses the perseverance to read it through. So to find an escape for our information starved minds, we turn to technological solutions; after all, it is easier to switch TV channels or sift-up trivia from the internet than it is to read a book. These trends has made the publishers to cross-scan and re-evaluate potential books before imprinting their colophons, for if they intend to stay in business, they must sell and selling a book is one of the hardest task in this generation. So we cannot totally blame them.
<Part Three Coming Soon>....

Op nice write-up and I partly agreed with what you wrote.
I have read books written by the English and they don't write big grammars the way you did, pls try and break down your words for better coherence and comprehension.

I appreciate dear @Luvmijeje; however...its a semiaiacademic read..not a novel, so had to keep the language formal and tactful; moreover its fun to turn my readers to their dictionary many times.

Watch out for Part three...

HAUNTED BY THEIR SHADOWS, PART THREE

<Continuation>
.....Sizing-up this problem from a different perspective reveals that most of the pioneer publishers are still making nominal profits from sales of those old Classics, many centuries after the big names that wrote them made their breaks. They are so engrossed in the status quo to be fancied by fads of new-generation writers and their ever-wavering literary forms- in various ways, dealing with literary forms is a serious issue too.
It took me almost a month to align these thoughts into a form that will attract readers' interest(s). At inception, my near inability to bridge the form-content gap was a near discouragement. So, I phoned a doctor friend, who apart from his stethoscope and vials, voluntarily commits to these Letters. His works though unpublished, are fantastic reads- apart from the inconveniency of reading his drafts which are often plagued with medical shorthand- those symbols doctors scrawl on paper while passing medical verdicts on patients and thereafter require such patients to convey them to nurses or the Pharmacy. You would be looking at your health problems, on paper- without understanding a word of it.
So, I shared my experience in the commercial passenger bus with him, declaring my intentions to write about it. First, he wanted to know what exactly I wanted to write. It took me several minutes to explain what I had in mind because I could not get the specifics.
“it's gonna be an Essay, A very long essay; not like the narrative, expository or argumentative types, but still an essay....maybe a slight mix of them all and...infact I don't think it will be an...essay at all”.
“How many words long do you intend to make of this..undefined essay...of yours ?” he queried.
“I haven't figured that out yet”, I quipped, in the manner of a person with order defect.
“...buh maybe....20 to 30 pages- I've lots to write about it”.
“You are not serious, that would be almost...not an essay”, his voice echoed through the phone.
“I'm a bit confused about the form...maybe I will just tell this story, straight ways” I defended.
“hummm!”, I heard him sigh.
“Whatsoever it will be, remember not to periphrasize- ofcourse you do all the time” he advised.
And so on, we went. He spent the rest of the call time re-educating me on what is acceptable; the target audience and tone of writing. He would have thought I was jotting the points as we usually do, but all that went through my mind at that moment was “Who made these Rules?”
I would have asked him this if not for the MTN-automated sweet voice update that instantaneously reminded me that my call units were dwindling. So to avoid an elongated chit-chat, I obliged. Yet, my doctor friend had unconsciously reiterated the same trend- whether you wrote poems or essays, you must conform to the unwritten rules- the status quo.
You must walk under the shadows of conventional writing forms- that was the refrain underlying his advice. What he reiterated was the general school of thought and stems from our fore-bears as I had explained before.
Young writers were expected to conform to these established trends or loose their voices in the crowd of a million more unpublished writers.
Most have battled unsuccessfully to oust these trends; some fail at imitating them and instead create literary caricatures- Burlesques. Instead of these ridiculing our Elite Literati, they emerge unscathed- heroes of the burlesque.
Very few have internalised their antics and for this, they are celebrated. I do not indulge in such pedantries, for I believe I am African enough to write in the illumination of my literary persona and be heard for it.
This story for example, started and ended in a bus-trip. No efforts were made to create characters and adorn them with beautiful African names. Though my bus traversed a lot of towns and villages enroute Owerri, none of their peculiarity aroused my interest enough to want to induct them into my story- maybe it might some other time. I was not even born in a village or have I ever slept on a creaking bamboo bed.
I belong to a crop of writers that were born at a generational crossroad, where our cultures were about to be romanticised with western values- but at that time, they stood on either sides. Thus, unlike other writers, I do not craft stories to totally reflect one but to portend the interplay of one against the other.
Therefore, I feel violated if I am cajoled by world trends to write in the norms that observe laid down rules of literary engagement- for it kills ingenuity and talent. The established literary forms of today were untutored experimentation of talented fore-bears, many centuries ago. So by religiously following them, the chances of developing and evolving new literary styles are being impeded.{Reduced}
Let Soyinka write soyinka, let Adichie write adichie and let Me write anny-justin, for I can not live forever under their tall obscuring literary Shadows.
<Part Four Coming Soon>.....

These are some of the Great Elite Literati.....
J.P. Clark, Chinua Achebe (of Blessed memory), Wole Soyinka

HAUNTED BY THEIR SHADOWS, PART FOUR

<Continuation>
....One might think I am filled with contempt at the infallibility of these ennobled gentlemen/ women of Letters. That is so untrue.
You see, these are Old Birds who have built nests on the strongest boughs of tall trees- Publishers. Some, being Eagles, have even scaled to mountain tops to erect their formidable edifices of Letters; so it would be folly to covet their high abodes- for we are baby-birds trying to internalize the calisthenics of first flight. In the imagination of my taunting, online friend, we should never be heard, collecting the tiniest yarns of grass for the purpose of nest building. That is Myopic.
But his myopia does not strike out the fact that no matter how many times our wings might break, we are learning and with determination will fly high someday. After all, these old birds shed their feathers occasionally and these become the quills “we” write with- for I am not alone in this.
Chimamanda Adichie used to be one of us, until recently when the literary world woke up to the aura of her presence. Now the morale behind Purple Hibiscus as well as the casts for the adaptation of Half of A Yellow Sun into the movies are daily debated. My Taunt-hard BlackBerry Messenger friend must have heard of [about] her by now for she is coined the-Achebe-protege.
However, very few know that she debuted with a not-very-successful collection of poems- Decisions, in 1997. Back then, she (like me) was still grappling with her craft, trying to find an exit from the obscuring darkness.
It would be time consuming to venture into Onyeka Nwelue's circumstances. Yet it is worth mention that before Abyssinian Boy, he was considered a total flop- not anymore.
My friend for one, is unaware of the multitude more writers who (armed with their mighty pens) are still dazed by the glare of the limelight which they have emerged from the shadows into. He and a million others like him, have not heard about Richard Ali, the Sentinel literary e-zine pedal; a legal luminary who has dedicated time to nurturing the bookcraft on the stables of a now flourishing Parresia Publishers. Or of Gimba Kakanda, the self styled Polemicist, author of Safari Pants, a constructive critic whose words of gold soothe flared nerves and gives hope to us who are still caught betwixt. Neither have they read “Farad” for it is not written by Achebe or Soyinka, but Emmanuel Iduma; nor Helon Habila.
But we do; even while languishing in this darkness, we learn to appreciate and celebrate the tiniest illumination- be it from the flickering flames of a candle.
Some time last year, I read about Chidera “Chiddy-Bang”, an American-based, Nigerian-born rapper; a wordsmith who broke the Guiness World Record for standing on rhymes and wordplay (what is conventionally called freestyle rap) for more than 9 hours. I was elated. I felt a connection-a sinew that conjoined my written poetry to his, afterall rap is a contemporary manifestation of Oral Poetry and as much as I know, Oral Poetry still stands as the bedrock and baby-carriage of all African Cultures and myths.
He was unpublished in the African Literary world. Unpublished till that winning moment- there is not a publisher that would have casted a second glance at his direction if he dared approach any to facilitate “en-booken-ing” his ingenuity with words. But that event proved his worth.
I know many more. Often times, I visit “The Fairy Godsisters' Blog” an online blog administered by Chioma Chuka. The content of that Lady's word-basket would be a bookworms' delight any day.
I know Pearl Osibu, a lady in the Lagos haute- couture who is as passionate about literary trends as she is about her fashion. Pearl writes very stimulating pieces on Facebook. Friends usually queue her wall to take a peek or comment on her daily literary dissection of Social issues. Infact, the informative substance in her works make Linda Ikeji's Blog retrogressive.
I know me- for writing pieces of nice poems. I own quite an enviable collection of them and I bask in the reverence of that genre- little did it cross my mind that I will wander this soon.
There is Isaac Inwang, an erudite Sociologist who pens political ideologies and discourses that could dwarf many a-contemporary Political scientists' arguments. When Isaac's Pen bleeds, my heart bleeds too, for the truth in his premises are heart- rendering.
All these are not widely known in the Book world for they are unpublished. They are just few of the voices in a crowd of talented yet unheard Literati’s. So by writing this, I am telling their stories too.
But we must walk out of these Shadows. No matter what form it presents itself, we must break free.
As my bus pulled into the metropolis of Owerri on its swift ride towards the bus-station; I was communicating these thoughts freely with my jotter- too engrossed to give a whining about the searing heat of the tropical sun or the sleep-drunk passenger on my right, who swayed perpetually about me. Momentarily, he had come to perch, comfortably on my already slump shoulder. I did not give him the shove he deserved. I did not care.
Suddenly, someone sighed aloud from the last row. I could tell his voice was heavily ladened with grief. He announced regrettably, “So this man is dead!!”
I was shaken briefly, thinking he was referring to the sleeping bird on my shoulder. Majority of the passengers half-turned and queried in unison “Who ?”
“Chinua Achebe...may his soul rest in peace”, he answered.
It took my mind a split second to register and as it eventually did, I again fumbled with my BlackBerry device, going online instantly to surf for the breaking news. Either the thunderstorm of my initial thoughts had drowned the ping sound of subsequent chat notifications I had or I was too engrossed in my jotting to care- for there were nineteen of them. As I scrolled through, about eight of the pings were from friends who were using different pictures of Mr. Achebe as DPs and asking me all sorts of questions concerned with my display picture. R.I.Ps flooded their time lines.
Being jerked by impulse, I rushed to take mine off, for it became unsuitable [inapproipriate] and disrespectful (by my reckoning [judgement]) to the memory of a great scholar who just passed on.
The sleep-drunk bird-man alighted from my shoulder as the bus engine grinded to a stop [halt]. I gathered my personal effects and prepared to alight too for I had reached my destination.
As I walked away from the park, a surge of grief flowed through me. Alas, his intellect turned to dust, I thought. The irreparability of the loss filled me with a momentary paroxysm. I had to sit under a pay-call girls' umbrella to let the surge pass.
I have since sent my condolences to the literary world in the form of an elegy “There He Lies”. I hope you shall read it.
This recent event has taught me that nomatter how we revere a pate of thinning grey hairs, the irony still remains- that it signifies human proximity to the lonely grave. These giants are greying but their inks will live forever. Yet I wish that we learn while they are still alive to look at literary works from the present generation- not as indices of comparison of strengths, but as tools for measuring the level of positive change in our literary styles and forms.
Also, I hope our youths will imbibe the reading culture and disprove the generalised thinkologies [ideologies] about them. For only if they have the patience to read through this; shall they understand that though some of us maybe relatively mediocre writers, the reason why most stay unpublished may not entirely be due to their inability to craft superbly in their various genres, but because they are victims of a complex web of interpolating issues; the major one- being Haunted By the Shadows of Our Elite Literati.
As for my taunting friend, I have not told him about this piece- not while I still remain unpublished, for I understood his terms. You will agree that it would be incorrigible of me to instigate another round of his Ridicule. Infact, this story has only been shared with my doctor-friend and a handful of acquaintances for they only understand and sympathise with an Unpublished me. If you read it, then you are one of them. (*Ovation*)

Yours in unpublished Words,
AnnyRazon Justin


<.......END.......>