₦airaland Forum

Oh well, Orikinla, what exactly is your grouse with Achebe for goodness sake? You seem to be repelled by his sucess, or rather, trying to tow down the literary acclaim that he has received in the western world. Adichie is following in its footsteps, and your remark about the literary writer, Adichie, coming to applaud for you if your parents were literates is high level display of arrogance and pride. Ke, has your work attained the same influence/publicity as those of Adichie?

Loved Isidore Okpewho's novel, "The Victims". The novel showcases the pitfalls of polygamy and the author really potrayed the characterizations/weaknesses of the characters in the show. Really liked it. I havent read Festus Iyayi, but I am curious, was he the guy who was fired from Uniben by Alele Williams?

Nigeria: Our Literature And Its Disappearing Elders



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Leadership (Abuja)

OPINION
10 November 2007
Posted to the web 10 November 2007

John Akpan


Perhaps because of their somewhat audacious and largely bohemian character and tendencies, most events that concern those in the world of the arts often come with ironies and tragic posers.

News of the death of Cyprian Ekwensi this week, took time to spread, almost like a non-event, and yet, an Ekwensi event should be accorded the deserved limelight and an open celebration, especially in our literary and media communities. But that is Ekwensi. I'm sure many Nigerians may not have known much about a man called Ntienyong Udo Akpan (forget the historical fact that he was Biafra's secretary of State). N.U. Akpan was a writer. He died and was quietly buried, sometime last year. Or indeed, the recent passage of James Ene Henshaw, buried some weeks ago.


For me, there is so much spirituality between my early literary encounters and these early men of letters. I can put the timeline at some 30 years ago. As an African child, (Camara Laye also made my early world) I had confronted the typical African cosmos of rich and crowded pantheon; the ringing echoes of the rustic rhythm of daily living; sports, warfare and endless scenes of communal and cultural intercourse. All these elements were constant in my dreams, songs, childhood imagination and concrete imageries of the outside world. I grew with that.

N.U. Akpan, James Ene Henshaw and Cyprian Ekwensi, collectively launched me into a world full of pure cerebral enjoyment, the awe of masquerades, and promises of self - contentment and peace, if one were to live and behave like the good heroes of their works. I later came to understand this as necessary moral lessons they deliberately generated, through their tactful survey and understanding of their social atmosphere and cultural environment, from where they took and adapted the commonplace fables, legends and folktales and other forms of their social engagement, as raw materials, to weave their stories.

From Akpan's, The Wooden Gong, through Henshaw's, This is Our Chance, to Ekwensi's, Passport of Malam Ilya, and the Burning Grass, I met characters and saw situations and scenes of human motion and emotions that fitted personal experiences in my little rural community.

I held onto this, until later in college where James Ngugi's (later Ngugi wa Thiong'O) Weep Not Child, further confirmed the character of African literary theme, colour and spirituality, as well as its large overflow of historio-cultural content. Then came the sharp dramatic shock of William Wordsworth's poetry, where I found myself in an entrancing literary suspension between such pretty and smart imaginary pictures, compressed by Wordsworth into short beautiful verses and the powerful waterfalls of African narrative, by writers like Akpan, Laye, Achebe, Ngugi, Henshaw and Ekwensi. My humble world of words, imagination and imagery began; and I've lived, experienced and carried these impressions ever since. But it pains me that these figures who often manifest as fatherly emanations and as teachers in my psyche, are fast depleting, Ever quietly.

For decades, I thought and believed (rightly so), that literature was sacred, and that its craft is a creation of sorts.

I wondered, and still wonder why African writers preoccupy themselves with the portrayal of the simple, quiet, rugged terrain of African life, even where there are big mansions in urban centres and posh Mercedes Benz cars that stream along its highways. What is their attraction to the former that would make them to write with so much profundity? When I met Prof. Ime Ikhide (he wrote the preface to Ngugi's Weep Not Child), the source of their inspiration suddenly hit me. But a strand of this debate still continues.

My interest now has been on the location, role and historical engagement of the Association of Nigerian Authors, (ANA). I remember, way back in the 1980s in Kano, and later in Abuja, when a few people, including my friend, Aliyu Ibrahim (with his fiery anti-apartheid poems), and one Akilu Abdullahi, (Hitler!) - and me, too - tried to organise a reading club. We thought very highly of any engagement in poetry, playwriting, or prose, almost to the point of regarding such people as community seers!

Our early experiences, or hope, were to create a kind of sense of strong community and brotherhood among ourselves, and to be open about our fledgling literary endeavours; to bounce about ideas of good character creation, development of unpredictable and dramatic plots, fresh and creative story lines, and all such things. We thought about these things as being extremely important in the craft. We worried less about getting published - ah! that was lofty and dream-like.

Even today, my vocation has plenty to do with matters like these, and it has proved to me severally, that a good literary product from a good, fertile mind, will find good publishers, readership and a good market. And finally, recognition. Shouldn't this be the natural trajectory in the trade? From a distance as a non-member of ANA, I take light interest in what the association does with our heritage. The last big thing about ANA that I knew of, was the hoopla about whether former President Babangida should be allowed to make a speech at its annual award ceremony or not. Needless debate, it turned out to be.

The business of writing is often self-revelatory, for better or for worse. From ANA's analyses of some of the output of new generation writers, some of the comments I read have been very grave. I hear of grammatical errors, slips and general poor execution of the stories they attempt to tell. This underlines the huge work ANA has to undertake. I've personally read some of today's Nigerian poetry, offered as mere common stories, chopped into pieces as verses.

Please, I don't intend to offend, because there are many beautiful exceptions - deep, refreshing masterpieces. I've also read them. By the way, has anybody read any poem by Chinweizu? Which brings us to the futility of introducing generational markers into Nigerian literature, with the Achebe - Soyinka era, as not only the ultimate benchmark, but the mainframe by which to assess ourselves. Nothing terribly wrong there, but where do you place people like N.U. Akpan, Sa'Adu Zungur, Ene Henshaw and Cyprian Ekwensi?

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ANA should re-survey its universe, not necessarily for equitable distribution of the NLNG dollar-denominated award, but for it to capture all its vital constituents. For the awards though, I have my reservations. Already, Niyi Osundare has declined being included in the next one. The point really is this, if this year's went to long-standing personages like Mabel Segun and Akachi Eze-igbo, one can't possibly say these were not deserving, but the devil is, in trying to evaluate the comments about Peter Umez's book, to wit, that it has the potentiality to win the award, in future.

I take this to mean that the next award will go to the young writer's work; but what I don't understand is if it will be so only when he revises the book, or that the future judges should expect poorer entries. I raised this point with a published and widely read poet, Dr. Leonard Emuren, (a medical doctor, like Dr. Ene Henshaw), who visited Nigeria lately, and he simply chuckled.

Our literary community should go back in time, to see how it all began, so as to do justice to the real pioneers. Or how will the ANA, particularly, say goodnight to N.U. Akpan, James Ene Henshaw and Cyprian Ekwensi?

http://allafrica.com/stories/200711100177.html

Like a musician or an actor, the mainstay of a creative writer is his intellectual property. More than other artists from the arts, creative writers have brought more joy to Nigeria, with literary giants like Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka, to mention a few, winning international renown and prizes, having their bestsellers translated into many foreign languages, and thereby promoting our cultural heritage.

Compared to the Nigerian musician or actor, the Nigerian writer, despite his intellectual edge, is taking the backseat as far as financial fortunes are concerned. Today, you can’t talk of any new Nigerian writer, whose books sell in thousands like, say, the hip-hop albums of Tuface Idibia or the B-rated movies of Nkem Owoh, aka Osuofia.

Are there some things our musicians and actors are doing well that our writers aren’t doing? Is it that they are telling the African story better than the writers? The answers to these questions will surely diepart from the affirmative.

Several reasons have been adduced for the down hill publishing creative works has been steadily going in the country, which has made most of our writers glorified paupers.
The 1950 and 60s have been described as the golden era of Nigerian/African literature. The publishing giant, Heinemann, capitalizing on the reception and profitability of Achebe’s classical novel, Things Fall Apart, worldwide, created the now-rested African Writers Series, exploiting the abundant reservoir of talents from the country and the continent, which led to the emergence of new writings by Wole Soyinka, J.P. Clark, Cyprain Ekwensi, Flora Nwapa, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Peter Abrahams, T.M. Aluko, Ayi Kwei Armah, Kofi Awoonor, Mariama Ba, Mongo Beti, Okot P’Bitek, Dennis Brutus, Bernard Dadie, Buchi Emecheta, Bessie Head, Aubrey Kachingwe, Mazisi Kunene, Alex La Guma, Taban Lo Liyong, Naguib Mayfouz, Gabriel Okara, Christopher Okigbo, Yambo Ouologuem, Ferdinand Oyono, Elechi Amadi, Chukwuemeka Ike, among others.

Taking a cue from the blossoming book market in Africa, the London-based publishers, Longman and Macmillan, joined the fray, publishing a new generation of African writers, including Jared Angira, Efua Sutherland, Bode Sowande, Ama Ata Aidoo, Meja Nwangi, Ben Okri, Odia Ofeimun, Lauretta Ngcobo, Aminata Fall, Isidore Okpewho, Festus Iyayi, among others.

In the 1980s, Heinemann and other small presses like Malthouse, Ibadan; University Press, Ibadan; Book Craft, Ibadan; Kraftbooks, Ibadan, Fourth Dimension, Enugu, etc., continued to publish Nigerian writers. This era witnessed the emergence of new literary heavyweights in Nigeria: the Osundares, Osofisans, Ojaides, Nwankwos and Enekwes.

Between 1950s–1980s, it is said that these publishing houses tried as much possible to pay royalties to writers they published, no matter how negligible the amount, and it was easier for writers to follow the number of sells from their books.

As the 1980s wore on and the tragic economic placebo, Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), was introduced by the military junta of General Ibrahim Babangida publishing creative works became a risky venture. The frontliners, like Heinemann, Longman and Macmillan, began to relax on publishing creative works in preference for academic textbooks, which, they said, record more sells. Small publishing houses that centred on vanity publishing began to emerge. Today, most of the noteworthy creative works published in the country are published by the Ibadan-based duo of Book Craft and Kraftbooks. In children’s literature, Lantern Books, Lagos, has emerged as a leader. Nevertheless, Nigerian writers have continued to complain of non-payment of royalties.

Following the successes it recorded by publishing the Nigerian editions of Chimamanda Adichie’s award-winning first novel, Purple Hibiscus, and Sefi Atta’s novel, Everything Good Will Come, in 2004 and 2005, Kachifo Books, Lagos, has emerged as a force to reckon with in publishing of creative works in the country. It has since added the versatile writer, Tanure Ojaide, on its stable. While other publishing houses are complaining of low sells, Kachifo Books is selling its authors’ book in thousands. Its welfare package to writers is second to none in the industry. One of the criticisms against Kachifo Books, however, is that it thrives on ready-made writers instead of discovering and publishing unknown but good writers, which has made the M.D., Muktar Bakare, to charge new Nigerian writers recently to send good manuscripts for consideration.

Disturbed by the downturn in publishing creative works in the country, a new writers’ collective, New Gong, was formed two years ago in Lagos, headed by Adewale Maja-Pearce, a former editor with Heinemann, Nigeria. This group leverages on the support of members to publish their works. The marvel of New Gong’s initiative is that works of writers it has published – Adewale Maja-Pearce’s Remembering Saro-Wiwa…, Maxim Uzoatu’s The god of Poetry, Dulue Mbachu’s War Game, and Isidore Uzoatu Vision Impossible – are available on the popular book website, amazon.com. Maja-Pearce told Sunday Sun in a recent interview that New Gong is getting offers from all over the world.

Last year, Cassava Republic Press, announced its entry into the publishing industry in the country with emphasis on creative works. Already it has published the novel, 26A, by Diana Evans, and the Nigerian editions of Helon Habila’s works, Waiting for an Angel and Measuring Time. The Yenagoa-based Publishing outfit, Treasure Books, is also encouraging the publication of creative works in the country. Aboki Publishers, Cel-Bez, Wusen Books, Delta Publications and Oracle Books, based in Makurdi, Owerri, Calabar, Enugu and Lagos, respectively, are also publishing new writers, but how far their books go is another thing.

There are hundreds of other printing houses masquerading as publishers where ambitious new writers take their manuscripts for printing. Often times the production quality of their works is nothing to write home about. In some rare cases, we have works of above average and good productions. After the printing of these books, marketing and promoting them become a big problem. Hence, we now see writers published by the vanity press complain of hard sells.

Jude Dibia, author of two recent outstanding novels, Unbridled and Walking with Shadows (2006 and 2007), published by Blacksands, Lagos, have interestingly sold out his first prints. Ken Ike-Okere, author of the poetry book, The River Died, informed Sunday Sun, too, that he has also run out of demands for his second prints by self-marketing. But, for many writers in the country, self-marketing does not translate into huge sells.

Nigerian publishers are not helping matters, too. For most of them, their work stops at the point when the books are rolled out from the press. They do little or none of promoting and marketing their authors. A few of them who attempt doing this only rely on book reviews on newspaper arts pages instead of advertising their books as is the norm in the western world.

How much royalties are Nigerian writers paid? Except the Lagos-based poet, Adolphus Amasiatu II, author of Diary of a Poet, it is rare to see a Nigerian writer who will admit receiving a dime from his publisher (s). At the 2007 Nigeria Book Trust Foundation Book Fair in Lagos, in May, the Ibadan-based writer, Tony Marinho, complained bitterly of being reaped off by his publishers. Niyi Osundare told Sunday Sun in 2005 that, despite his many award-winning books and bestsellers, he was yet to reap from the fruit of his labour. These are not isolated complaints.

Denja Abdullahi, General Secretary, Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), is of the view that “a writer may not make much money from royalties or from self-marketing of his books, but there are allied benefits he can use his creativity to achieve”. Like elsewhere, royalties for creative works are maximum of ten percent from the money realized from selling a copy, but “even getting the ten percent is always a problem, because publishers always short-change writers,” said he.

Writers, in Nigeria, today, he noted, are just publishing to get known. The way forward, according to him, is for writers to explore alternative publishing, that is, writers-friendly publishing outfits that will give them good contracts.

Prof. Chukwuemeka Ike belongs to the Chinua Achebe generation of writers and was the founding president of the Nigeria Book Trust Foundation. He told Sunday Sun that a writer who is lucky to have his work(s) recommended to schools will have more sells than others, but how many new writers get this opportunity nowadays?

He has identified the lack of promotion by Nigerian publishers as another setback to Nigerian writers, “otherwise creative writing should be more profitable than it is now”. He has never depended solely on the royalties from his works. “So, whatever comes in is an addition to my income,” he said. “In the UK, you get advance royalties for your works,” he informed.

Chukwu Eke, a writer and a stringler with The Source magazine, echoed the view that publishing creative works in the country is not profitable. The author of the poetry volume, Rhythm of a Pathfinder, he lamented that the book has not sold like his published instructional materials.
“If you don’t hawk your books, nobody will go to a bookshop to buy them, except they have heard your name somewhere.

Achebe published Things Fall Apart in 1958, and he made money and has continued to make more money. Maik Nwosu’s works are comparable to the Achebes’, but he hasn’t made much progress with them. The delimma of a Nigerian writer, whether self-published or published by big publishers, is that he cannot depend on the sells or royalties from his books.”
Hyacinth Obunseh is currently ANA’s assistant secretary. He doubles as the CEO of Hybun, a publishing outlet that has published many new Nigerian writers.

He attributed the cause of our writers not making money to the fact that publishers themselves are not making money. “For instance, if you publish a book at N150 and sell it at N250, your gain is N100. But, if you take it to, say, a bookshop somewhere in Surulere [Lagos], it is going to take you 20 percent of the money to be there and another 20 percent for distribution cost. That leaves the author with 60 percent. Often you spend so much time, energy and money, and it takes longer time to pay him; it is not deliberate.”

Omale Allen Abdul-Jabbar chairs ANA Plateau State. His opinion isn’t different: “Publishing creative writing in the country is no longer profitable”. He has seen several instances where authors have struggled to get published only to have their works either dumped under their beds or autographed to their friends and relations. “I am yet to see any writer who has received any royalty,” he lamented. According to him, the downward trajectory in the publishing industry in the country is “ a reflection of the changing times in the country.”

Big names like Achebe and Soyinka also make extra money from public speaking. Depending on the occasion, they may collect up to 20 thousand dollars, said Maxim Uzoatu, a poet and a literary activist. But, can we talk of the richest writer in Nigeria? Uzoatu suggested that it could be Achebe, because his Things Fall Apart has sold over 10 million copies worldwide, the highest figure by any Nigerian writer. However, he cautioned that “books, especially literature, should not be reduced to Nollywood’s grossing”, which is to say that the worth of a writer cannot be measured in monetary terms.

Judging from the foregoing, the creative writer in Nigeria is only a few steps removed from becoming an endangered species. But, if what Obunseh said that “what is happening in the music and film industries will soon happen in the book industry” has an echo of possibility, smiles will soon return to the famished faces of most Nigerian writers. Let’s hope this won’t be like waiting for Godot.

http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/features/literari/2007/nov/18/literari-18-11-2007-001.htm

And your proofs?@doyin?