THE AFRICAN WRITER: FACING THE NEW

Helon Habila

Politics and the African Writer

There is no denying the fact that the African writer has always considered himself a political animal. The practice of literature as socio-political commentary, among its many other functions, predates the advent of written literature; it goes back to pre-colonial times when the public story-teller never hesitated to weave into his tale a moral caution at the end. Didacticism in literature was one of the many ways in which traditional societal values were reinforced. For instance, it was not unheard of for a court poet to admonish the king in his songs, this was taken in good faith and accepted as part of the duties of the poet, as part of the functions of literature.

The emergence of the novel in Africa coincided with the struggle against colonialism in many African countries, and the writer, because of his education and the privileged position in which he found himself in terms of audience and respect for his views, naturally continued in this tradition of maintaining societal values and integrity with his writing. Maintaining societal values here of course meant the reinstating of the African’s dignity through the overthrow of foreign dominance, and to use Ngugi’s expression, through ‘decolonising the mind.’

And so the first generation African writers set the trend: Achebe with Things Fall Apart, Ngugi with Weep Not Child, and Soyinka in his many plays and novels.
Soyinka, in his foreword to his play, Opera Wonyosi, re-emphasises what he sees as the writer’s duties to society: ‘Art should expose, reflect, and indeed magnify the decadent, rotted underbelly of a society that has lost its direction, jettisoned all sense of values and is careering down a precipice.’

This is the tradition, more or less, in which African literature has continued. In his interesting essay, ‘Self-Censorship in Africa and Scholarly Publishing’, Jacob Jaygbay, mentions the current ferment in African affairs, the great push for democratisation in many African countries since the 1980’s, he says, ‘Ceaselessly confronted by globalisation, with its agenda for political and economic liberalisation, the African continent is witnessing a new wave of socio-economic transformation due to both internal and external pressures.’

If it is true that art mirrors and often interprets the dominant mood of its times, then the African writer will continue to dramatise, in human terms, this economic and political drama that is unfolding in his milieu. However, despite the writers’ undoubted eagerness and ability to contribute to the national debate, he is not always free to do so. And here we must pause to ask whether writing, and literature in general, is actually able to effect change in African societies. Of course the writer does create political awareness. Ngugi Wa Thiongo’s staging of his play, I’ll Marry When I Want, and the popular upheaval that followed it is a testament to that. But does the writer cause bad governments to fall, and make dictators embrace democracy? I remember asking Wole Soyinka the same question in an interview. I asked: ‘…do you think literature matters in terms of shaping political policies?’ He answered: ‘Not as an immediate fixer. Not as an instant fructifier of our aspirations. ..let us not get too romantic about literature being mightier than the sword, or expect immediate change; but in terms of shaping ways of thinking, and ultimately shaping the collective conscious, it does matter. ’

The purpose of this essay is not to dwell on the limitations of literature as a tool for change, but on its possibilities. And this leads us to the question, what are the things that stand between the writer and his desire to express himself, especially on political issues, in his society? Censorship is of course a good answer.

Censorship and the African Writer

State Censorship

But of course the writer’s inability to create immediate change does not diminish the threat he poses to despotic regimes in his own country. Because he is most often taken seriously by the outside world, he is often quoted in newspapers and by pro-democracy groups, he is thus indirectly able to shape opinion about his country and to bring about pressure for change in his own country. A good example of this would be the Nigerian writer and environmental activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa. His short stories and letters to newspapers outside Nigeria led to the expulsion of Nigeria from the Commonwealth Group of Nations, causing great embarrassment to the Nigerian government and the oil companies whose exploration activities were causing grave and irreparable damage to the Ogoni land.

I’ll like to discuss two types of censorship here. One is the official, or state, censorship. Jacob Jaygbay defines it as: ‘the interdiction or denial of information by decree (in whatever form) as applied by governments.’ In his book: Giving Offence: Essays on Censorship, the South African writer, JM Coetzee, takes a rather figurative look at censorship. He first likens the act of writing to an interaction between a lover and his beloved whom he is trying to please – the writer is the lover and the reader the beloved, then he goes on to imagine what will happen ‘if into this transaction is introduced … the dark-suited, bald headed censor, with his pursed lips and red pen and his irritability and his censoriousness.’ But most writers would be too happy to settle for mere irritability and censoriousness from their censors, because most censors go further than that. They close down newspapers and publishing houses, they send writers to prison, or exile, and in some extreme cases, to death. In Africa, censorship is serious business. In Nigeria with the advent of successive military dictatorships from the 1980s to the 1990s came a succession of decrees all enacted in an effort to stifle free speech by writers and journalists, most of whom became victims of these anti-press legislations. These decrees are, Decree No. 2 of 1984, Decree No.43 of 1993, Decree No.107 of 1993, Decree No.35 of 1993, Decree No.29 of 1993, Decree No.14 of 1994 and Decree No.1 of 1986. By the mid 1990’s most indigenous publishing houses, which had briefly thrived in the vacuum left by the multinational companies’ pull out with the devaluing of the local currency in the structural adjustment programmes of the mid 80’s, slowly expired under this stifling conditions.

The writer, Phaswane Mpe, in his essay, ‘Censorship and Multinational Publishing in Africa,’ also rattles out a long list of such decrees in South Africa’s history: he mentions the ‘Publications and Entertainment Act of 1966, the Suppression of Communism act in 1966, the Publications act of 1974. ‘Under these laws,’ he wrote, ‘the government was empowered to ban books and reinforce the states decision so that certain individuals regarded as dangerous to the state, may not be quoted .’ There was also the Internal Security Act of 1982. He noted that it was not only writers who suffered; publishers could be fined or arrested if they published material offensive to the laws. And so the government, through their decrees and through their clampdown on any form of intellectual exchange, had sounded the death knell on the aspirations of most young writers.

Writers like Biyi Bandele Thomas, and earlier, Ben Okri, had to leave Nigeria to seek publishing opportunities outside. Even older, more established writers like Tanure Ojaide and Femi Osofisan had to search for publishers outside the country because of the limited publishing opportunities at home. At this time I had just graduated from the university and had started writing seriously, and all I can remember of that period is the great despair I felt at the total absence of any opportunity to get my works published.

Self-Censorship

There is another subtler, less overt type of censorship. This is self-censorship. Again Jacob Jaygbay defines it very well: he says: ‘this is the form of censorship that is part of the African education system, its official languages, and its societal values, the kind of censorship that is packaged in the form of ideology and therefore constitutes part of the intellectual make-up of the African scholar.’ This is not censorship by decree, but by psychology.

Most African writers have come across this form of censorship – it is the kind that tries to tell you what language you should write in, or shouldn’t write in, or themes that are more relevant to African literature: many times I’ve been asked why I am not writing on identity and colonialism. The Zimbabwean writer, Dambudzo Marechera, in one of his essays, expressed his amazement at the things that go on daily in the society, like sex, and for which he is condemned if he mentions them in his writing. Almost all of Marechera’s career was shaped by his attempt to maintain his integrity as a writer, to write not what is expected of him, but what he feels like writing about. Nadine Gordimer, in her essay, ‘A Writer’s Freedom,’ says: ‘The fact is that even on the side of the angels, a writer has to reserve the right to tell the truth as he sees it, in his own words, without being accused of letting the side down.’

The African society sometimes puts too much pressure on the writer as to what he should or shouldn’t write about, this stifles his creativity as surely as any government decree – and this often leads to the writer seeking other publishing opportunities far away from his country where he can imagine himself writing for a faceless, non-judgemental audience.

Ways Forward

In 2000 when I wanted to publish my book, the least of my worries was whether it was going to be banned by anyone or not, all I wanted was to get published, in any case the worst of the military dictatorship was over, but its legacy of the absence of publishing houses still lingered. I had to do what most of my peers did. I went to a private publisher. These were mere roadside operators of presses who perhaps didn’t even know how to read, let alone edit a book. They simply print, and you pay. They did not promote or market it in any way; that was left to the author to do. I scrapped together the required amount. I got my book published, and when it eventually won the Caine Prize, to my surprise the printer, who now started introducing himself as my publisher, wanted a share of the prize money. He claimed that he had contributed to my success: if he hadn’t published my book, I wouldn’t have won the prize. He even threatened to take me to court. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I did not hesitate when I was invited by the University of East Anglia to come to Britain and be a writing fellow. I needed time to collect my thoughts. But of course not all writers are able to get away from their societies, in fact not all writers desire to do so.

Nothing ever stands between a committed writer and his writing, except perhaps death. The serious writer almost always finds a way. The whole history of publishing in Africa I think testifies to this. In 1987 a coalition of South African writers, as a result of the stultifying atmosphere created by apartheid and its restrictions on writing and publishing, decided to form a political organisation called COSAW( Congress of South African Writers), apart from being a political organising that represented the writers interest, COSAW also had a publishing house which published poems, novels and essays in which writers expressed their critical opinions about the political situation in South Africa. Speaking about the organisation Nadine Gordimer says: ‘We saw writers as the cultural wing of the struggle, whose task was to fight constantly against censorship, encourage small publishing houses to take the risk of publishing stuff that probably would be banned.’ More of such associations are needed today.

In Uganda, with its lack of publishing possibilities resulting from years of war and dictatorships, a group of young women have formed a writers co-operative called FEMWRITE (Female Writers) and with the help of foreign arts agencies they are able to invite international writers who organise workshops for them, but most importantly they also publish their own writing and market it. These alternative publishing, I think, is the way forward for most African writers. It gives younger writers a better chance of getting published as most multinationals prefer established names.

Distribution

In his book, Home and Exile, Chinua Achebe makes a strong case for why African writers should remain in Africa. ‘…America,’ he says, ‘has enough novelists writing about her, and Nigeria too few.’ Writers must invest in their societies. I agree with that, though I think that one can stay at home and fail to make any appreciable impact on his society. It is a question of balance.

I think one way writers can ensure that the right balance is maintained is by making sure that no matter where they are published, or where they live, a connection with their society is kept alive. One of the ways to do this is to see that their books are distributed properly in their countries. This is not as easy as it sounds. I encountered the problem when I found out that the price of a copy of my book, when translated into Naira, was almost half the monthly wage of a minimum wage earner. I had to sign a separate contract with my publishers waiving most of my royalties for Nigeria to see that the books are sold at more affordable prices. But even then the book is still too expensive compared to books produced locally, albeit of a higher quality. I hope in the future to be able to retain the Nigerian rights for my books and have a separate Nigerian edition.


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