Writings of Anietie Isong

Short story review

2009-11-18T01:35:00.000-08:00

My short story, 'Devotion' has been reviewed in the Independent. More here.

Roads Ahead

2009-09-24T01:47:00.000-07:00

My short story 'Devotion' is published in an anthology of short stories, Roads Ahead edited by Catherine O'Flynn. It is available to buy here.

There's also a review of the book here.

In 1999 a spiky collection of young writing was put together by the Tindal Street imprint, the first on a prize-winning road ahead. Receiving critical acclaim for its energy and variety, and awarded an Arts Council publishing prize, Hard Shoulder kick-started the careers of many young writers, editors and publishers. Ten years on, Tindall Street Press celebrates a decade of publishing – and commitment to the short story and wealth of regional writing talent with Roads Ahead.

Kachi Ozumba's Shadow of a Smile

2009-09-21T06:30:00.000-07:00

Kachi Ozumba's first novel Shadow of a Smile is now out. The story: Torn from his father and a loving sister, the young student Zuba is imprisoned for a crime he has not even thought about committing. His misfortune: to live in a world where corruption is rife and honest and law-abiding people are crushed by the wheels of a blind, unscrupulous bureaucracy. More here.

Uwem Akpan humbled by Oprah pick

2009-09-21T06:20:00.000-07:00

Nigerian author Uwem Akpan, who is a Jesuit priest, said he was "humbled" that his debut collection of short stories was chosen by influential U.S. talk show host Oprah Winfrey for her book club. More here.

Now you can talk!

2009-06-28T09:25:00.000-07:00

You are inches away from God is Good Telephone Centre – a rickety structure with rusted metal roofs. The man inside the cubicle is ranting on the mobile phone. You imagine his wife on the other end, defiant, bellowing back. You picture her at her oven hot home, tapping her foot on the floor, waving at the kids, and urging them to be quiet. Noisy motorcycles rattle past. A skinny dog barks. This is Lagos.

In the hotel room, you switch on your television set. The presenter announces that Africa is now the world's fastest-growing cell phone market. The number of mobile users in Africa is growing at double the rate of the rest of the globe. From 1999 through 2004, mobile subscribers in Africa jumped to 76.8 million, from 7.5 million, an average annual increase of 58 percent.

The revelation tickles your ears, takes you by surprise. Your cold fingers clutch the coffee table. You have never thought Africans to be great telephone users. How could these people, with their tribal strives and diseases, afford the luxury of a telephone? They were too poor - living on $2 a day or less, they were supposed to be too poor to justify corporate investments in mobile telecommunications outside the more prosperous continents. The newscaster takes you on a voyage, tells you that when African nations began to privatize their telephone monopolies in the mid-1990's, and competitive operators began to sell air time in smaller, cheaper units, mobile phone use exploded. Demand for air time was so strong in Nigeria that from late 2002 to early 2003 operators there were forced to suspend the sale of SIM cards, while they strengthened their networks.

In the beginning, people in the remote villages were so eager for service that they built ‘treehouses’ to catch signals from distant mobile phone masts. Beads of perspiration appear on your forehead. You and your Western friends would have invoked the laws of health and safety. Risk assessment. Fire drills. Evacuation. Yesterday, you met an old woman unable even to write her last name, telling customers to call her mobile phone if they wanted to buy the akara she sold. Time stood still and framed for you then. You stood and watched the woman, in her pale blue dress.

The sun is setting. The sky wraps around itself a purple hue. It makes you want to weep. You have always known Africans to be ingenious. Look at what they did to the English language. They added a bit of this and that, and came out with the Pidgin language. But you didn’t think that they would carry their ingenuity over to the mobile phones. In order to save calling units, most people in Nigeria resort to a practice called ‘flashing’ which means just to dial a number, let it ring once or twice and then hang up before the person called is able to touch a button. In Kenya, they have introduced a service called M-Pesa. This is simply an extra line on the mobile phone menu that says: "Send Money". With this, people go to an office, transfer funds onto their phone account, and then send them to their friends, or family, or anybody else with a mobile. The receivers then go to an office, show the code on the mobile and some ID, and collect the cash.

Music oozes from the TV. You feel comforted, becalmed by the African beats. Analysts have agreed that the technology revolution has come to African countries via the mobile phone, not the personal computer, as it did in America and Europe. And just as the internet encouraged the creation of some dotcom firms, the mobile phone boom in Africa may create the same sort of businesses, but tailored to local needs.

You become aware of your heart thumping, of the blood thudding in your ears. By the year 2012, around 485-million people in Africa will be mobile phone users. Increasingly mobile phones firms in Africa are encouraging users to venture online via their handsets.

You have always loved literature. In Things Fall Apart, you discovered the rich Igbo culture. South Africans have now launched the first text based entertainment, fiction written specifically for the mobile phone. Novel Idea inspires innovative content creation on the mobile platform. The pilot, which launched on 7 July 2008, is apparently the first time short fiction has been specifically commissioned for delivery via mobile phones in Africa. It has also been a unique way to promote professional South African writers.

The mobile phone revolution tells us of the ability of the silenced to triumph over adversity. It tells us that Africa has not been swallowed by history; Africa too knows how to swallow history!

Debut novelist takes €100,000 Impac Dublin prize

2009-06-22T05:11:00.000-07:00

A debut novelist who says he's never really had a proper job has won the world's richest literary award. American writer Michael Thomas beat authors including Philip Roth, Doris Lessing and Joyce Carol Oates to take the €100,000 (£85,000) Impac Dublin prize with his debut novel, Man Gone Down. More here.

Oyeyemi's White is for Witching

2009-06-22T04:59:00.000-07:00

Anyone who has read those earlier books, The Icarus Girl and The Opposite House, will find themselves in familiar territory, as Oyeyemi revisits a few of their themes: haunted houses, unquiet memories, female insanity, twins, eating disorders. More here.

The Penguin Prize for African Writing

2009-04-21T02:10:00.000-07:00

Penguin Books has announced a new literary award for writers from the African continent. The Penguin Prize for African Writing has two categories: a previously unpublished full-length work of adult fiction and one of non-fiction. The prize in each category will be R50 000 and a publishing contract with Penguin Books South Africa, with worldwide distribution via Penguin Group companies. More here

The Jacksons

2009-03-06T07:52:00.000-08:00

Seems to me that the Jacksons will always be in the news. LaToya featured in this year's Celebrity Big Brother. Marlon is involved in a controversial development to turn a former slave port into a luxury resort that will house a Jackson Five museum, five-star hotel and slavery memorial. The king himself Michael, has announced a series of comeback concerts at the O2 arena in London. Stepping through the red curtains at the O2 arena in London to the hysterical screams of his loyal fans, the King of Pop almost seemed like his old self once more.
There were broad smiles, sparkling silver and jewels adorning his black jacket, and waves and peace signs for his army of followers. More here.

Dialogue Among Civilisations

2009-03-06T07:37:00.000-08:00

“Dialogue among Civilisations” forms the basis for a new initiative by Art for Humanity. It involves collaboration between artists and poets from Africa and those countries who participated in the 2006 Soccer World Cup. The participants will be invited to create work on the theme of identity, land, object and belief.

More details here

Es'kia Mphahlele: And the Man Died

2008-11-06T02:02:00.000-08:00

Ezekiel (Es’kia) Mphahlele, African writer, teacher and arts activist, was born on December 17, 1919. He died on October 27, 2008, aged 88. Mphahlele’s writings had a strong autobiographical strain: he was persecuted and driven into exile himself, experiences which provided the material for his art. This was reflected, above all, in his second and most popular work, Down Second Avenue, published in 1959 — a vivid account of growing up in rural northern South Africa and in a bustling Pretoria black township before the Second World War. More here.

African Writers and the Internet

2008-11-06T01:57:00.000-08:00

I gave a talk recently at the Institute of Creative Technologies. I looked briefly at the mobile phone revolution in Africa. Jess reported it here.

New Media Writing and Publishing, 22 Oct 2008, IOCT

2008-10-08T13:57:00.000-07:00

Every autumn, First Year CWNM students spend a week on campus at DMU. This year Campus Week includes a day of discussion open to DMU students, staff, and the general public. More here.

More on "Say You're One of Them"

2008-07-17T03:28:00.000-07:00

This astonishing first collection of short stories marks the arrival of a major writer - The Independent. Read more here.

Uwem Akpan: "Say You're One of Them"

2008-07-17T03:21:00.000-07:00

Uwem Akpan is a Nigerian writer whose debut collection of short stories "Say You're One of Them" has been well received. In 2004, when the Rev. Uwem Akpan applied to the graduate program in creative writing at the University of Michigan, his folder attracted a lot of attention. He was both a Nigerian and a Jesuit priest, and the program was unused to applicants from either category. And though Father Akpan’s talent was abundantly evident, if a little raw, Eileen Pollack, the director of the program, recalled recently, there was some hesitation on the part of the admissions committee. “There were discussions about having a priest be part of workshops where students would be writing about sex and drugs,” Ms. Pollack said.

Read more here

Call for Papers - New African Journal

2008-04-14T09:57:00.000-07:00

Announcing the launch of a new journal on African studies entitled Africana: A Journal of Ideas on Africa and the African Diaspora, a bi-annual (two issues per year) targeting an audience of scholars, practitioners, and other parties interested in African issues. The journal is meant to be multidisciplinary with a global distribution. We are currently seeking submissions and invite you to consider writing an original and unpublished article or book review to be included in our next volume. We are also interested in submissions from colleagues working in organisations similar to your own and kindly request that you circulate this Call for Papers among your own networks.

Submissions should be made to Editorial Co-ordinator, Yilma Tafere Tasew, at editor@africanajournal.org in Microsoft Word format. A brief biography and contact detailsshould be included with all submissions. Alternatively, you can mail submissions to:
Dr Christopher LaMonica
Senior Editor, Africana Journal
Political Science & International Relations Programme
Victoria University of Wellington
PO Box 600
Wellington 6001
New Zealand
Tel: +64 (4) 463-5760
Fax: +64 (4) 463-5414

"Playing Games" (New Short Story)

2008-02-26T13:48:00.000-08:00

Nene, my cousin, called the gossip session the real meeting. I watched her closely as she mingled with the other women. I noticed for the first time how bony her hand was, how all the veins that ought to have been covered with healthy flesh stood out like the drawing of a school child. But Nene was not an old woman. It was too much hard work that had aged her. As the bread winner, she supported her family with sales of akara and other petty goods. As in my own case, her husband had left her for the world beyond.

To read more, click here

Chika Unigwe

2007-12-06T07:39:00.000-08:00

Chika Unigwe is on reading a tour. If you reside in Lagos, please don't miss this event. Chika is a great writer. Visit here for more details.

Here is an excerpt from Chika's story, Alek:
"Alek had never heard her father sound like that: timid. Servile. She felt embarrassed for him, this efficient policeman. Maybe on his knees. “Please, Sir…” the faltering voice. Begun but not finished. A shot amputating the rest of his sentence. A stillness. Inside the cupboard, the smell of fear. Rising and rising. Then, a wail. Ma sounding bigger, louder."

Read more here.

Adieu Cyprian

2007-11-22T08:22:00.000-08:00

In my primary and secondary school days, I devoured Cyprian Ekwensi’s adventure series: Samankwe and the Highway Robbers, Samankwe in the Strange Forest, Passport of Mallam Ilia, etc. I recently discovered his Survive the Peace at the University of Leicester library. The slim book vividly portrays the aftermath of the Biafra civil war. Many years ago, (I cannot remember the exact year) at the University of Ibadan Theatre, I played the role of Mallam Ilia in a stage adaptation of the Passport of Mallam Ilia. The writer himself, Cyprian Ekwensi was present. RIP Cyprian.

Inclusion and Exclusion

2007-11-13T09:08:00.000-08:00

What is the fate of immigrants in today's Britain? How well can an African integrate into the way of life here? There have been talks about "Equal Opportunites" and "British jobs for British people". My short story, "Strangers" deals with the immigrant experience in contemporary Britain. It is published in Farafina.

Poetry

2007-10-23T09:37:00.000-07:00

A poet is an unhappy being whose heart is torn by secret sufferings, but whose lips are so strangely formed that when the sighs and the cries escape them, they sound like beautiful music... and then people crowd about the poet and say to him: "Sing for us soon again;" that is as much as to say, "May new sufferings torment your soul." ~Soren Kierkegaard

In my unhappy state, I wrote this poem:

The Honourable

Tonight,
I leave for the House.
I leave to dwell among wolves and sheep.

O Benevolent One, Patriarch of the Tribe,
I pray for courage.
Courage
To resist bribes concealed in cellophane bags.
Courage
To resist the advances of Assembly sluts.

May I not forget the Tribe.
May I not forsake the Tribe.

O Benevolent One, Patriarch of the Tribe,
I pray for power.
Power
To survive the assassin’s bullets.
Power
To survive the heat of impeachment.

O Benevolent One, Patriarch of the Tribe,
I am on my knees.
I have been on my knees.
I, the honourable.

Read more here

The Last Messenger

2007-10-22T14:18:00.000-07:00

They called him The Last Messenger. His predictions had the uncanny precision of a chisel. Word went round that many heads of states consulted him on the calamity that might befall their nations. But where the presidents stopped, the public proceeded. In The Last Messenger's website, followers posted volleys of questions: Will Mugabe be ousted? Who will discover the cure for AIDS? What will be the fate of Neverland? Who will arrest Osama?

Read more here.

Action! Nollywood in Cyberspace

2007-10-22T14:12:00.000-07:00

The appellation ‘Nollywood’ has been adopted as the official title of Nigeria’s home video business. With the production of over fifty movie titles per week, the industry is fast commanding global attention, and is being seen as a great cultural contribution to the international community. The ‘Nigerian Phenomenon’, as Nollywood is sometimes called, is believed to be the third biggest film industry in the world. Analysts say it is worth over £80 million annually.
Read more here.