I write what I am drawn to write
Chris Abani at Festival of Books Poetry StageChris Abani is profiled in the Daily Sun:
The claim that he is also pandering to foreign publishers sounds ridiculous to him. “We are all part of a tradition of literature that is often very critical of the society it comes from. Ekwensi's work on the lives of the poor in Jagau Nana and Coal Camp and even Amos Tutuola's mythical and beautiful novels [including The Palmwine Drinkard] used the supernatural to show what was going on in the culture.
Achebe's Arrow of God deconstructs the abuse of power in a pre-colonial or marginally colonized context, where the players are all from one community. A Man of the People satirizes the early independent Nigeria and almost predicts the coup to follow. Festus Iyayi's Violence does the same,” he explains.
“These are all great books, wonderful books, all published by foreign owned and run presses (Heinemann and Longman) and awarded prizes not Nigerian or African in origin, yet they don't get talked about in this way. When a new generation of writers continues this fine tradition and also expands it, having complete freedom (a freedom made possible by the work of the generations before them) to create new works in this way, we are accused of pandering to foreign publishers.
This kind of criticism is lazy and underdeveloped, and doesn't take in the entire work. But, I must also say, that a writer writes a book and then it is in the public domain and, therefore, every criticism of it is not only appropriate; it is valid; but only in the context of other criticisms and positions.
