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Sometime this week, I was at a
carpenter’s shop. I was to give him a description of what I wanted him to do for
me. I thought of sketching or showing him a snapshot of what I wanted. Anyway,
I relied on words. Awfully, my words failed at description, at successfully
substituting the sketch or the snapshot. I struggled with descriptive words as
I resorted to gestures and voice modulation. Maybe he understood me. Maybe he
didn’t. I wouldn’t know. However, I left there feeling unfulfilled. I didn’t
used words well. I could have done better. Some of the books I have been
reading lately are seriously starved, lifeless and unable to communicate. Just like
my encounter with the carpenter. It is Updike who says “but one can’t give more than he has received…” (see “Burn This Book” edited by Toni Morrison). So who says the many books I have
been reading recently didn’t affect my carpenter’s experience? And who says they
have? *winks*
My recent readings failed to draw
me into their worlds. Talking about them, lukewarmness would be a compliment. And
that’s the simple reason I have been shying away from reviewing them. I may bellyache
if I do, which is as bad as just ranting. I want to review objectively. Anything
totally rubbish is not just worth my time, my words, this space, the awareness,
the readership. So, I have been mute for some time until now. Perhaps because African
Roar 2013 is an anthology of short stories. And not all stories in an anthology
can be as all bad, some will still be well worth talking about.
I have been following African
Roar since its inception in 2010. Read my previous comments here, here and
here. I have always found the short story genre interesting. Like living, it’s
in mixes of its interesting own. It could sometimes be misshapen but not entirely
shapeless. I believe the short story is the proper depiction of life in its
multi narratives. That is also the reason why I see more tangibility in Alice’s
short stories than Morrison’s novels (or sometimes novellas). They both are
feministic though and true to their engagements but one moves me closer to life
than the other. I love short narratives, they cannot afford pretense. The space
is little. They come to tell life better without as much dithering. When they
dither, they fail. When they do, it’s clear to all. I think the allure of the
short story influences what Oyebanji
Ayodele has attributed to its fleeting nature.
In 2010 I reviewed African
Roar as speaking with the
synergy that tells of the past, present and continuing-present. In 2011, it
guides you through the labyrinth of issues its writers are concerned with. Last
year, it
portrays bleak situations but moving all the same. So, this year, when I say
it is as good as some parts are also lost on you, know I am frank. No word minced. African
Roar 2013 is better enjoyed at its half. That is the way I see it. In African
Roar 2013, the themes are of the dire needs for companionship, of social
battles for a better living, of tortuous fates, of insensitive paternity and of
evil catching up with the doer. These mixes are interesting. You should read
this year’s anthology, there are a lot going on in it.
Of Companionship:
Alison Bwalya's
“Home”
connects identity with pains, with death, with reinvention; the reinvention
that makes us half human and half un-human. Being un-human is worse than being
a beast. We are memories. We collect them and they define us. We slip on them
and we become the un-us, the new 'us' opposite to what our loved ones know, the
ones they can't relate with. We slowly kill ourselves and others because we have lost some memories to gain more. We think of
home and know not where it is; here or there. Fungisai is reinvented. Katherine
is memory. Neville is killed; he is un-him, he is un-past and Katherine is
gone. Forever. And Fungisai is reinvented. Immediately.
Just how far will you bear it
before you yank his penis off? In Lydia Matata’s “Cut it Off” we see the
different abuses that could push a woman to such end. The abuses that could make a woman suddenly turn to
what makes her lover male and slices it off. This story stages a montage of a
phone-in show as listeners call in to comment on a woman who has recently cut
her husband’s off. It is a story of the abused gaining public confidence from a
woman’s bold step. This is one of the stories that you may have to read twice
to get. You are half into the story before you know how one conversation is
different from the other. So many are talking and the paragraphing is poor. The
writer fails at dialogue separation. And that muddles the characters together. It
is so noisy in there.
Of Social Battles for a Better Living:
There could be only one main
reason why Khaled is leaving Bunkpurugu, Hassan and Grandmamma behind. Khaled’s
journey to Accra is not only of his own salvation. It is of others’ too. For
one reason though, it is of Hassan’s salvation from the many Khaled-esque
troubles. Read Aba Amissah Asiboni’s “Salvation in Odd Places”.
Ola Nubi’s “Green Eyes and an Old Photo” graces
my reading. Oyedeji wants a better life abroad. He goes to England studying and
working. As his family’s burdens weigh on him, he also struggles with racism. There
is black hatred everywhere. He seeks a better life and finds Sandra. He later
has Sarah and his trauma becomes a loveable memory.
Of Insensitive Paternity and Tortuous Fates:
Bryan Bwesigye’s “Through
the Same Gate” interests me. His is of a good story telling and one of
the reasons you should read this anthology. The flashback is well laid and you are not
lost. The narrator is called all sorts. His great tribulation is his
stepmother, Annette. He bears it well and gets inured to it. That he lives with
his father does not bring reprieve. With his tears also comes the relief he
needs from his bottled up emotion.
It is fate that separates Samira
from Njeri and Atenio, her childhood friends. In their infantile convenience, they
had built colourful future together. Abdiqani Hassan’s “The Faces of Fates” explores
the irony of their separation. But more ironical is the way they meet later
again. Life could be that funny.
****
African Roar keeps coming every year to showcase our writings. We should
appreciate this. It isn’t everywhere you come across a medium as this which is
committed to giving voices to relatively unknown writers. African Roar promotes us, our stories.
- Follow me on Twitter @omotayome
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