African Writers in the Popular American Conscience

The grand man of African literature, the genteel and erudite Chinua Achebe was the first exposure of many Americans to the rich legacy of African literature. Achebe’s Things Fall Apart was requisite reading and often the lone title by an African writer on the syllabus of college World Literature 101 courses. After Things Fall a Part the serious and attentive reader’s appetite was sufficiently whetted; making it perfectly okay for future birthday and Christmas gifts to consist exclusively of other Achebe works, e.g. Arrow of God, Man of the People, No Longer at Ease and Anthills of the Savannah.

 

The writing and literary output by African writers received some intellectual credibility as a result Aime Cesaire’s 1930s praxis of Negritude; the Marxist polemics of Franz Fanon and later viability via Black Arts patriarchs Amiri Baraka and Haki Madhubuti. Although there were no definite organized actions, to bring African literature to the forefront of the Western literary canon, intermittent mentions in books and essays by Madhubuti (formerly Don S. Lee) directed young would be revolutionaries to the writings of African writers such as Ayi Kwei Armah, Chinua Achebe and Ngugi wa Thiongo.

 

Following my undergraduate studies, during a stint organizing youth activities in Zimbabwe, under the auspices of the United Method Church’s General Board of Global Ministries, I came face to face with Ghanaian literary giant Ama Ata Aidoo strolling down the streets of Harare. I had seen her face often enough on the outside back cover of her books to recognize her, but, I had no idea as to why she would be residing in Southern Africa—away from the cuisine, sights, sounds and smells that make Ghana…well Ghana. During that time Zimbabwe was a progressive place full of open-minded, socially progressive people.

 

After following her closely down Harare’s wide boulevards, I finally gathered the nerve and resolve to approach her and to say: “Hi Ms. Aidoo. I’m a big fan of your writing, what brings you to Harare?” Her countenance and welcoming smile spoke volumes as she countered my query with: “Oh, thank you. I am here with my daughter to focus on my writing.” Ms. Aidoo was a well-traveled woman by this time; her daughter was more American than the average American, and she had a better understanding of the American educational system than me—someone who had been thoroughly indoctrinated and influenced by its tenets.

 

Being next door neighbors to friends that frequently hosted African National Congress comrades in exile, as well as being a voracious reader and true believer of Somara Machel and Robert Mugabe’s polemical “Chimurenga” rhetoric, I proudly proclaimed to Ms. Aidoo the shortcomings of America’s capitalistic pedagogy. “Yes, yes…I see.” Then she reminded me that one of the American system benefits were freedom of expression, ideas and opinion in the non-science areas. These points were well taken and stored in the regions of my memory, that I vowed to reconstitute, when numerous Zimbabwean acquaintances were intent on dogmatically evoking ZANU-PF Mugabe-ism over bottles of Castle beer.

 

The other writer that further heightened my senses and awareness of African literature was the outspoken and eloquent Nigerian Wole Soyinka. I had read Soyinka’s satirical plays and essays that taunted, prodded and questioned everything from corrupt governance on the African continent to the “brain drain” that exported African professional know how and intelligence to Europe and the United States.

 

A colleague and good friend of Soyinka’s, linguist Olasope Oyelaran knew Soyinka from their days on the faculty at the University of Ife in Nigeria. Oyelaran was on the faculty at Winston-Salem State University and somehow managed to convince cross-town Wake Forest University (the school responsible for Soyinka’s visit to Winston-Salem in 1999) and Soyinka of the need to pay a visit to WSSU. I was not very hopeful that many of the students had heard or read Soyinka’s work. Needless to say, I was shocked when I heard one of Oyelaran’s English department peers admit that he had never heard of Soyinka: “Who is that?” This fellow was not the least embarrassed. Never mind that Soyinka was awarded the prestigious Nobel Laureate in Literature in 1986. For the sake of preserving his credibility as an academic, I told him not to mention this aforementioned daftness out of doors or in any remote, quiet setting for that matter.

 

When Soyinka settled into the heart of his message—amidst a backdrop of talkative, nodding, dozing students—I and other faculty/staff members that had been inspired by his genius, became almost giddy with a particular sort of intellectual delight. When he peered over his glasses and began speaking in his sonorous tenor, the controversy making the rounds in barbershops, churches, street corners and in the popular press centered on a word—niggardly. A D.C. city government official David Howard (who happens to be white) resigned from his post after he was said to have offended two colleagues (who happened to be black) by saying he would have to be niggardly with his agency’s budget. Of course the word, though not popularly used in everyday American English, has no racial connotation but means miserly or stingy. Soyinka said that the very fact that a public official resigned due to the use of the word niggardly was “terrorism by the ignorant, intellectual abdication by the knowledgeable”. He later reminded the gathered audience that Chaucer uses the term in his Canterbury Tales. Bravo Wole! Bravo Soyinko!

 

The Vanity Fair July 2007 special issue on Africa contains a wonderful article on African writers, and more specifically a new breed of young African writers, entitled The Continental Shelf. A few of the older writers mentioned by authors Elissa Schapel and Rob Spillman are Achebe, Nurrudin Farah, wa Thiongo, Nadine Gordimer and Soyinka. Some of the young lions on the African literary scene these days are Nigerian, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie; Ugandan, Dorren Baingana; Sierra Leonean, Aminata Forna and Nigerian, Helon Habila. Adichie has taken the book industry by storm and is very popular in the American and European markets. Adichie’s moving Purple Hibiscus won the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for First Book in 2003. Her most recent tome Half of a Yellow Sun takes the reader back to Nigeria’s Biafran War and may very well entrance younger, hip hop generation, non reading youth to consider reading and buying books by African writers. Maybe…hopefully that will occur.

 

 

Libraries, Literature and the New Generation of Readers

In his 1993 book What Black People Should Do Now deceased author/journalist Ralph Wiley includes a chapter entitled “Why Black People Don’t Buy Books”. Wiley’s chapter title, undoubtedly, is a reference to the often said phrase: “If you want to hide something from a black person put it in a book!” and the once-believed notion within the mainstream publishing industry that African Americans do not read. Wiley said that these editor’s pronouncements left him confused because all of the “black people he knew and kept up with over the years read books by the pound.”

Somewhere shortly after the aforementioned quote, Wiley states the most significant caveat of the essay: “Of course it depends on what you’re (the publishing industry) selling.” Mind you that Wiley’s referenced association to refute the notion that African Americans do not read books in quantifiable numbers was Terry McMillan’s http://www.terrymcmillan.com/mcmillan.html mega-hit Waiting to Exhale, which sold in excess of 700,000 copies.

According to Philadelphia Weekly reporter Kia Gregory in 2004 African Americans read $257 million dollars worth of urban fiction, e.g. ghetto fiction, a type of modern day pulp fiction peopled with unsavory pimps, crack heads and prostitutes, and erstwhile conniving, intelligent hustlers, thugs, drug dealers, crooks and thieves. The urban literature genre has been such a financial boon for the slumping, post-internet publishing industry that high brow publishers such as Kennsington, Simon & Schuster and St. Martins have developed urban fiction imprints.

 

These actions in and of themselves, are letting self-proclaimed literary purists and erudite bibliophiles in on a little secret—namely that the publishing industry is interested in the bottom-line. The bottom-line and cold hard cash are the mantra of the publishing industry these days. Instead of the former imprisoned crooks, streetwise hustlers and self-publishing first time writers making all the money off of their personal experiences, the Industry took a wise and strategic, “If you can’t beat em’ join em’ approach.”

 

Writing in the July 15, 2006, Library Journal, David Wright pointedly proclaims in the first sentence: “One of the hottest literary phenomena of recent years has been the explosion of what has been variously termed hip-hop, street, or urban fiction.” Wright also goes on to say that librarians and libraries are also hesitant to purchase the books due to discomfort with the genre and the tendency for the popular books to be stolen from the shelves—not a particularly good thing if the library is not a fiscally robust one.

 

The genre, which at times is not considered a well written one, has advocates and critics on both sides of the debate. Atria books (an imprint of Simon & Schuster) editor Malaika Adero, a self-professed proponent of the genre, admits “calling the books literature may be a bit of a stretch.” But this wildly popular literature is being purchased by a demographic that is supposed to be fearful of books; thus, it will be marketed and promoted as though it were written by James Michener, Toni Morrison or any other celebrated author.

 

Is it disingenuous for the publishing cabal to promote and give book deals to urban fiction authors with names like Jihad, Zane and Joy but barely whisper the names of icons such as Ishmael Reed and Charles Johnson? I do not have a definitive answer, however, some publishing industry spokesmen tend to mouth the Mafia hit man phrase quite frequently: “Its nothin’ personal its just business.”

Or consider the trend of commercial bookstore giants like Borders Books to carry rows of urban fiction titles in their African American section but not carry Z.Z. Packer, Alice Walker, John Edgar Wideman or Octavia Butler. Interestingly enough, I have often had a tough time locating at least three titles by James Baldwin at any of the large commercial bookstores. Unfortunately, for the culturally ignorant or unread browsing the shelves at Barnes & Noble or Borders, the historically vast range of African American has been defined by what they see—namely urban fiction.

Today the grandest celebratory recognition of African American literary achievement is the Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards. These legacy awards are given each year by the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation http://www.hurston-wright.org/. The 2006 winners in the fiction literature category were Clyde Ford (The Long Mile: The Shango Mysteries) http://www.clydeford.com/website/index.php, Nancy Rawles (My Jim: A Novel) http://www.nancyrawles.net/ and Denise Nicholas (Freshwater Road) http://www.nathanielturner.com/freshwaterroad.htm . But in all likelihood, their names are less-known in black America’s Hoods,’ than say Vickie Stringer http://www.triplecrownpublications.com/, Zane http://authors.aalbc.com/zane.htm, Omar Tyree http://www.omartyree.com/ or Teri Woods http://www.teriwoodspublishing.com/

I remember conducting a radio interview with the science fiction writer Octavia Butler http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octavia_Butler twenty years ago, and asking her why the cover art for the hardback edition of Dawn, a book heavily populated by genetically African characters, had an Anglo-American character on the front. At the time I thought Ms. Butler had a great deal of autonomy over her works. She responded that she had no control over what went on the cover of the book. But compare this with the shiny urban fiction book covers that sport provocative, scantily clad, black men and women.

Literacy advocates and librarians point out that these books bring a love of reading to the masses. If he were alive the Indian library progenitor (considered to be the father of modern library science) S.R. Ranganathan would probably weigh in on the debate by quoting the third of his famous five laws http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_laws_of_library_science of library science: Every book its reader. Should academic libraries, or public libraries for that matter, include urban fiction in their holdings? Maybe they have their place if library professionals consider Ranganathan’s third law.

 

It is strictly a personal choice. I never thought graphic novels, e.g. flashy, colorful comic books, would be used in college classroom settings but they are now a part of the required reading list for courses at colleges across the United States, Japan and Europe. For many people there is no gray area when it comes to urban fiction; either you like it or hate it.

 

The aforementioned literary dichotomy is very much like the one between the Kenny G. Smooth Jazz fans and the traditional jazz adherents that love Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gilespie and Charlie Parker. I prefer the traditional variety myself but the wispy, paper- thin melodies of Smooth Jazz, did take the idiom out of the smoky clubs and into the mainstream where there is greater exposure and acceptance. Or look at the chaotic creativity that ensued when a younger generation of jazz men such as Dizzy Gillespie put their stamp on big band jazz, and developed the rambunctious style later known as Be-Bop.

 

Most evolutionary artistic trends are a part of humanity’s cultural DNA and will continually buck all efforts to remain stagnant. All performing and visual art forms—like businesses and the African American church—have a starting point from somewhere, were influenced by some external or internal force, and eventually die or transmute into something else.

 

Maybe the new literary icons will take a page from the book of Hip Hop rappers and MCs. These musical poets frequently pay homage to old school musicians and seemingly have no problems trotting the “Old Skool” artist out on the stage to perform with them. George Clinton http://www.georgeclinton.com/ has literally had his legacy, career and bank account renewed thanks to the efforts of Rappers that sample his music from the 1970s and 80s.

However, I believe there is the question of quality that we must look at, which tends to be pushed to the back whenever critics begin to contextualize and scrutinize the impact of American popular culture on all artistic and literary forms. There is good sounding, expertly played music and there is horrible sounding and poorly played music. The same goes for literature, although, the average person may not be as discerning or objective about what they are reading.

At the end of the day, maybe there is no need to compare Baldwin to Zane or Angelou to Woods. Each author and book has its own reader. However, chronological time will ultimately be the great judge and decide urban fiction’s fate in the literary cannon.