Sheroes on the Edges of Consciousness (II)
Mother Story Not my father, but my mother, is a story teller. She is at the epicenter of my narrative inclination. Her masterful exaggeration taught me that the narrator must sell a story to an audience — that you have to do…
Sheroes on the Edges of Consciousness (1)
Free. Nina Simone wears an enchanting and endearing detachment on her face. The kind worn by people who have seen a land flowing with milk and honey. Then she smiles, raises her hands. The video closes in on her face…
Everywhere in Lagos
Lagos, the shining and perishable dream itself. Our bodies tattooed with scars of survival, every one of us trading our narratives of killability, every time we meet menace. It’s a hustle, or business-like nonchalance; it’s ambition or plain listlessness.
Discovering Swartz: A personal tribute
I live in Nigeria, but Aaron Swartz’s death holds a deep meaning for me. His short life. His suicide. Being a commons man. Being a programmer by profession and an activist by calling. There are many of us around the world who won’t understand why…
Key Challenges of the Nigerian Book Sector
Part of my work this week has revolved around reading and researching the problems of the Nigerian book/publishing industry. Today I completed a list of questions/posers (included in a brief for an event my firm is working on) which I…
Bakassi: The World’s Unwashed Backside
Fathers make decisions bordering on causes, infantile and asinine, on behalf of their progenies. It becomes doubly asinine when said progenies are middle-aged and veritable providers for progenies of their own. That being said, fathers are a necessity. I must warn you, before this work goes any further, that my analogies after you have eaten of the meat of this piece shall be shown for what they are: crude and, in the words of agriculturalists, ‘cobs with rust’.
Victor Ehikhamenor – Ways of Seeing
Victor Ehikhamenor defies stereotype – a master at multi-tasking and multi-thinking and multi-creativity. He has produced, to critical acclaim, short stories, photographs, illustrations and paintings. He “needs no introduction†in the Nigerian art scene, as YNaija pointed out.
Get Inside, Identify
My friend, a medical doctor, and namesake, Emmanuel Okeleji, has just launched Insidify, a “peerless job meta-search engine with deep social media integration.” Insidify aggregates thousands of job openings from hundreds of sources — jobsites, company career pages, newspapers etc…
The inevitable direction of my life
One of my very girl-best friends calls me and after we exchange a string of sentences, she asks me, “are you happy, Emmanuel?” I respond without thinking, “yes.” I respond without thinking. She asks me if I am happy, and…
Obodo 9ja
Guest post by Adebiyi Olusolape* I read Achebe’s piece in the Grauniad. The piece says nothing about his latest book, but it says a lot about Nigeria. What follows are some of my prejudices and misconceptions, stated in response to statements culled from…
Rom Isichei – A Way of Seeing
Today, while working with my new boss Victor Ehikhamenor, I stumbled on an amazing Nigerian visual artist, Rom Isichei. Accoridng to his website, he was born in Asaba, Delta state, Nigeria, on the 8th of September, 1966. Between 1984–1989, he was a student of Yaba college of technology, Lagos, where he obtained both ordinary and higher national diploma in fine arts, (specialising in painting). Seven years after graduation, Rom criss-crossed three advertising agencies in various management positions before finally channelling his energy into full time studio work since 1997. He has exhibited widely, both within and outside Nigeria. He lives and works in Lagos, Nigeria. He was recently involved in a Chelsea College of Art and Design exhibition. Reading his artist statement for the exhibition, I picked the following, quoting him directly in most cases: I develop new ways to expound my visual viewpoints. The human form inspires me I probe the synthesis of human actions in close proximity to their immediate milieu. I engage my audience in an intimate dialogue My styles and themes has always been elastic and organic I reconstruct found objects layered with absurdities and myth into new conceptual realities, and a visual language that resonates with the style of the avant-garde. My Art are my self-portraits, frozen in time. You can view some of his work on his website. Read more about my side-project Afropicking
Teju Cole’s 20+ Rules On Writing
Eight Letters to a Young Writer evolved as a fictional exercise addressed by Teju Cole to an imaginary young Nigerian writer. With the encouragement of Molara Wood, the editor of the series, Cole tried to move from discussions of simple…
Invisible Borders: Emeka Okereke in conversation with Emmanuel Iduma
From Invisible Borders A conversation between Emeka Okereke, founder and Artistic Director of Invisible Borders Trans-African Photographers’ Organization, and Emmanuel Iduma, Nigerian author and writer. The conversation took place in Libreville, Gabon where Okereke and Iduma are participating in a road trip….
A New Nigerian Literary Order
I will argue for a new Nigerian literary order. Suppose we call this ‘neo-literariness’, for want of a better word, and because in hyphenation a word acquires two identities. So, neo-literariness is the word to use for a generation of writers…
Rotimi Babatunde: Interesting Reads
I am learning Rotimi Babatunde. Here are interesting interviews he has granted, which I have found very interesting: PEN America Nigerians Talk Books Live SA And then, Tade Ipadeola, President of PEN Nigeria, wrote an interesting essay bothering on the accusation against…
From Oil City to Book Central!
My friend, Richard Ali, has also written about Port Harcourt as the World Book Capital City 2014. I consider his thoughts refined, and even apposite. Here is an excerpt: The sense of achievement in this win is seen at the…
Port Harcourt: An Outpost City
My short essay on the successful bid for Port Harcourt as the World Book Capital for 2014 by the Rainbow Book Club appears in YNaija. Here’s a short excerpt: “Port Harcourt as the World Book Capital of 2014 will thrust…
The Parameters of Longing
I will argue for a new literary order. Suppose we call this ‘neo-literariness’, for want of a better word, and because in hyphenation a word acquires two identities. So, neo-literariness is the word to use for a generation of writers…
3bute.com adapts Caine Prize 2012 Shortlisted Stories
The 2012 winner of the of the £10,000 Caine Prize, Africa’s leading literary prize, will be announced at a celebratory dinner at the Bodleian Library, Oxford, on Monday 2 July. To promote the new crop of young writers, 3bute.com in collab…
On Maiwada’s Foray in Plagiarism
The problem is not that Ahmed Maiwada has complained of the similarities in ‘Bombay’s Republic’ and ‘Burma Boy.’ It is the manner in which he has done so — choosing to make a hurried conclusion before a logical argument, and…