Grace Ogot whetted my appetite for African texts

I first ‘met’ Grace Ogot through her anthology of short stories, Land Without Thunder, when I was just 13 years old.

I do not remember where I got that book from but I loved how she wrote it.

At the time, I was on Enid Blyton’s  Famous Five and Francine Pascal’s Sweet Valley High series and Permanent High (Mills & Boon), with my only interaction with African writing being the class textbook, Read with Us, which I read when I was seven.

One of the stories by Grace,  'Tekayo', stood out for me.

I remember the story like it was yesterday. Never mind that I first read it 18 years ago.

Tekayo, the main character in the story,  was accompanied by his son Opija, when he saw an eagle flying around with a piece of meat.

It was a piece of liver, still dripping with blood. He wanted to throw it away but decided otherwise. He roasted it. It was the best-tasting meat he had ever eaten.

After this incident, Tekayo went on a mission to relive this taste, killing one wild animal after another with disappointing results.

He stopped the hunt after his wife died, but stayed at home to look after his grandchildren as younger members of the family went to till the land.

The craving for the sweet liver came to him again. It overpowered him to the extent of him killing his grandchildren and extracting their livers.

This was the taste that had his taste buds singing in joy. He killed his grandchildren one after the other, until the day he was discovered.

MORE POSSIBILITIES

I remember what he said as his son dragged him away: “Atimo ang’o? Atimo ang’o?” (What have I done?) Tekayo eventually committed suicide.

I remember reading and re-reading the story. I remember retelling the story to my younger and older sisters. My copy got dog-eared, worn out.

I did not understand how human beings could be so cruel, and my 13-year-old heart bled for the children.

I ‘met’ Grace again in my second year of study at university. I was all of 23 years.

Ten years later and the beauty of the story was still ingrained in my memory.

It was a class reader at the time when we were studying East African Literature.

As a 13-year-old girl, Tekayo, to me, was just an ogre but I looked at him differently at 23.

I considered the possibility that Tekayo may not have been an ogre, after all, but a paedophile.

That what he was stealing from the children may not have been their liver after all but their innocence.

That is how I ‘met’ Grace Ogot. She whetted my appetite for African literature in a way no other author ever has.

I later dabbled in short story writing for a while because I assured myself that if I could write even one story as good as Tekayo, then I would be home free as a writer to reckon with.

These are the memories of Grace Ogot that I will be carrying forward.

Rest in Peace Grace Ogot!

FAITH ONEYA

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Gem from Gem was also Kanu sychophant

I don’t know whether it is Kenyan or African culture or human nature, in general, that whenever someone passes on, what follows from friends and foes alike is glowing tribute.

This was the case when the March 21 edition of the Saturday Nation dedicated several pages for Kenyan literary giants to say a word about their departed colleague, Grace Ogot.

All and sundry— surprisingly including Ngugi wa Thiong’o — heaped  praise on her as “ a gracious lady” “Undying culturalist”, among many other plaudits.

Not me.  I will always remember Grace Ogot as a Kanu sycophant, who cheered on as the Moi dictatorship mutilated our country and squeezed us dry when she was an Assistant minister. 

Grace Ogot shall remain in my memory as a griot and court poet, who once rose on the floor of the House to congratulate the President for detaining heroes of multi-partyism Kenneth Matiba and Charles Rubia, whom she described as the “two hyenas who keep following each other like animals on heat”.

She joins Joseph Kamotho, Kuria Kanyingi, Sharif Nassir, Mulu Mutisya  and others, who were in Kanu during those dark days. They all remain imprinted in my roll of shame.

There is no way her death will sway me to compare her with other heroes and heroines of the academia like Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Micere Githae Mugo, Prof Edward Oyugi, Katana Mkangi and Ali Mazrui, who wrote our history in tears and blood.

The tragedy of our history is that it is always distorted by the elite to discard our heroes while heaping undeserving accolades on our villains.

Fare thee well mama.  Anything to me, yes, but a heroine of democracy, No!

KIARIE RANJI

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Women should learn from departed author

I am happy to  pay my tribute to the departed woman of African letters, Grace Ogot, who was talented in many respects.

I remember her mostly because of her short story Tekayo that I read and even wrote an exam about.

Tekayo was among the short stories on which I was required to answer questions in my Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education exam in 2005.

The story is about a character called Tekayo, an old man who developed a big appetite for human liver after roasting and eating a piece of meat an eagle had been carrying.

This led Tekayo to embark on a barren hunt for the animal from which the eagle’s liver came.

He killed and slaughtered many but none of their livers matched the taste of the one he had snatched from the bird.

Eventually he ended up killing one of his grandchildren and eating the liver — ironically finding an answer to the puzzle.

Beyond the  above, Ogot performed exemplarily  while working as a columnist, author, broadcaster and even as a nurse.

I would not have known her had I not read Tekayo, a story that is featured in Encounters from Africa, an Anthology of Short Stories, which was once a set book.

She also wrote other books like Promised Land, The Rain Came, The White Veil and Karatina being her short stories.

But one of her masterpieces was Land Without Thunder that revolved around Luoland during the pre-colonial period.

And as Grace Ogot moves to the land without thunder, young and budding women should be greatly inspired that in spite of limitations, one can get to her destiny. Gender is not a limiting factor.

DENNIS SINYO

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Don’t be held back by fear of errors, they only make you a better writer

To err is human. To identify and correct an error is to become better. To aspire after perfection is to have a truly healthy ambition.

In Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s piece, I’ve lost my literary sister, Kenya has lost a literary icon’ (Saturday Nation, March 21), it is indicated that Grace Ogot’s novel Miaha was translated into English as The Strange Woman.

The translation actually is entitled The Strange Bride. Also, the article’s 13th paragraph reads, in part: …for the launch of the my Gikuyu language novel… (Notice the misplaced definite article after the preposition ‘of’.)

In the same edition, Philip Ochieng’s ‘The happiness of others does not concern us’ has ‘sub-ediitor’ in its seventh paragraph. (Notice the double ‘i’.) Collins Odhiambo’s (my own) ‘Any writer among the achievers?’ has KSCE in its opening paragraph.

Now, any instance of obvious error is like that small stone in the nicely cooked rice. Crushing such a stone while chewing does not only hurt; it makes one want to empty the mouth of all that semi-chewed stuff, at once.

Those of us who have written quite a bit for the public know that sometimes something unwelcome will ensconce itself somewhere in our text. Sometimes the error is ours, originally, such as the name Anaya, which I once wrote correctly in the opening paragraph but as Ayana a number of lines down that particular piece.

There is quite a handful to learn from all this. That “small stone in the rice” hurts the author much more than it does anyone else metaphorically masticating the piece.

An original (the author’s own) error is, therefore, the one thing a writer must strive, strain the eyes, to arrest and correct before submission.

A public piece of writing, such as this one, is actually a product of many hands and minds. There would be no newspaper at all if what every contributor submitted were to be carried exactly as such, without the special preparation. Thus, it is normal to encounter one or two new things in the final product. Often, the newness serves a positive purpose. In certain cases, unfortunately, complications arise.

A mistake actually has a way of causing one to work more and much better than before. The motivating factor here is the burden to demonstrate that an instance of error is not reflective of sloppiness or wanting personal capacity. This applies even outside of writing.

In a nutshell, let fear of errors not make you hesitant to take part or to play your assigned role in any endeavour. 

COLLINS ODHIAMBO

The writer is the president of Alyp Writers Organisation and author of ‘The Bell Ringer’ and ‘Miss Pheromone’.

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‘Tekayos’ have become too many 

Literary icon Grace Ogot is gone, but the message in her many works continues to ring a loud bell.

Take, for instance, her short story Tekayo. In the easy-read, Tekayo ate a very tasty liver that he grabbed from a low-flying eagle.

What was to follow was a macabre penchant in the herder that pushed him into killing his own grandchildren.

It is so sad that we have many Tekayos in our midst.  Newspapers are awash with nasty stories of miscreants, who commit unimaginable sins against children.

They range from greedy private developers who take away school playgrounds. Others mismanage children’s education. Another lot runs down hospitals, leaving sick children to suffer, while others’ misdeeds have left maternity facilities in a sorry state.

The less said of the fathers who defile their own flesh and blood, the better. Fare thee well the gem from Gem!

NICHOLAS CHERUIYOT 

Cheruiyot is a Bomet-based freelance journalist.