Standa: I still speak for the bush

If you were to take a literal reading of it, you might be a tad fearful to meet the author of a poem titled I Speak for the Bush.

With your heart beating hard, you might imagine that you will encounter a barefoot, animal-skin clad, phlegm expectorating, rattle shaking man, his ‘Africanness’ waved as a card to excuse the purveyance of all things boorish and preposterous.

But Prof Everett Maraka Standa is anything but ‘bush’.

Soft spoken, self-effacing, diplomatic and modest, your eyes widen at the constancy with which he apologises when his phone goes off mid-interview.

In a country where public officials have a reputation for being swashbuckling and haughty, this former university vice-chancellor gives humble a new meaning.

The room we sit in at Moi University’s Nairobi offices in The Bazaar has a 17th century baroque air, purple velvet-lined walls nestling above dark wooden panes.

It seems to be taking a decidedly non-aligned position on this debate between traditional African values and Westernised ‘development’, which the professor’s literary works famously enunciate.

“Many of the poems were written a long time ago, in the late 1960s when I was a student at the University of Nairobi,” Standa says.

Hub for literary who’s-who

He reminisces on his time there, in an age when it was akin to a hub for the literary who’s-who.

“We used to have Paa ya Paa (gallery) for literary discussions.

I wrote a poem and read it there and it sounded like something Tabaan Lo Liyong had read elsewhere by a 17th century Englishman.

Tabaan said ‘We don’t allow cheating here.’

I got annoyed and threw my papers at him and told him that these were just my thoughts.”

Another of Standa’s lecturers, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, was nevertheless encouraging of his efforts and included his poetry in one journal.

“Ngugi encouraged me with my first poems.

I think he appreciated the efforts I was making. He was my lecturer and my friend; he invited me to his house a couple of times.”

Prof Standa did a BA in English before he left for the US, where he pursued a Master’s in Education and a PhD in communication at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Prior to his leaving, he had, nevertheless, been busy on the literary scene.

“The late Kitheka of KIMC and I ran programmes on poetry on VoK while I was still at university.”

I Speak for the Bush, written in 1967 and first published in 1968, is a classic for a generation of Kenyans.

It is also part of a little known anthology of Prof Standa’s works, Shades of Life (published in 1994), a collection of poems of varied themes.

These poems are not coldly intellectual. As you might imagine from his titles, they have heart and soul.

They openly lay bare life’s puzzles and contradictions in a simple easy-to-read style.

Standa candidly explores love and marriage.

Mother Nature calls for an open embrace of sexuality away from its hypocritical shroud; Wedding Eve reveals the calculations and machinations couples weighing each other for marriage engage in.

That Other Life is a nostalgic remembrance of the motions of early passion and the eventual falling out of love and distaste at each other, which a couple goes through.

Meanwhile, Something Terrible has Happened speaks of the gradual crumbling of a marriage due to the two spouses living for different ideals — one for money and prestige, the other for family ties and honesty.

Change, Cousin and Elections Afterthought meanwhile, capture the tribal feeling.

The Tribal Kenyan gives a chilling premonition of the future: We live in the same land/ Yet we dream against each other/Preparing for a future war/Between yours and mine.

The power of Standa’s rendering is not in the style but in the attitude and tone.

Rather than being accusatory, it is gentle, compassionate and understanding, recognising the bigger picture of the motivations that cause people to act evil in the name of religion, tribe and other motivators.

Apart from the anthology, Standa’s poetry has been published in other collections worldwide, in different languages including French, Spanish and Chinese. It has brought him fame, but it has also led to humorous outcomes.

“Because of the subjects I choose, an American professor who had read my poetry was surprised to meet me. When I told her that I was Everett Standa, she said, “That’s interesting, I thought you were a woman!’.”

Born in Mahanga village, Webuye, in Bungoma County in 1945, Standa attended Sipala Primary School, and Friends School, Kamusinga.

He spent his early academic career at the University of Nairobi, Moi University and Masinde Muliro University, gradually leaving teaching to get into administration. He was appointed Vice-Chancellor of Kenyatta University, where he served from 2003 to 2006.

What was it like being a VC? “It was interesting, exciting one would say.

In Kakamega, where I had also been in administration, I had been dealing with a much smaller group.”

Prof Standa recounts with humour how his poetry, nevertheless, shadowed him at Kenyatta University, saving the day at troubled times.

“When I would enter the hall to address students, they would start chanting a line from ‘Wedding Eve’ — should I, should I not.

I would recite the poem and it would calm them down when tensions were high. They would always applaud after.”

Perhaps 100 years from today, poets might strive to claim that it was Prof Standa’s poetry that led to Kenyatta University being closed only once for rioting in his tenure, at a time of rowdy student politics.

Following his stint as VC, Standa joined the Commission for Higher Education, where he served as CEO and commission secretary for six years, leaving in 2013.

“We tried to give support and encouragement to stakeholders who wanted to set up new universities.

This was with the view that Kenyans were spending a lot of money on university education abroad and opportunities locally needed to be expanded.”

The professor is optimistic about the current state of universities.

“I think universities have responded well through common efforts in quality assurance standards.

The current emphasis is on ensuring these are raised and that there is relevance in the educational programmes.”

Having served time as an administrator, he is now back to teaching at his former station at Moi University.

Was it hard to transition after a relatively busy lifestyle?

He sits back quietly. “It is different. I was used to meeting people, now I don’t; I mostly have an empty office.

I also have new colleagues here from the time I left and I have had to start looking for books again. But it is exciting.”

Literary interests

One of the things he is glad about is the opportunity to return to his literary interests as his administrative work had cut the flow of his writing.

“I found that my job would suffer if I did too much writing then. But now that I am out, I will slowly get back to doing more of it.”

In this instance, while the administrative world of higher education may be grieving his loss, literature and philosophy lovers can rub their hands in anticipation of new poetic gems.

Does he still speak for the Bush? He laughs.

“In theory yes, I am still sympathetic to the plight of the poor, which is why I talk about developmental issues.”

Asking questions on how to uphold traditional values that upheld humanity against the onslaught of the cold impersonality of Western modernisation, the questions asked in I Speak for the Bush are still relevant.

This is especially at a time of fast GDP growth and the concomitant rising of inequalities in the continent.

Questions such as: But my friend, why do men/ With crippled legs, lifeless eyes,/ Wooden legs, empty stomachs/ Wonder about the streets/ Of this civilised world?

Almost 50 years later, the values of the bush have not entirely gone out of style.

Prof Everett Standa notes, “It is still the poem everybody asks about.”