READERS' CORNER: Writers should help awaken our national consciousness

Someone wants Kwani? Trust, a regional publisher and distributor of contemporary literature, founded in 2003 by Kenyan writer Binyavanga Wainaina, probed. PHOTO| FILE| NATION MEDIA GROUP

Writers should help awaken our national consciousness

By Nobert Oluoch Ndisio

Someone wants Kwani? Trust, a regional publisher and distributor of contemporary literature, founded in 2003 by Kenyan writer Binyavanga Wainaina, probed. Reason? He feels that the texts published by the trust give a distorted and sloppy account of the Kenyan national history.

With a liberal flow of thought, writer and Kenyatta University literature don Abenea Ndago, in his article published in AfricanWriter.com on September 19, 2016, argues his case against Kwani? Trust. He accuses the trust of using literature as a vehicle for promoting tribal stereotypes, gossips and myths and elevating one Kenyan community above the rest. He is convinced that Binyavanga is a protégé of Ngugi wa Thiong’o and has, consciously or not, bought the half truth attributing the struggle for our independence from the yoke of colonialism solely to the efforts of the Mau Mau that features prominently in his writings.

He reminds his audience of the old view of many critics that Mau Mau movement is so dear a subject to Ngugi that without it, Ngugi the prolific writer would be non-existent. He, however, finds it fallacious for Ngugi to restrict the attainment of Kenya’s independence to the sacrifices made by the Mau Mau members. It’s a national lie, he points out, to ignore the contributions of trade unionists, the civil society and the Asian and European moderates.

The long and short of his argument? Our high level of ethnic bigotry as a nation might be a clear reflection of how badly Kenyan literature talks about national coexistence. Whether his allegations about Kwani? Trust are true or false remains open to debate. Nonetheless, the issues raised in the article call for urgent and deep reflection.

Reading him, the foundation of his bitterness and anger was not lost on me. He had expected Kwani? Trust to do things differently, to completely break links with the old fashion of packaging our literature. We have to affirm the writer’s appreciation of the intimate relationship between art and the society. Writers and publishers, more than anybody else, are aware of the emotional impact of literature on readers or audience. This is why speculation that a publisher uses writing workshops within and without Nairobi to tune budding writers to consistently depict certain Kenyan communities in a certain light in their writing should raise eyebrows.

Literature should not hurt the national cohesion crusade. Instead, it should be used to awaken the national consciousness. Apart from America, which Abenea repeatedly points at, obviously because it is the motherland of Kwani? Trust donors, as an example of how literature can help a country achieve true statehood or nationhood, Canada is another relevant case. Canadian authors like Margaret Atwood, author of The Edible Woman, and Hugh Maclenan, author of Barometer Rising, among others, hugely contributed to the birth of the Canadian national consciousness.

The contemporary Kenyan writer should interact with the works of penmen of Ngugi’s generation not to copy their writing style but to interrogate their presentation of our national history. Modern writers ought to make it their endeavour to model their works in a way that would help cool the political animosities and bickering whose root cause is the communal myths and stereotypes. The kind of literature that belongs to our age is that which reminds us how we can turn diversity into strength. With their pens, the writers of this century should shoot down all lies that are told with the intention of putting any community on a socio-political and economic pedestal at the expense of the rest. For to do this is to breed hatred and intolerance.

Given the prevailing cut-throat competition in the publishing world, it would be fair if we allowed publishers a free hand to tailor and package their publications as they dim fit. However, they should propagate nothing less than the production of literature that enhances integration and cohesion. And when all is said and done, Abenea’s sentimemnts certainly point at the need for financiers of literary ventures from within and without the country to closely monitor how their benefactors use literature to foster unity and peaceful coexistence. Something has to be done, not based on Kwani? Trust’s guilt or innocence but with the possibility of a ripple effect of the charges levelled against the trust in mind.

 

The writer is a primary school teacher and author based in Migori County. [email protected]

 

 

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Do not rely on poor quality guide books

By Edwin Oteya

 

Several years back, I went to a dispensary for medication. I explained to the clinical officer how I was feeling. He turned to a voluminous book on his desk, opened some pages and read for close to five minutes. He then went on to prescribe treatment for me. I left but with many questions on my mind.

That is how bright students of literature will doubt a teacher who relies on guidebooks to teach. I support Kennedy Buhere’s sentiments in his article titled ‘Guidebooks undermine the thinking skills of students’ (Saturday Nation, September 24, 2016). These books depict the teacher as lazy and lacking in confidence. I once wrote on this page that some literature guidebooks are hurriedly written; replete with textual errors and questionable analyses that could misguide the student. The KICD should lay down standards for writing guidebooks. For instance, a writer should have studied literature or fasihi, taught for at least five years; then the work should be peer reviewed and be approved by KICD.

 

The writer is a freelance journalist and teacher of Literature and English based in Nairobi

 

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A writer can never be part of the society

By Malowa Malowa

The debate about writing, the writer and the source of writing reminds me of Prof Taban Lo Liyong’s short story, Lexicographicide. It proposes that a writer should concretise his ideas, but the writing must remain independent. One musters writing capability and ideas from around him. But these ideas must not be part of the writer. They belong to the society that created it. The society will teach the writer language and train him on how to use it. The writer in Lexicographicide is guilty when he abandons his noble duty of writing and, in cowardice, ventures into pleasure at the beaches and dancing halls. The role of the writer is to keep watch, condemn evil and extol virtues. Because certain members of society do not conform to the latter, they subject the writer and the publisher to persecution. The writer must not succumb to this intimidation and degenerate into writing for pleasure but continue writing for the masses. Two groups represent the populace in Lexicographicide: the group that robs the writer of everything; the other attacks the professor before his students.

 

The writer teaches at Kabarak

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Students should learn that hard work pays

By Oginga Orowe

The 2016 Form Four examinations are set to begin in a month’s time. An editorial piece in the Daily Nation told the ministry of Education thus: “The single most important objective of the Education ministry this year is to administer credible national examinations. The cheating that happened last year was outrageous.” (Daily Nation, September 13, 2016).

Cheating is not a legitimate short cut. It may save on time, money and, if successfully executed, may gain the one who cheats a passing mark, grade or degree. But the essential knowledge has not been acquired. Therefore the grade or degree is a lie and a misrepresentation. Insofar as the score becomes a foundation for life and opens up certain opportunities, the cheater’s life becomes a lie and perversion and is often devoted to protecting and preserving the lie.

When I visited Lugulu Girls High School in Bungoma County for the first time as an examiner of the Kenya National Examinations Council, one thing which struck me was the choice of their school motto: ‘Excellence is our pride.’

This is the kind of motto that develops in a student qualities that surpass ordinary standards arising from dedication, discipline and tenacity of character.

In his book Excellence, John Gardner says: “Some people have greatness thrust upon them. Very few have excellence thrust upon them. They achieve it. They do not achieve it unwittingly by doing what comes naturally and they do not stumble into it in the course of amusing themselves. All excellence involves discipline and tenacity of purpose.”

There is a cost or a price to pay for every achievement in life and as Olukayode Fadairo puts it: “It is those who pay the price that win the prize.”

A pastor once delivered what was regarded as a good sermon. At the end of the service one member of the congregation went and asked him: “How long did it take you to prepare that powerful sermon?” His response: “All my life.”

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow aptly says: “The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upwards in the night.”

In his autobiography, Why not the Best?, President Jimmy Carter tells of his interview with a legendary interviewer, Admiral Hyman G. Rickover. The admiral asked how he had stood in his class at the Naval Academy. “I swelled with pride and answered, “Sir, I stood 59th in a class of 820!” I sat back to wait for the congratulations. Instead came the question: “Did you do your best?” I started to say, “Yes sir,” but I remembered who this was. I gulped and admitted, “No sir, I didn’t always do my best.” He looked at me for a long time, then asked one final question, which I have never been able to forget — or to answer. He said, “Why not?”

One statement that is commonly made is that there is no gain without pain. The reason people cheat or lie is to avoid the pain of challenge. It is an attempt to circumvent genuine travail.

 

The writer teaches at Ng’iya Girls High School in Siaya County

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Take the book fair down to the people

by Mutahi Miricho

The Nairobi International Book Fair (NIBF) ended last Sunday September with its climax being the announcement of the winners of the sixth edition of Wahome Mutahi Literary Prize by Kenya Publishers Association. My Kiswahili Professor at the University of Nairobi, Prof John Habwe with his novel Kovu Moyoni by Bookmark Africa and Nation editor, Ng’ang’a Mbugua, with his book Angels of the Wild carried the day. Having taken time to visit all the stands at the book festival, I was convinced that it is such a great event not only to authors and their publishers but to school children, students, teachers, parents and the general public.

However, I felt the choice of venue keeps many potential visitors to the book fair away as it is an elite event. The Sarit Centre in Westlands, Nairobi, which was the venue, is not a place where just anybody could visit. In my opinion, the organisers should consider taking the book fair from Sarit Centre to a more public place like the Kenyatta International Conference Centre (KICC) grounds or Uhuru park, where members of public could attend as they go about their other leisure activities. Like writer Zukiswa Wanner wrote, maybe it is time that the publishers started asking themselves how to do things differently.

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Tribalism has no place in varsities

By Edward Lokidor

 

Public universities are supposed to hasten national unity and cohesion. On the contrary, our public universities have become the centre of tribalism when it comes to the recruitment of teaching and non-teaching staff. It is not right for some leaders to reject college heads posted by the government simply because they come from different communities, as we saw recently with a governor and MPs. These leaders have forgotten that government workers are entitled to work anywhere in the country. NCIC should move fast. Let the recruitment of teaching and non-teaching staff reflect the face of Kenya.