Author: Brittle Paper

Growing up black, foreign and legal in South Africa

(Pic: AFP)
(Pic: AFP)

by Wadeisor Rukato 

On Thursday the 30th of April 2015, I stepped off a taxi coming from the Bree taxi rank in order to make my way toward the MTN taxi rank[1]. I was coming from Greenside, where I work as an intern for a consultancy firm.

Immediately, as I stepped onto the curb, I was stopped by an aggressive tap on my shoulder followed by loud commands of “Eh, I said stop”, “You must respect me”, “Look me in the eye” – from two black women.

I steadied myself quickly and realised that one of the women, the taller one, was dressed in the navy official uniform of the South African Police Services. The shorter one, with a bob-cut weave, was wearing an orange golf T-shirt and a reflective warrant officer vest. She was holding a clipboard and pen. They both had a threatening but smug look on their faces, like they had just caught a big fish.

“This is a stop and search. Open your bag now!”

Without really thinking about the legal procedure regarding bag searches or my ‘rights’, I hastily unzipped my bag and revealed its contents. The short one clumsily ran her hand through and asked: “Where is your passport?”

I panicked. In my now 19 years of living in South Africa, I had never been asked this question. I didn’t have my passport. I don’t walk around with it.

I did have my green book – my stamp of legality, the document that guarantees my status as a permanent resident of South Africa. I took it out, handed it to them and felt like I had narrowly escaped doom. Until a week before, I refused to carry my ID with me, for fear of losing it given how hard it was to get in the first place.

My ID was handed back to me. The two women seemed disappointed. Maybe I imagined this.

I moved to South Africa when I was three years old. I am now 22. I am Zimbabwean and my parents moved to the City of Gold in 1995 to realise what, for many Zimbabweans then, was the real potential of a South African dream.

My first experience with xenophobia was in primary school in the early 2000s. Names such as “Kwerekwere” and “Girigamba”[2] were pelted at me like stones by children both my age and skin color. Even as a child I knew that these terms were meant for a select few. They were used to “other” and alienate foreigners of a specific kind. While the white French foreign student who visited was welcomed with curiosity and admiration, I, a black African child, was labelled Kwerekwere. I was taunted and excluded.

Throughout the rest of my school career, I experienced a dizzying identity crisis. In junior high, I spent time dreaming of living in Soweto, Diepkloof, maybe Orlando. In this imagined life, I spoke fluent Zulu. My friends and I took a taxi to Ghandi Square or MTN taxi rank to get home. I arrived at school on Mondays with news of Thabo, the boy from the opposite street, and how he asked for my number over the weekend. If anything, this dream bears witness to how profoundly I longed to become a South African citizen. Simply to belong, wholly and indisputably.

By the time I entered grade 10 in 2008, my delusions had been completely dashed. In May of that year foreigners were violently assaulted in the Johannesburg township of Alexandra.

Ernesto Alfabeto Nhamuave was set alight and became known as “the burning man.” The image of him on his knees and wrapped in flames appeared almost everywhere.

Pieces of land along highways in Johannesburg, Olifantsfontein and Midrand became lined with rows and rows of UNHCR refugee tents for the displaced and vulnerable.

Young boys and girls in my grade huddled in the cold autumn/winter mornings before class. There were conversations that sometimes involved making ‘arguments’ for why black, lower-class and African foreigners earned the contempt they were experiencing.

I was made hyper-aware of my identity as a black Zimbabwean. I wanted to simultaneously lash out and dissolve. I felt convicted in the symbolism of my decision to have taken Afrikaans instead of Zulu as my second additional language.

I felt frustrated, angry, disappointed, rejected.

Today, I proudly identify myself as a Zimbabwean and choose to describe myself as a Zimbabwean who grew up and lives in South Africa. I fully acknowledge the influence that being raised in South Africa has had on me. Given my familiarity and extensive experience in the country, it is, in many ways, home. Zimbabwe is, however, where I feel rooted, where I belong. I feel a responsibility to return there at the earliest opportunity in order to reacquaint myself with my country and contribute to its development.

My identity crisis has, in effect, been resolved.

I recently read a paper by Michael Neocosmos –The Politics of Fear and the Fear of Politics: Reflections on Xenophobic Violence in South Africa – in which he addresses the reasons for these xenophobic attacks. 

While xenophobia in post-apartheid South Africa is generally understood in terms of economics, there is good reason to believe that it is a product of political discourse and ideology. Neocosmos points to “state or government discourse of xenophobia, discourse of South African exceptionalism and a conception of citizenship founded exclusively on indigeneity”.

The reckless and quite frankly deplorable statement made by King Goodwill Zwelethini in which he called for all foreign nationals to return to where they came from is a prime example.  It demonstrates the power that leaders wield in terms of influencing the perceptions and actions of certain groups in society toward African migrants in the country.

I remain disillusioned and disgusted by the poor show of leadership and lack of both urgency and agency displayed by key government officials and the president himself when it came to honestly and effectively addressing the recent xenophobic violence. An honest dialogue on why African foreigners are specifically targeted in xenophobic attacks in this country will not occur until the role that leadership plays in sparking, influencing, curbing or dealing with xenophobia is understood.

The fear/dislike of and violence against African migrants is not a new phenomenon in South Africa. The March 2015 attacks are also not likely the last we will see. That’s why it is important to address the role of leadership in the perpetration of xenophobia.

 

[1] MTN Taxi Rank and Bree Taxi rank are two of the main taxi terminals in the Johannesburg CBD.

[2] A derogatory term used in South Africa to refer to foreigners, particularly from Zimbabwe.

This post was first published on Brittle Paper, an African literary blog featuring book reviews, news, interviews, original work and in-depth coverage of the African literary scene. It is curated by Ainehi Edoro and was recently named a ‘go-to book blog’ by Publisher’s Weekly.

6 African novels to fuel your wanderlust

(Pic: Flickr / Susana Fernandez)
(Pic: Flickr / Susana Fernandez)

We’ve picked out six African novels about travel guaranteed to delight any wide-eyed traveler like yourself looking for adventure. No matter how classic or unconventional your taste in fiction might be, you’ll find something on the list to comfort your travel-weary soul or tease out your inner adventurer.

1. Traveller To The East  by Thomas Mofolo
Thomas Mofolo’s turn of the century classic is a petite, purse-size novella, but it chronicles the larger-than-life experience of a man called Fekisi, who abandons family and land and heads east to a mythical land where he hopes to encounter God.

Mofolo’s first novel is a travel story made alluring and exotic with the intensity of poetry and myth.

2. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts by Amos Tutuola
Who wouldn’t want to get enveloped in a fog of magical delight?

Tutuola’s second novel is what Alice in Wonderland could have been if Lewis Carroll had enough grit and gumption to imagine a world haunted by outrageous beasts and ghouls.

The novel charts the adventures of a little boy lost in an enchanted forest. His search for the way back home seem to take him deeper and deeper into secret colonies of creatures living in a plane of reality at odds with human life.

3. The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
Reading a novel this good can be good or bad – good because it blows your socks off, bad because it’s a once-in-a-life-time experience.

There is literally nothing out there like Beukes’ time-traveling serial-killer romp of a novel.

Harper is a creepy slime of a man who travels through time to kill women. Kirby is his only failed attempt. She survives his assault and commits her life to finding Harper and putting a stop to his murderous hatred for women.

For the lover of crime thrillers, this quirky time travel novel is a gift straight from the god of fiction.

4. Nigerians in Space by Deji Olukotun
Wale is a Nigerian lunar geologist. He is under the spell of a life-long dream to traveling out to the moon when the mysterious Mr. Bello offers him the chance to man a Nigerian space-exploration mission. But like most dreams, what starts out as the magical fulfillment of desire quickly slips into the realm of nightmare. Wale is caught within the complicated web of an African political illuminati. His attempt to piece the puzzle of his ever crumbling reality takes him on a nomadic jaunt through Houston, Stockholm, Basel, Paris, Abuja, Bulawayo, Lagos, Capetown, Johannesburg and Paris.

An exquisite blend of unpredictable twists and lightening-speed plot.

5. Our Sister Killjoy by Ama Ata Aidoo
Ama Ata Aidoo’s quirky novel is a tourist adventure set in Germany and London. It charts the journey of Sissie, a bright and self-assured Ghanaian student who wins a European travel scholarship. Like any good explorer, she is very aware of her surroundings—an awareness that she conveys in a blend of poetic and prose expressions. In novels like this, travel through space easily becomes a journey into the self.

6. The Moor’s Account by Laila Lalami
Step aside Marco Polo! Estebanico, a Moroccan survivor of a doomed Spanish expedition, is our latest guide through the alluring enigma of unknown lands and peoples.

It is 1527 when a ship with a 600-man crew and a calvary of 600 horses leave Spain and heads out to the gulf coast of the United States. Ravaged by a series of misfortunes, their great number is decimated, but Estabanico lives to tell the story of their subsequent travels across America and how their dream of becoming wealthy conquistadors becomes a humbling journey in search of self-discovery and redemption.
Give yourself a priceless gift. Get Laila Lalami’s new novel.

Brittle Paper is an African literary blog featuring book reviews, news, interviews, original work and in-depth coverage of the African literary scene. It is curated by Ainehi Edoro and was recently named a ‘go-to book blog’ by Publisher’s Weekly.

Film adaptation of ‘Beasts of No Nation’ set for 2015 release

beast-of-no-nation-idris-elba

Yet another African novel makes a bold entrance into Hollywood.

Way back in 2013, Deadline announced that Cary Fukunaga, the director of the critically acclaimed HBO show, True Detective, was teaming up with Idris Elba to film Uzodinma Iweala’s war drama titled Beasts of No Nation.

Word has just come through that the project is done and that Netflix, the US media-buying giant, has purchased the worldwide rights for 12 million dollars. The rights covers online streaming and theatrical release.

Those of you who know your Fela would recognise the phrase, “beast of no nation.” It’s the title of Fela’s 1989 album. Iweala, a Harvard-trained Nigerian novelist, clipped the title for his 2005 novel about a child soldier, named Agu, in an unnamed war torn West African country. Beast of No Nation, alongside Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus, Chris Abani’s Graceland, and Habila’s Waiting for An Angel, spearheaded the big comeback of Nigerian fiction on the global literary scene.

This is such exciting news.

Apparently, Netflix is really hoping that the movie catches the attention of the Oscar committee, so they’re putting all their weight behind the it.

According to insiders, the media distributor is planning a strong Oscar push for the feature,” reports Variety.

Netflix is yet to announce a release date. But since they’re hoping to get it out in time for the Oscar season, later this year is a good enough guess.

Fingers crossed. There are African literary critics who don’t care for Iweala’s novel, citing it as a classic example of the “poverty porn” genre. Add to this the fact that Hollywood doesn’t exactly have a good track record when it comes to representing the continent.

Either way, it’s one more African novel making its way to the big screen. Definitely worth celebrating.

Of course, we’re also looking forward to Adichie’s Americanah starring Lupita Nyongo and David Oyelowo and Lauren Beukes’ The Shining Girls optioned for TV by Leonardo Di Caprio’s media company.

Brittle Paper is an African literary blog featuring book reviews, news, interviews, original work and in-depth coverage of the African literary scene. It is curated by Ainehi Edoro and was recently named a ‘go-to book blog’ by Publisher’s Weekly.

African novels are not anthropological documents

NoViolet Bulawayo. (Pic: AFP)
Zimbabwean author NoViolet Bulawayo with her award-winning debut novel . (Pic: AFP)

We have to be careful how we position African novels, that we don’t make claims for the African novel that it does not make for itself.

So when someone comes to you looking for a novel that represents Africa or African life, say you can’t help.

A novel is not an anthropological document, meaning that it can only give a peep into life through a very, very, very narrow frame. That’s why it’s dangerous to get into the habit of thinking of novels as expressive of truth and reality.

I remember an American student asking, after reading Things Fall Apart, whether human sacrifice was a thing in Africa. Now imagine your first American novel was American Psycho, would you ever think to ask an American if most American men were prone to a similar kind of psychosis?

From years of studying British and African novels, I find that people make demands on African novels that they don’t make on other kinds of novels. Whether realist or fantasy, African novels are required to offer direct access to Africa’s way of life.

The truth is that no matter how true-to-life, how history-based a novel such as Things Fall Apart might be, it is first and foremost a fictional work. Things Fall Apart is a fictional representation of life. It is not life. It is not a document on how African fathers kill their foster children. It is not a document on how polygamous marriages work. It is not a document on why Igbo men love yams so much. It is not a document on late 19th century Igbo laws and customs. It is a story.

There is nothing more unattractive and annoying than a naive novel-reader, someone who believes everything they read in novels, who can’t seem to come to terms with the fact that novels tell us very little about real life, even when they claim to do so.

But isn’t this a question as old as Aristotle – the question of how life relates to fiction? Since Aristotle, European philosophers and novelists have written themselves to death about how much of life can be captured in art. The sad thing is that today, Africa bears the burden of the most simplistic understanding of that link between art and life. So many readers go about expecting African novels to tell them a political and anthropological fact about African life.

To be fair, there is a certain sense in which every novel whispers something to us about a real world out there. But you have to love the novel for itself first before you can hear what it says or does not say about that world.

So never encourage anyone to expect an African novel to tell them the truth about Africa and its people. It is far too much to ask a novel. And people who put such a burden on a novel are being lazy, small-minded, and sorta cheap.

If you really want to learn about Lagos, get a plane ticket.

Brittle Paper is an African literary blog featuring book reviews, news, interviews, original work and in-depth coverage of the African literary scene. It is curated by Ainehi Edoro and was recently named a ‘go-to book blog’ by Publisher’s Weekly.

Cameroonian novelist signs million-dollar book deal

(Pic: Flickr / Jordi Boixareu)
(Pic: Flickr / Jordi Boixareu)

It is rumored that US publisher, Random House paid at least a million dollars each to secure the US rights to two novels – The Girls by Emma Cline and The Longings of Jende Jonga by Cameroon-born Imbolo Mbue.

This all happened in Frankfurt a few days ago. Publishers came to Frankfurt ahead of the book fair, which ran from October 8 – 12, to shop for new writers and promising manuscripts.

Publishers Weekly reports that David Ebershoff of Random House snagged the US rights for Mbue’s novel after a bidding duel with Susan Golomb, the agent who discovered Jonathan Franzen.

If you’ve never heard of Mbue, it’s probably because she’s never published anything. At least, not yet. Her first ever published story will be out soon in the Threepenny Review.

The Cameroonian writer, who moved to the US in 1998, has written an immigrant novel that clearly has publishers very excited.

“Mbue’s The Longings of Jende Jonga…opens in New York City in 2007 and focuses on the West African immigrant of its title, who lands a job as a chauffeur for a high level executive at Lehman Brothers. Jende’s family becomes close to his employer’s – Jende’s wife is quickly hired by the exec’s wife – only to have both families thrown into disarray when the 2008 financial collapse hits.”

The way I see it, if publishers are willing to pay this much for a debut novel, the story must be off-the-charts amazing.

Golomb – a front runner in the bid for the novel – not only compares Mbue to Adichie but also notes that her novel is built around “some of the most delightful and refreshing characters seen in recent fiction.”

I’m guessing it won’t take much for Mbue to be admitted into the new elite African writers club where she’ll be in good company with the likes of  Chimamanda Adichie (Half of a Yellow Sun), NoViolet Bulawayo (We Need New Names), Teju Cole (Open City), Dinaw Mengestu (How to Read the Air), Taiye Selasi (Ghana Must Go), Lauren Beukes (Broken Monsters), and others.

Congratulations to Mbue! We can’t wait for her novel to be published.

Brittle Paper is an African literary blog featuring book reviews, news, interviews, original work and in-depth coverage of the African literary scene. It is curated by Ainehi Edoro and was recently named a ‘go-to book blog’ by Publisher’s Weekly.