TUESDAY, AUGUST 11, 2009
I know there are many technicalities to the writing process, yet I have never been really conscious of them. I do what I would call ‘feely’ writing, ‘gut’ writing, as it were, much like a man stumbling in the dark and allowing himself to be led by some sixth sense. Or maybe that’s not quite right; more like a blind man, a man who has been blind throughout his life gets by with more gut :-). I ‘feel’ a story as I write. I ‘feel’ my way into it. And I ‘feel’ when I believe it’s just right, when I think the product is ready. That is how I have always worked. I have no formal ‘training’ or ‘education’ in the creative writing process, but I do intend, at some good measurable point in the future, to perhaps equip myself with something of a creative writing degree, as I think it will help improve my present stature. I say this because one of the most exciting events for me has occurred; I recently got launched into Story Time. It is a daunting and exciting thing, to have your work bared out, for other authors to read and turn over and scrutinise. So far I have had beautiful and encouraging comments about my story. It is indeed inspiring and encouraging to receive positive comments from established and wonderful writers such as Jude Dibia, for instance. And one of my favourite writers of the moment, Noviolet Mkha Bulawayo. It is indeed encouraging. What got me thinking about a creative writing degree at some point in the future, for instance, are the comments I received about my story. There was talk of pacing and language and point of view. Aspects, I then realised, I have never thought about when I am writing. I usually treat my writing as a sort of pilgrimage, a ‘faith mission’. I cannot tell you about how I chose my point of view and I have certainly never deliberated on pacing, but I ‘know’ what I am writing. I ‘feel’ my way through my writing. But now that my attention has been drawn to these aspects which build up a story, I feel the need to delve deeper into them.
I have had a number of interesting experiences re my writing. Like, one time, someone read my story ‘Big Pieces Little Pieces’ (currently on Story Time), and insisted that I had to have experienced what I was writing about, and would not be convinced otherwise. It was too vivid, he said. Some of the detail was too stark to be made up. Someone else, who read part of a story I wrote centred around an illegal immigrant living in South Africa, seemed to think I had experienced what I was writing about. This person went on to divulge some rather touching and personal information about themselves, believing I would be able to relate to it as I had gone through a ‘similar experience’. I did not know how to respond to this individual, as I had simply been writing fiction. I would just like to disagree with this notion that one should write stories related to his or her ‘experiences’, as this makes him or her write better. I do not think this is necessarily so. I believe the beauty of the fiction story is its allowance to explore unchartered territory, to convincingly ‘make believe’, as it were. I find that as I write ( and I guess I write what you would term ‘realist fiction’), I really get into a character, sit in his or her shoes, and for that moment, feel what he feels, express what he is. So far, I have not written a story that can be said to be auto- biographical, to be a relation to something I have, at least, directly experienced. But then I suppose there are sprinkles here and there of the familiar, used as a springboard to convincingly ‘make believe’ the not-so-familiar. I generally like to keep it fiction.
Writing has been many things to me; I used to do it without thinking about it (the beauty of being a child is that you do the things that come naturally to you without having the burden of having to consider the bigger picture :-) ) Perhaps inside I have always known. It was like something that was just a part of the horizon; I eat, I breathe I sleep, I write. But, and I guess like many significant things in life, there was a turning point, some pivot around which the moment had to turn, reshape itself into something more defined, something bigger. I dunno if all writers have such moments. I’m interested to know if they do, and what theirs were. My ‘moment’ came in the form of the astounding writer, Miss Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. It was mid 2007; I was just about to start my degree back home in Zimbabwe, at NUST (National University of Science and Technology). I had enrolled for a BscHons in Architecture. So I’m sitting watching BBC Hardtalk Extra one day and there is this interview with this writer, Miss-Chimamanda-Ngozi-Adichie-who-has-just-won-the-orange-broadband-prize-for-writing. So I’m listening, and it’s really interesting, Miss Adichie has all these views about Africa and her book is about some civil war that took place in Nigeria and from the sound of the interview, everybody’s making a fuss about it. It’s interesting enough for me to go and google her the next day.
This life story of this young writer who once pursued a degree in medicine and left it after two years to go to America and pursue her writing is just astounding to me. More so, her voice is unique, her writing voice is unique; I love the things she is talking about, writing about, amazing. Reality has just hit me. I write. I will write. I want to be a writer. I know all this, have always known all this. But. But. How? There is a journey to be travelled, I realise. But the ‘moment’ is not yet complete, is still making its pivot.
I read the synopsis of Half of a Yellow Sun. I’m in a frenzy. I have to read the book. I just have to get the book. I need to read this book. But wait a minute. Wait a minute. I’m in Zimbabwe. Everyday I walk past Kingstons Book Store and the book shelves stare back despondently at me. There is no way this book is available in Zimbabwe. I look up the book, see the price and the shipping costs, do my calculations, and quickly realise that, there is no way I will be able to afford this book. I have no VISA card or access to any of these complicated payment methods. But I need to read this book.
In a fit of excitement, I write an email to this writer I admire very much, frenzy-fan style, telling how her story inspires me, how I’m an aspiring writer and so-into-writing and I-need-to-read-her-book-but-I-can’t-afford-it-please-may-she-send-me-a-copy-please-please-please-oh-pretty-please. My friends are split to pieces. They are making fun of me. And I am laughing with them, because as I’m reading this email that I’ve sent, it really does sound like the crazy fan to me. Not composed, not cool, very much the crazy fan. No-one will take this email seriously. So I reprimand myself, think of all the corrections I ought to have made, and get on with life. But I’m checking my email as regularly as I can, just in case, you know :-). So there’s nothing for a while and so I kinda forget about it even though I’m a bit disappointed because I’m really itching to get my hands on that book.
Then one day. I’m sure you can guess what happens one day. I open my email and there it is, a reply from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Encouraging little me to write, and saying yes, she will send me a copy of her book, if only I will give her my address. To say I am over the moon is an understatement. Those two months, before I got the slip in the mail to go and collect my parcel at the Post Office, were the longest two months of my life. So here I am standing outside the Post Office clutching this book and loving the smell of fresh pages and feeling like something is happening. I dunno what it is, just something, you know. What a pretty cover. I’m vowing to myself I will look after this gift, this book should always look like this, so beautiful. And then I open the book and the-something-that-is-happening stops happening because the moment has completed its journey around the pivot.
Inside, the book- a signed copy- reads:
‘To Novuyo. With the hope that you will keep reading and writing. Chimamanda Adichie August 2007’.
The moment has completed its journey around the pivot. Needless to say, Half of a Yellow Sun is an astounding piece of work and it’s not just the story itself, it’s the writer’s voice. It’s the way she presents her writing in that way that is uniquely her. Her explorations of the Biafra war bring to mind the remembrance of much unchartered territory, many pieces left hanging in the air in my own country, dangling and jabbing. I am talking about the brief ‘civil’ war that occurred in the 1980s in Zimbabwe, famously known as Gukurahundi, a time that is not officially recognised in my country and which one cannot talk about.
At university (this is 2007 at NUST), during my free moments, I write. Now everybody is always coming around and asking me what am I doing? And when I say I am writing, the question is always what am I writing? And when I say a story, the question is why? Why? Well, because I love writing and I want to get something published. Now that answer, nobody seems to understand. There is usually this distant look in my interrogator’s eye, as though he or she does not really understand, does not really see the point. It’s something I always struggled with, that always bothered me, until I gave up and decided, it is better to show them. It is better to write and then show them, because to tell them is like to speak Chinese. So at university I am studying Architecture (fondly termed Archi-torture by my class) and during my spare time I’m finding out as much as I can about how Miss Adichie got to where she is, and in the process I am discovering other writers too, like Uzodimna Iweala, author of ‘Beasts of No Nation’. I had no idea that young Africans are writing so beautifully. To be honest, I was quite ignorant of the ‘African Writer’. I did Cambridge in High School and so cannot even boast of having read an African novel as a set book. The last ‘African’ novel I had ever read, was ‘Son of the Soil’ (can’t remember the author’s name) when I was eight, when my teacher saw me with it and told me I was going to go mad, because the book was just ‘not for my age’. And the only reason I read this book was because it was lying around at home, because I was itching to read something and it was conveniently there. Growing up, I voraciously devoured Enid Blyton and any other mystery books I could get my hands on. The Famous Five. The Secret Seven. Nancy Drew. The Hardy Boys. John Grisham. Robert Ludlum. It had never actually occurred to me, that there was anything like an ‘African’ novel. I actually saw myself as the next John Grisham; the fact that I was not in America and had never been to America did not deter the belief that I could write books about Americans in America and be the next John Grisham :-). Such was my state. So this new discovery of the existence of young Africans who write, was very exciting for me.
I started brooding. During my classes, when my lecturers were reeling off the names of great and inspiring architects, I was busy thinking of great and inspiring writers. Questions began haunting me. Like, what am I doing here? Sure, architecture is a great subject, very prestigious, very challenging. And in third world country, being a girl and pursuing such a degree was considered a very great thing. Five years. Five years in this degree.
We are hanging with the second and third years in the canteen and they are teasing us and saying, ‘This degree is hell. You work like hell and while others are partying, you are busy working. But-‘ says a third year, a twinkle in his eye. ‘ The pay off is great. Architects work hard, and they also spend hard.’ He grins.
Don’t get me wrong, I find architecture to be a very interesting subject. It’s just, I want to write. I’m tryna picture myself as an architect and the vision needs a lot of coaxing and even then it’s blurry. I picture my name on the cover of a novel and the vision is as clear as day. Five years. Hmmm. Some of us know why we are here, doing Archi-torture. We have always been clear from the get go about it and we enjoy it and our focus is unwavering. Others, well, some-of-us-the-others, are not quite sure. In third world country, it is easier to pack your dreams in a trunk and sit face to face with reality. And the reality is, Architects even in Africa are highly paid. The reality is, Writers in Africa… who? Who is highly paid? It’s a cut throat industry, I’m told. I can always do my writing as a thing-by-the-side, I’m told. Writing won’t take me anywhere, I’m told. I can always be an architect and well…writing on the side. Problem is, I’m sleeping four hours a day because of the work load and I feel my writing is not getting the attention it deserves. I’m moody as a result. I’m beginning to resent Archi-torture.
Something snaps inside of me. I resent the fact that nobody takes my writing seriously, that everybody wants me to treat it like some little hobby, a poor little addiction to be nursed by the side. So, heart in my throat, I decide to leave Archi-torture, because, wonderful-prestigious-well-paying-degree that it is, it’s just not me and I feel I will not experience the height of my happiness if I do it. There are mixed reactions. Basically many people are disappointed, because they believe I am throwing away one of the greatest degrees on earth. Some are in awe, that I am actually doing this, me, girl in third world country, passing up the chance at such a prestigious and exclusive degree. The awe is mixed with some criticism. The general prediction is that disaster is on the horizon.
So here is how the disaster is working out. I am now at the University of Witwatersrand. Pursuing a Bachelor of Commerce degree. Do not ask me why I am doing Bachelor of Commerce. I just am. And I do enjoy it. Much more than Archi-torture. I think I can marry my Bachelor of Commerce degree to my writing. Because there are many wonderful artists in my country who do not seem to be able to make a decent buck from their work and I think our ‘arts industry’ needs a bit of refining. Because I think the artist in Africa does need, if he is going to take his work seriously and make a living from it, to think just beyond the beauty of his craft to how he is going to manage it.
But now. Learning in South Africa has opened me up to so much, writing wise. Access to the internet is much easier, for example. In Zimbabwe, I personally, in my situation, would not have been able to maintain a blog. The internet access and cost would just not have really allowed me to do so. Here, in South Africa, I have managed to purchase what I consider to be the writer’s most prized utility-his laptop. Back home, I used to write by hand, then go to a public internet café and spend hours typing it out. I did not like to have my work typed by somebody else because there were always errors after the typing was done and I discovered I always revise and rewrite and change this and change that as I am typing. ( I don’t like writing by hand at all, as I’m a messy writer, I constantly change sentences and paragraphs as I go along, cancel this and add that, and so for me writing by hand is a tedious process). In SA, as I am writing, people will not come up to me and ask me what I am doing, then look at me as if I’m crazy when I say I’m writing. In SA, there are nice big book shops that smell of that delicious scent of new books and fresh pages. All of this is contributing to my writing. The atmosphere is conducive.
It has taken me a while to grow into it and get comfortable with it, but, there is no ‘work’ I enjoy more than writing. It has become such an addiction. To write, to check out what is happening with other writers, to find out who is doing what, to discover others’ beautiful work. All a pleasure. Such a pleasure. There is great pleasure in reading others’ work, beautiful work that gives you just another glimpse of the world. I love it. I feel at home in it. I get excited about it. And I know I am young, so young, and so I have a long way to go. I am just starting the journey. But I have had my ‘moment’, that pivot around which I turned. And yet I cannot say it is the only moment, for I have had so many other ‘moments’ after that. For instance, I was reading the work of Noviolet Mkha Bulawayo the other day, and I got so excited, because I did not know that Zimbabwe has such beautiful, starkly unique writing that stands out in the way her writing does. So that was another moment. I was reading E.C Osondu’s ‘Waiting’, and I had another moment. Read Parselelo Kantai’s ‘You Wreck Her’-another moment. Christopher Mlalazi’s ‘A Cicada in the Summer’. ‘Behind the Door’ by Kola Tubosun. ‘Emotional Chameleon’ by Jude Dibia. So many moments. Little moments of beauty inspiring, encouraging, urging on. Writing that is so strong, so captivating. Little moments for a little writer.
As always, I have written too much, lost myself in the ‘moment’. It was just a thought at the back of my mind this, Writing about Writing.