Northern Nigerian Writers summit repositions self
The American short story writer George Saunders has won the Man Booker prize for his first full-length novel, Lincoln in the Bardo.
The book is based around a real event: the night in 1862 when Abraham Lincoln buried his 11-year-old son Willie in a Washington cemetery. Imagining the boy trapped in the Bardo - a Tibetan Buddhist term for a kind of limbo Saunders’ novel follows the fellow dead, also trapped in the graveyard and unwilling to accept death, who observe the boy as he desperately waits for his father to return.
The short story master’s first novel is a tale of great formal daring, set in the cemetery where Abraham Lincoln mourns his son
Written almost entirely in dialogue, the novel also includes snippets of historical texts, biographies and letters, some of which contradict each other and others that Saunders, 58, created himself. In his review for the Guardian, fellow author Hari Kunzru praised Lincoln in the Bardo as “a tale of great formal daring”, adding: “[It] stands head and shoulders above most contemporary fiction, showing a writer who is expanding his universe outwards, and who clearly has many more pleasures to
After three days of deliberation, the 3rd Northern Nigerian Writers Summit has taken measures to position itself as an umbrella organisation for the promotion of literature in the region
This resolution was reached at its annual summit held at the conference hall of the Katsina State secretariat complex where an interim executive, under the headship of BM Dzukogi was given a one-year mandate to stir the affairs of the body and oversee this transition.
Other members of the executive, according to a communiqué issued by the interim secretariat are the writers Alhaji Muhammad Sani Kabir, Aisha Umar, Zaharaddeen Ibrahim Kallah, Kabir Assada and Hajiya Hafsat AbdulWahid.
They are charged with designing a blueprint for administering its operations to cover the 19 states of Northern Nigeria and Abuja. offer his readers.”
Accepting the prize, the 58-yearold Texan-born author made an eloquent defence of the importance of culture. “If you haven’t noticed, we live in a strange time, so the question at the heart of the matter is pretty simple,” he said. “Do we respond to fear with exclusion and negative projection and violence? Or do we take that ancient great leap of faith and do our best to respond with love? And with faith in the idea that what seems other is actually not other at all, but just us on a different day.
“In the US we’re hearing a lot about the need to protect culture. Well this tonight is culture, it is international culture, it is compassionate culture, it is activist culture. It is a room full of believers
Other resolutions reached at the summit include developing a strategy where Northern Governors Forum, multi-national corporations, institutions, individuals, governments and organisations in the region can intervene through funding and provision of facilities that will accelerate the development of creative writing in the region including Abuja.
The summit hopes to coerce established writers and institutions in Northern Nigeria and elsewhere to facilitate capacities of young writers from the region through publishing, residencies, mentoring, prizes, workshops, trainings, and conferences.
Part of the measures of attaining literary development in the region that the summit will explore include establishing Book Development Agencies like the one in Niger State to further institutionalise book development initiatives in the region through official recognition and annual statutory budgetary allocations. The book agencies shall be in the word, in beauty and ambiguity and in trying to see the other person’s point of view, even when that is hard.”
The chair of judges, Lola Young, described the novel as “an extraordinary piece of work. Admitting that she initially felt challenged by its layout, which is reminiscent of a screenplay, the Labour peer said she was eventually “captivated” by work which she came to regard as unique.
“The challenge is actually part of its uniqueness. It is almost saying, ‘I dare you to engage with this kind of story, in this kind of way.’ It is incredibly rewarding.
“For us, it really stood out because of its innovation, its very different styling, the way it, almost paradoxically, brought to life these exclusively for the development of creative works.
The summit also wishes to liaise with the Nigeria Copyrights Commission to enable the protection of intellectual properties of writers in the region as well as get maximum value for their creative products.
During the summit, papers were presented by prominent writers including Dr. Wale Okediran (The role of creative writers in nationalism and cultural development), Professor Yusuf Adamu ( Contribution of the media towards the development of Hausa language and literature), B. M. Dzukogi (Teen Authorship: Towards discovering and mentoring the next generation of northern Nigerian writers) and Prof. Asabe Kabir (Hausa women folksongs: Tool for cultural preservation).
Participants at the summit also had the opportunities of visiting the Emir of Katsina’s place where the emir received writers. They also visited the 700 year old Gobarau minaret and old Katsina College established in 1920.