SciELO - Scientific Electronic Library Online

 
vol.45 número2 índice de autoresíndice de materiabúsqueda de artículos
Home Pagelista alfabética de revistas  

Servicios Personalizados

Articulo

Indicadores

Links relacionados

  • En proceso de indezaciónCitado por Google
  • En proceso de indezaciónSimilares en Google

Compartir


Tydskrif vir Letterkunde

versión On-line ISSN 2309-9070
versión impresa ISSN 0041-476X

Tydskr. letterkd. vol.45 no.2 Pretoria ene. 2008

 

Migrating bards: Writers' burdens and a writers' body in Nigeria at the turn of the century

 

Migrating bards: Writers' burdens and a writers' body in Nigeria at the turn of the century

 

 

Isidore Diala

Isidore Diala is Associate Professor and Head of the Department of English, Imo State University, Owerri, Nigeria. E-mail: isidorediala@yahoo.com

 

 


ABSTRACT

Wole Soyinka's 1986 Nobel Prize for literature was received as a well deserved international recognition not only of the distinction of Soyinka's sustained output but also as a tribute to Nigerian and African literature in general. However, given decades of irresponsible leadership in the country, a sober appraisal of the Nigerian cultural and intellectual front twenty years after the Nobel event reveals a shocking impoverishment of the institutions for the production and evaluation of literature. With a collapsed publishing industry and the continuing migration of Nigeria's most distinguished writers and literary critics to the West, Nigerian literature stands the risk of being subject to the dictates of legitimizing foreign agents of literary production and evaluation with the consequent danger of the perpetuation of Western biases of African literary excellence. By its crucial interventionist measures though, the Association of Nigerian Authors continues to strive to transform the socio-political environment so critical for the creation and appreciation of literature, to sustain the ideals of good writing in Nigeria and, moreover, by its annual awards of literary prizes, to remain a prominent stakeholder in the appraisal of literary excellence.

Key words: Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Nigerian literature, Nigerian publishing industry, Wole Soyinka


 

 

Full text available only in PDF format.

 

 

Works cited

About the Association of Nigerian Authors.         [ Links ] [O] <www.ana-ng.org/aboutANA.htm> Accessed: 01.06.2007.

Attridge, Derek. 1992. Oppressive silence: J. M. Coetzee's Foe and the politics of the canon. In Karen R. Lawrence (ed.). Decolonizing Tradition: New Views of Twentieth-Century "British"Literary Canons. Chicago: University of Illinois, 212-38.         [ Links ]

Adiche, Chimamanda Ngozi. 2004. Purple Hibiscus. London: Fourth Estate.         [ Links ]

Ajileye, Gbenga. 2004. A Whisper and a Silence. Owerri: Taurus Books.         [ Links ]

Chinweizu. 1998. Interview with Chinua Achebe. ANA Review October - December, 3.         [ Links ]

Chukura, Lynn, Reuben Abati, and Tanimu Abubukar. 1998. ANA Literary Awards. Report of the Judges. (Unpublished).         [ Links ]

Gordimer, Nadine. 2006. Turning the page: African writers in the 21" century. Paper presented at the International colloquium on 20 years after the Nobel Prize in Literature: Governance and Development in Africa. Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria., 25-7 August.         [ Links ]

Hogan, Patrick Colm. 1994. Mimeticism, reactionary nativism, and the possibility of post-colonial identity in Derek Walcott's Dream on Monkey Mountain. Research in African Literatures 25 (2): 103-19.         [ Links ]

Huggan, Graham. 2001. The Postcolonial Exotic: Marketing the Margins. London: Routledge.         [ Links ]

Ike, Chuwuemeka.         [ Links ] [O] <www.sabre.org/publications/publishing-in-nigeria.pdf> Accessed: 01.06.2007.

Irobi, Esiaba. 1999. The Other Side of the Mask. Enugu: ABIC.         [ Links ]

Izevbaye, Dan. 1996. Critical engagements: Developments in African literary theory and criticism. The Post Express 30 November, 12.         [ Links ]

Jeyifo, Biodun. 2006. The unfortunate children of fortunate parents: Reflections on African Literature in the wake of 1986 and the age of neoliberal globalization. Keynote address presented at the International colloquium on 20 years after the Nobel Prize in Literature: Governance and Development in Africa. Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria., 25-7 August.         [ Links ]

Kotei, S. I. A. 2006. The book today in Africa. In Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin (eds.). The Post-Colonial Studies Reader. London: Routledge, 404-7.         [ Links ]

Lasisi, Akeem. 1999. A jury in the Court of the People. The Comet, 28 August, 27.         [ Links ]

Lock, Charles. 2006. Indirect rule and the continuities of Nigerian fiction. In Isidore Diala (ed.). The Responsible Critic: Essays on African Literature in honor of Professor Ben Obumselu. Treton, NJ: Africa World Press, 181-96.         [ Links ]

Nnolim, Charles. 2005. Contemporary Nigerian fiction. Keynote address presented at the 2005 annual convention of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Imo State Branch, 6-7 July.         [ Links ]

Samuel, Gloria Ernest. 2005 Dear Kelechi. Owerri: Cel-Bez Didatic Books.         [ Links ]

Williams, Adebayo. 2006. The missing scholar as icon: Ben Obumselu and the crisis of intellectual modernity in Africa. In Isidore Diala (ed.). The Responsible Critic: Essays on African Literature in honor of Professor Ben Obumselu. Treton, NJ: Africa World Press, 1-14.         [ Links ]

Creative Commons License Todo el contenido de esta revista, excepto dónde está identificado, está bajo una Licencia Creative Commons