African Literature Today – serie

Is the woman writer free to follow her own creative impulse and write about what she pleases?Reflects the emergence of accomplished works by African women writers. North America: Africa World Press

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.The intention of the African Literature Today series [ALT] was, and still is, to encourage African writing in any language, whether of fiction, poetry or plays, and also to encourage its criticism. The critic's role, according toEldred Durosimi Jones in his 1968 Introduction to ALT 1, is to make the work accessible to a wider readership and to help establish literary standards for African literature: "The more permissive the publisher's policy is,the more necessary becomes the function of the critic."This book combines the first 4 volumes in the series, which had been published as single volumes between 1968 and 1970, then combined into one volume in 1972. It includes Bernth Lindfors' essay "The palm wine with which Achebe's words are eaten", plus early reviews of Elechi Amadi's The Concubine, Aimé Césaire's Une Saison au Congo, Flora Nwapa's Efuru and Ngugi's A Grainof Wheat.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.This volume, first published in 1978, looks at the fascinating literary links of the African diaspora in Harlem, Cuba and Haiti. Eldred Jones outlines in his Editorial the impact of the pride in connections with an African past as"one of the great transformations of modern times". The impact on writing moved in all directions and comparisons in this volume are made between Wole Soyinka and Leroi Jones, and between African and Irish Nationalist writing. Among the contributions are articles on the American background to Ayi Kwei Armah's Why Are We So Blest?, the African elements of Cuban literature, and an analysis of the early works and later crime fiction of Chester Himes.The Reviews include Kadiatu Sesay on Ekwensi and Okpwewho, Maryse Condé on Sembene Ousmane's Xala and Eustace Palmer on Meja Mwangi's Going Down River Road and Nuruddin Farah's Naked Needle.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.In this 10th anniversary volume, first published in 1979, Eldred Jones outlines the trend over the years since independence of "a greater degree of alienation or dissidence of the principal writers from established regimes and a movement towards a closer identification with what they see as the needs of the ordinary people. Writers increasingly found themselves in difficulties with their respective governments, with ensuing consequences of loss of favour,of exile - enforced or voluntary - or worse still of detention or imprisonment in their own countries." This issue makes a reassessment of African writing with special articles on novels, drama and poetry and particular studies ofthe work of Kofi Awoonor, Ngugi, Ezekiel Mphalele, Richard Rive, Cyprian Ekwensi, Ayi Kwei Armah, Yambo Ouologuem and Arthur Nortje.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.First published in 1983, this volume looks at new developments in the African novel and also at those aspects of more established works that received less critical attention, such as writing from southern Africa, to which censorship and war restricted access. Eldred Jones in his Editorial also cites the "searing impact of the Nigerian Civil War, on the consciousness, not just on Nigerians, but on Africans as a whole". There are also contributions on Nigerian populist Kole Omotoso and Dambudzo Marechera's prize-winning House of Hunger. One of the most significant trends is the emergence of the powerful feminist talents of Buchi Emecheta, Flora Nwapa, Bessie Head, Ama Ata Aidoo and Rebeka Njau. Articles by Eustace Palmer and Femi Ojo-Ade examine the depth and intensity with which some new novelists present the female point of view.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.This volume, first published in 1984, studies the attraction of Africa for non-African writers and the widespread and differing outside influences on African writers. This relationship raises complex problems such as which language to write in, and the representation or misrepresentation of the continent. Kole Omotoso gives a trans-Saharan view of Africa, Funso Aiyejina a West Indian perspective highlighting the work of George Lamming and Denis Williams, and Katherine Frank examines the relevance of feminist criticism to the African novel. Other contributors compare and contrast the works of European, American, Caribbean and African writers: Graham Greene and Dadié; Soyinka and Beckett; Laye, Lamming and Wright; Camus and Césaire; Yeats and J.P. Clark; Equiano and Defoe; Ernest Gaines and Oyono.

North America: Africa World Press

North America: Africa World Press

North America: Africa World Press

This work features articles which examine the works of new African writers who have appeared (or who have developed significantly) in the last two decades in all of the genres.

The experience of childhood as examined in the works of African writers.This volume examines linguistic, literary, gender and generation issues in both autobiographies and fictional treatments of childhood in the works of Camara Laye, Wole Soyinka, Mongo Beti, Chinua Achebe, Ben Okri, Zaynab Alkali, Buchi Emecheta, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Athol Fugard and Issac Mogotsi.North America: Africa World Press

This volume explores the recurring theme of exile in African literature, both as physical and mental alienation. It focuses on the writings of Dambudzo Marechera, Bessie Head, Dennis Brutus, Ayi Kwei Armah, John Munonye, CatherineAcholonu and Buchi Emecheta.This volume explores the recurring theme of exile in African literature, both as physical and mental alienation. It focuses on the writings of Dambudzo Marechera, Bessie Head, Dennis Brutus, Ayi Kwei Armah, John Munonye, CatherineAcholonu and Buchi Emecheta.North America: Africa World Press

The rapid upsurge of writing by African women has been one of the most dynamic, phenomenal trends of African literature at the end of the twentieth century.African women writers have come a long way since the 1960s when they were hardly acknowledged or noticed as serious writers. In the past four decades their works have been steadily rising in quantity and quality. Today these writers are seriously redefining images of womanhood, providing new visions, and reshaping erstwhile distorted characterizations of African women in fiction.ERNEST EMENYONU is Professor of the Department of Africana StudiesUniversity of Michigan-Flint.North America: Africa World Press; Nigeria: HEBN

Critics take stock of where African Literature has got to and where it is likely to go with the next generation of writers.Contributors to this volume ask what are the new directions of African literature? What should be the major concerns of writers, critics and teachers in the twenty-first century? What are the accomplishments and legacies? What gaps remain to be filled, and what challenges are there to be addressed by publishers and the book industry? What are the implications for pedagogy in the new technological era?ERNEST EMENYONU is Professor of the Department of Africana Studies University of Michigan-Flint.North America: Africa World Press; Nigeria: HEBN

How have African writers addressed the issue of war and its impact across the continent?Since the second half of the twentieth century, no single phenomenon has marred the image and development of Africa more than senseless fratricidal wars which rapidly followed the political independence of nations. This issue ofAfrican Literature Today is devoted to studies of how African writers, as historical witnesses, have handled the recreation of war as a cataclysmic phenomenon in various locations on the continent. The contributors explore the subject from a variety of perspectives: panoramic, regional, national and through comparative studies. War has enriched contemporary African literature, but at what price to human lives, peace and the environment? ERNESTEMENYONU is Professor of the Department of Africana Studies University of Michigan-Flint. The contributors include: CHIMALUM NWANKWO, CHRISTINE MATZKE, CLEMENT A. OKAFOR, INIBONG I. UKO, OIKE MACHIKO, SOPHIE OGWUDE, MAURICE TAONEZVI VAMBE, ZOE NORRIDGE and ISIDORE DIALA.Nigeria: HEBN

This issue of African Literature Today focuses on new novels by emerging as well as established African novelists.This is a seminal work that discusses the validity of the perception that the new generation of African novelists is remarkably different in vision, style, and worldview from the older generation. The contention is that the oldergeneration novelists who were too close to the colonial period in Africa had invariably made culture-conflict and little else their dominant thematic concern while the younger generation novelists are more versatile in their thematic preoccupations, and are more global in their vision and style. Do the facts in the novels justify and validate these claims? The 13 papers in this volume have been carefully selected to consider these issues.Brenda Cooper a renowned literary scholar from Cape Town writes on Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Purple Hibiscus, while Charles Nnolim writes about Adichie's more recent novel Half of a Yellow Sun; Omar Sougou of Universite GastonBerger, Senegal discusses 'ambivalent inscriptions' in Buchi Emecheta's later novels; Clement Okafor of the University of Maryland, addresses the theme of 'racial memory' in Isidore Okpewho's Call Me By My Rightful Name, juxtaposed between the world of the old and the realities of the present. Joseph McLaren, Hofstra University, New York, discusses Ngugi's latest novel, Wizard of the Crow, while Machiko Oike, Hiroshima University, Japan looksat a new theme in African adolescent literature, 'youth in an era of HIV/AIDS'. There is abundant evidence of the contrasts and diversities which characterize the African novel not only geographically, but also ideologically andgenerationally.ERNEST EMENYONU is Professor of the Department of Africana Studies University of Michigan-Flint.Nigeria: HEBN

The success of the Caine Prize for African Writing and the growth of online publishing have played key roles in putting the short story in its rightful place within the study and criticism of African literature.African writers have, much more than the critics, recognized the beauty and potency of the short story. Always the least studied in African literature classrooms and the most critically overlooked genre in African literature today, the African short story is now given the attention it deserves. Contributors here take a close look at the African short story to re-define its own peculiar pedigree, chart its trajectory, critique its present state and examineits creative possibilities. They examine how the short story and the novel complement each other, or exist in contradistinction, within the context of culture and politics, history and public memory, legends, myths and folklore.Ernest Emenyonu is Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Michigan-Flint, USA; the editorial board is composed of scholars from US, UK and African universitiesNigeria: HEBN

Examines some of the varied African literary responses to politics and social justice and injustice under colonialism/neocolonialism.In 1965, Chinua Achebe, in his classic essay "The Novelist as Teacher", declared that the "African past - with all its imperfections - was not one long night of savagery from which the early Europeans acting on God's behalf, delivered them." That assertion included a still reverberating sentiment shared by many of the first generation of African writers that it is possible to reclaim that distorted past creatively in order to show and understand "where andwhen the rain started beating Africa".Many genres and forms of literary and cultural production have recalled and recorded and reconfigured that past - many projecting a new confident African future defined by self-determination. The spectrum of that complex engagement, which encompasses critical issues in politics and social justice, provides the basis of this volume, which concludes with tributes to the life and works of Kofi Awoonor.Articles on:Binyavanga Wainaina + Ben Okri & Nationhood + J.M. Coetzee & the Philosophy of Justice + Isidore Okpewho & "Manhood" + Ngugi's Matigari & the Postcolonial Nation + Politics & Women in Irene Salami's MoreThan Dancing + Ayi Kwei Armah's The ResolutionariesErnest Emenyonu is Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Michigan-Flint, USA; the editorial board is composed of scholars from US, UK and African universitiesNigeria: HEBN

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.Originally published in 1971, this was the first volume in the series to focus on a specific theme, in this case the novel, but continues the format of including contributions from both writers and critics. There are articles on:Equiano, Onuora Nzekwu, T.M. Aluko, Ngugi, Sarif Easmon, Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka. The volume also includes a contribution from Ernest Emenyonu asking of African Literature "What does it take to be its critic" plus reviews of Sembene Ousmane's newly published God's Bits of Wood, Mbella Sonne Dipoko's Because of Women

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.First published in 1973, this volume of the series includes a tribute from the Editor to the poet Christopher Okigbo who died fighting in the Biafran War in 1967, and two articles on his poetry. Also discussed are Leopold Senghor,Dennis Brutus, Wole Soyinka, Lenrie Peters and Ferdinand Oyono. The contributions analyse East African poetry, French Algerian poetry, Zulu poetry, and "Rara" chants in Yoruba oral poetry. Donatus I. Nwoga writes a general article on modern African poetry. The new books reviewed include Mazisi Kunene's Zulu Poems and Okot p'Bitek's Two Songs: "Song of Prisoner" and "Song of Malaya" and Taban lo Liyong's Another Nigger Dead.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.First published in 1975, this volume of the series continues in more depth the debate on the role of critics and the purpose of criticism. As Eldred Jones reminds the reader in his Editorial: "African Literature Today has always aimed to be a forum for discussion ... Not surprisingly some opinions have provoked strong reactions. Indeed where there is time reactions are deliberately sought so that differing opinions can appear close to each other....African Literature Today is happy to serve as the threshing floor."The lively exchanges on who is best placed to judge African literature and how best to teach it continue both in responding articles and in the Comments section of the volume. Eldred Jones again embraces this debate and is reminded of the Igbo proverb: "The world is like a mask dancing; if you want to see it well you must not stand in one place."

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.First published in 1976, this volume has a focus on African drama and carries an introductory article by Ghanaian poet and playwright J.C. de Graft. There are three articles on Wole Soyinka's work as a playwright and an article onthe dramatic works of Ama Ata Aidoo, as well as an article on four dramatists from East Africa. The dilemmas of the popular playwright are discussed in an article on two Zambian writers and Eldred Jones's Editorial gives examplesfrom Sierra Leone of the challenges faced by more "popular" playwrights and those with the more "literary" concerns of publication.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.This volume, first published in 1980, provides an overview of the way myth and history have influenced both the literature of Africa and individual writers. Isidore Okpewho, Solomon O. Iyasere and Mazisi Kunene contribute here onmyth, oral tradition and African cosmological systems. Armah's vision of history is examined both in the way that it appears in his novels and in comparison with Ouologuem and Soyinka; also examined are Elechi Amadi's view of thegods, Achebe's use of myth in Arrow of God and the inward journey of Tutuola's Palm-Wine Drinkard. There are views across the Atlantic of the way the Middle Passage resonates in the work of Edouard Glissant and in the work of a number of writers from West Africa.

The re-issue of archival volumes ALT 1 to ALT 14 makes the complete series available and provides the historical perspective of these early contributions to the literature and its criticism.In his Editorial to African Literature Today 12, first published in 1982, Eldred Jones laments the death of Camara Laye and gives tribute to him as one of the pioneers of African literature. The volume celebrates new writers whose works "have not received much critical attention either because they are relatively new, or because not being what might be described as mainstream they may unintentionally, perhaps, have been damned with faint praise or neglect." There are contributions on the works of Gabriel Okara, Robert Serumaga, Hamidou Kane and John Munonye, and emerging as significant new voices are playwrights Femi Osofisan and Ola Rotimi, and feminist writer Mariama Bâ.

Contributors analyse the theories behind children's literature, its functions and cultural significance, and suggest the new directions this literature is taking in terms of its craft, themes and intentions.Africa's encounter with the West and its implications and consequences remain far-reaching and enduring in the craft and thrust of its creative writers. The contributors to ALT 33 analyse the connections between traditional stories and myths that have been told to children, as well as the work of contemporary creative writers who are writing for children in order that they understand this complex history. Some of these writers are developing traditional myths, folk tales, and legends and are writing them in new forms, while others focus on the encounter with the West that has dominated much modern African literature for adults.The previous neglect of the cultural significance, study, criticism and teaching of children's literature is addressed in this volume: How can the successes and/or failures of stories and story-telling for children in Africa be measured? Are there models to be followed and whatmakes them models? What is the relationship between the text and the illustration of children's books? What should guide the reader or critic of children's literature coming out of Africa - globalism, transculturality or internalregionalism? What problems confront teachers, students, publishers and promoters of children's books in Africa?Ernest Emenyonu is Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Michigan-Flint, USA; the editorial board is composed of scholars from US, UK and African universities.Reviews Editor: Obi Nwakanma HEBN: Nigeria

Imagined or actual returns to a "homeland" in African literature are examined in relation to changing concepts of identity, belonging, migration and space.This special issue focuses on literary texts by African writers in which the protagonist returns to his/her "original" or ancestral "home" in Africa from other parts of the world. Ideas of return - intentional and actual - have been a consistent feature of the literature of Africa and the African diaspora: from Equiano's autobiography in 1789 to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's 2013 novel Americanah. African literature has represented returnees in a range of locations and dislocations including having a sense of belonging, being alienated in a country they can no longer recognize, or experiencing a multiple sense of place. Contributors, writing on literature from the 1970s to thepresent, examine the extent to which the original place can be reclaimed with or without renegotiations of "home".GUEST EDITORS: HELEN COUSINS, Reader in Postcolonial Literature at Newman University, Birmingham, UK; PAULINE DODGSON-KATIYO, was formerly Head of English at Newman University, Birmingham, UK, and Dean of the School of Arts at Anglia Ruskin University.Series Editor: Ernest Emenyonu is Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Michigan-Flint, USA.Reviews Editor: Obi Nwakanma

Imagined or actual returns to a "homeland" in African literature are examined in relation to changing concepts of identity, belonging, migration and space.This special issue focuses on literary texts by African writers in which the protagonist returns to his/her "original" or ancestral "home" in Africa from other parts of the world. Ideas of return - intentional and actual - have been a consistent feature of the literature of Africa and the African diaspora: from Equiano's autobiography in 1789 to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's 2013 novel Americanah. African literature has represented returnees in a range of locations and dislocations including having a sense of belonging, being alienated in a country they can no longer recognize, or experiencing a multiple sense of place. Contributors, writing on literature from the 1970s to the present, examine the extent to which the original place can be reclaimed with or without renegotiations of "home".

As well as a rare examination of Egyptian literature, this volume includes a non-themed section of Featured Articles and a Literary Supplement.Creativity has flourished in Egypt, a historically important and strategically located North African country and a leading nation in the Arab world. The main focus in this volume is to examine Egyptian writers, especially those whose works have enriched African Literature through their depiction of historical, cultural and socio-political forces such as Naguib Mahfouz, Yusuf Idris, Nawal El Saadawi, Ahdaf Soueif, Tawfiq al-Hakim and Alifa Rifaat (Fatimah Rifaat). Writing in both Arabic and the English language, their thematic concerns have been as versatile as they have been controversial. Nawal El Saadawi provides a Foreword to the volume and an interview.This volume also includes a non-themed section of Featured Articles and a Literary Supplement.Volume Editor: Ernest N. EmenyonuSeries Editor: Ernest N. Emenyonu is Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Michigan-Flint, USA.Reviews Editor: Obi Nwakanma

ALT 36 turns a "queer eye" on Africa, offering provocative (re-)readings of texts to position formerly erased sexualities and contemporary sexual expression among Africans on the continent, and abroad.Debates on the future of the African continent and the role of gender identities in these visions are increasingly present in literary criticism forums as African writers become bolder in exploring the challenges they face and celebrating gender diversity in the writing of short stories, novels, poetry, plays and films. Controversies over the rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, Intersex, Queer (LGBTIQ) communities in Africa, as elsewhere, continue inthe context of criminalization and/or intimidation of these groups. Residual colonial moralizing and contemporary western identity norms and politics vie with longstanding polyvalent indigenous sexual expression. In addition to traditional media, the new social media have gained importance, both as sources of information exchange and as sites of virtual construction of gender identities. As with many such contentious issues, the variety of responses to the"state of the question" is strikingly visible across the continent. In this issue of ALT, guest editor John Hawley has sampled the ongoing conversations, in both African writing and in the analysis of contemporary African cinema,to show how queer studies can break with old concepts and theories and point the way to new gender perspectives on literary and cinematic output.This volume also includes a non-themed section of Featured Articles anda Literary Supplement.Guest Editor: John C. Hawley is Professor in the Department of English, Santa Clara UniversitySeries Editor: Ernest N. Emenyonu is Professor of Africana Studies at the University of Michigan-Flint, USA.Reviews Editor: Obi Nwakanma