INTERVIEW

Dubem Okafor: The Sentinel Interview

Nnorom Azuonye:  You have written extensively on Christopher Okigbo. You were his friend. Many years after Don’t Let Him Die, and The Dance of Death, do you have fresh thoughts on Okigbo and his continued influence on African poetry?

Dubem Okafor: Okigbo was not my friend; he was my uncle. And, as you say, I have thought and written extensively on him. I have some more thoughts about his works, the latest of which I incorporated in the brief essay I did on “Okigbo as Cultural Globalist,” which was presented at the Boston International Conference on Okigbo, organized by Professor Chukwuma Azuonye.

Azuonye: For the benefit of those who may read this interview who did not have an opportunity to attend the Okigbo conference, what are the key issues or points you address in “Okigbo as Cultural Globalist”?

Okafor: Okigbo’s upbringing, his education from elementary through university, his self-education, his travels, his occupations, all prepared him for life as cultural globalist, as world citizen.

Azuonye:  I started this interview with the Okigbo question because you are one of those poets that appear to have been greatly influenced by him. Would you say you have been able to forge a distinct Okafor voice and style?

Okafor: Actually, in spite of the vast influence of Okigbo on my life and thoughts, I have tried to forge my own distinct voice as a writer. But, the lyrical impulse, which I got from Okigbo, remains an abiding feature of my poetry. So, whether I am writing poetry of social commentary, or otherwise, the lyricism persists.

Azuonye: For the benefit of those who may read this interview who did not have an opportunity to attend the Okigbo conference, what are the key issues or points you address in “Okigbo as Cultural Globalist”?

Okafor: Okigbo’s upbringing, his education from elementary through university, his self-education, his travels, his occupations, all prepared him for life as cultural globalist, as world citizen.

Azuonye: I am going to ask a long-winded question now. Many scholars like you that have grown through the last fifty years to be strong voices in African literature live outside the continent. You touch on this a little in Meditations on African Literature. Many of you teach African Literature in non-African universities. Who exactly are your students? What do they do with what you teach them? How authentic are the experiences you impart on them given what distance can do to memories?

Okafor: Many of my students are American; some are African American, and a few of them are African. First and foremost, they are exposed to the poetry of the greatest poets from Africa. Their horizon is thus broadened. And they learn first-hand from an African (and American) writer and scholar. Even though I have lived and taught on these alien shores for twenty-one years now, I believe that I still retain the core of Africanness, which makes what I teach the students really authentic.

Azuonye: If one of your students should ask you what makes African poetry stand apart from the poetry of the rest of the world, what would you say?

Okafor: I think it is the commitment to the social. African poetry, like African Art generally, is committed to social commentary, to social criticism, to a condemnation of social injustice, to the denunciation of the greed and misdeeds of those in power or on the corridors of power. So, social functionality makes African poetry stand out amongst poetry that merely sings of beauty or “sings idle songs of an idle day.”

Azuonye: What are the major challenges you face in your work as a writer and teacher of African literature?

Okafor: The main challenge is the general lack of enthusiasm for African Literature. There is some, don’t get me wrong, but not quite enough. Then, there is the tendency to still read African literature as anthropologism, as social-historical documents, that may or may not have any real aesthetic value.

Azuonye:  Do you read offerings from younger Nigerian poets at all? Who do you read more, those living and writing on the continent or those living abroad?

Okafor: I try to read “good stuff” from both those that are also here and those that live on continental Africa. That way one does not lose touch with the currents of African literary productions.

Azuonye:  Have you been drawn publicly or privately into making generational debates on Nigerian poets? In your opinion, is there a 3^rd generation of Nigerian poets or not?

Okafor: Definitely, there is a third wave of new Nigerian writing, though I have not been drawn into the generational debates, as you call them. The first wave, including Achebe, Soyinka, Okigbo (late), Bekederemo (JP Clark), Michael J.C. Echeruo, Kalu Uka, etc., continues to produce; the second wave, including Chukwuma Azuonye, Chimalum Nwankwo, Dubem Okafor, Tanure Ojaide, Niyi Osundare, Ossie Enekwe, Obiora Udechukwu, Akomaye Oko, Ogonna Agu, Femi Osofisan, Ify Amadiume, Stephen Vincent, Pol Ndu (late), Kevin Echeruo (late), etc., is prolific, but has not achieved the name and fame of the first generation. The third wave may well surpass us all in the sheer quantity and quality of their works. And, I suspect, there may well have started, a fourth wave!

Azuonye: What are the things that will bother you enough these days to warrant writing poems?

Okafor: Social injustice and inequities!

Azuonye: What were you thinking when you titled your 2005 book of poetry Tsunami, Katrina and Other Poems?

Okafor: I was thinking of the unprecedented natural disasters that did overwhelm us in 2004 and 2005.

Azuonye:  Do you have a recollection of the precise moment you decided that you would become a writer? What was the trigger?

Okafor: No, I just wrote! I remember, when I was in high school, doing secondary class two, I would write, borrow money from my mother to have my manuscripts typed, and go from one newspaper or magazine publisher to another, asking to be published. Of course, the heavily-starched editors always politely dismissed the upstart youthful writer, who presumed he could get published at his age! I must have been eleven or twelve then.

Azuonye: How much do you draw from the Igbo culture in your writing?

Okafor: Not much, except those things that are residues of the cultural doxa, a common inheritance that remains more or less beyond the level of consciousness.

Azuonye: Do you make the time to give public readings of your poetry and do you share the view that a poem’s life is incomplete until it has been read by/to a discerning audience?

Okafor: Yes, I give as many public readings as I can be invited to. And it is true that poetry, being a dialectical project, comes to life only when a reader engages it in a process of transaction.

Azuonye: Do you write any fiction at all?

Okafor: My excursion into fiction ended during my graduate studies days, when I was doing the MA under Professor Gerald Moore. He warned me that my fiction on the Nigeria-Biafra war, which I was wont to read to the group at our weekly seminars, was not going to be a substitute for an MA thesis. I quickly put whatever I had written away and have not revisited it since.

Azuonye: What has happened to your Books for Black Children project anyway?

Okafor: Books for Black Children, Inc., a project I started and financed, fell by the wayside, after we had brought out three books, as it became unsustainable without any outside funding. But, I have more that compensated for that sad loss with the founding of Multicultural and Literacy Institute (MALI), now in its seventh year, with two fully functioning Learning Centers, catering to the dire educational needs of our children. It has several components, including: After-school Literacy Program, Family-in-Literacy Program, GED Program, Literacy & Math Tutoring, Teen Mentoring (Teen Corner), Adult-Teen Chess Club, and Summer Literacy & Math Camp.

Azuonye: MALI seems to be quite a project. Are you looking at growing it to have learning centres in Africa as well?

Okafor: As soon as we are able to stand on two feet here, I plan to establish a Learning Center or two in Nigeria.

Azuonye: On that note of hope, I say a very big thank you for taking out time to be our guest this month.

Top  l  Feedback