Achebe, one of the central forces that evolved the true African literature -Professor Nnedi Okorafor

She is indeed an inimitable novelist. Professor Nnedi Okorafor is a Nigerian-American science fiction, culture, fantasy and magical realism writer based in the United States of America..

The professor of Creative Writing at Chicago State University has written over twenty novels, both published and unpublished. In a chat with ADA DIKE, the tall, slim and amiable fiction writer among other issues discloses her love for writing and how she received news about Professor Chinua Achebe’s death.

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Nnedi

Few minutes after she stepped out of an 18-hour flight from South Africa to the United States of America, she became devastated when she heard about Professor Chinua Achebe’s death.

She recalls: “I was so tired and so discombobulated that when I looked out of the window and saw the sun rising, I thought it was actually setting! I was so happy to get off that plane. I went to a social media and announced in my status update that I was back in the States. Seconds later, one of my Nigerian friends commented that Achebe has died.

“This wasn’t even three minutes after stepping off that plane. My legs became weak and my jaw fell open. People around me looked at me worriedly. It was horrible and sad. Achebe lived 82 years. That’s a good chunk of time. And he used that time well. He was one of the central forces that evolved the true voice of African Literature. I know I should have not been as distraught as I was…but I was. Achebe’s job was done, And he’d left us.”

 Achebe’s novel that appeals to her above others is Things Fall Apart. “My favorite will always be Things Fall Apart. It’s such an Igbo narrative. It’s also the tragic narrative of so many African nations. It’s both specific and universal. It’s simple, but complex. And the lessons in the novel still have not been learned. Oh and it’s a great story,” she revealed.

Reacting to the dwindling reading culture in Nigeria and abroad, she noted that the problem is nothing new. “Reading is like a muscle. If you don’t read, the ability to do so will atrophy. This leads to all these people who whine that “reading is boring,” and that they cannot sit for a long period of time and “concentrate on a bunch of words.” It’s sad because the ability to read and enjoy reading helps in other areas in life. People who read are more able to educate themselves, as opposed to needing someone to guide them to explain information. They are better able to study because they have a greater attention span. They can concentrate on things for more extended period of time. They are more relaxed. Reading can be like a form of meditation. Furthermore, those who read have bigger active imaginations.”

Nnedi predicts the future of Nigerian authors in this age that youths prefer chatting on social media to reading book and stresses: “I don’t think these are directly correlated. They serve two separate purposes. However, I do think that it’s up to Nigerian authors to write stories that are both entertaining and thought–provoking. Social media and chatting may force writers to amp up the entertainment factor and more skillfully embed social commentary into their stories so their stories don’t sound clumsily blatantly preachy.”

Born by Igbo parents from Isiekenesi in Imo State, her regular visit to Nigeria with her parents also helped increased her love for writing. She was the one observing, recording and documenting everything that was going on in her family. Nigeria is very much her muse. Whenever she visits Nigeria, by the time she goes back, she has a new novel in her head. She writes a mix of fantasy and science fiction. When she was growing up, everyone in her family knew that if they did anything funny, Nnedi would write about it.

She attended Homewood Flossmoor High School before she proceeded to the University of Illinois, where she studied Rhetoric and graduated in 1996. From there, she got Master of Arts in English from the University of Chicago and also obtained Master of Arts in journalism from Michigan State University in 1999. Nnedi obtained her Doctor of Philosophy in Creative Writing in 2007 from University of Illinois, Chicago.

Her journey into writing is a complicated history because up till when she was 19 years old, she thought she was going to be a doctor or entomologist (Something in the sciences). “My journey into writing is not long, compared to many writers I know. My father was a cardiovascular surgeon and my mother was a registered nurse and midwife holds a PhD in heath administration. I come from a medical/scientific family and I grew up and thought that I would be a veterinarian or an entomologist (I still maintain a fascination with creatures of the earth, especially insects and birds).

“It was in my second year in college in 1994; after someone at the time read a short story I wrote and told me that I might do well in a creative writing course, that I actually realised that I was good at writing stories. At the end of my junior year, after finishing my third class in creative writing, I changed my major to Rhetoric (which was creative writing at my university). I’ve been writing ever since.”

Her first short fiction, a story called Uche, was published in 2000 by an international women’s magazine. The following year Strange Horizons published her short story The Palm Tree Bandit, which ended up receiving an honourable mention in The Year’s Best Horror and Fantasy (14th Ed), and made it into Strange Horizon’s 'Best of' anthology some years later. From that point on, she has had several short stories published and being placed in several writing contests.

She has always been a better novel writer than a short story writer. “Even when I first started writing, I was a lot more attracted to stories that were novel sized as opposed to shorter ones. So all this time that I was getting short stories published, I was writing novels. Actually, many of my short stories came from the novels I was writing. Two stories from my novel have been contest winners, one story was shortlisted for a contest, and two has been published in anthologies. Zahrah the Windseeker is my first published novel, but it’s not the first novel I’ve written. It was my fourth or fifth novel. My other published novels are Long Juju, Ejii the Shadow Speaker. Most of my novels are in some way connected, they may take place in the same world, involve reoccurring characters or the relative of another novel’s main character, and so on. There’s always some interesting connection. I learned that technique from reading Stephen King.”

Her inspiration to write novels comes from people, animals, things and creatures. “The idea of one of my novels came from a time our family friend who came to visit us from Nigeria. He had a nine-year-old daughter and I ended up being the one to stay with her for a while. She was a lively little girl and always had something to say. After that week, I knew I was going to write about her.”

She wrote Long Juju, after her maternal uncle, a story-teller told them about long juju shrine and she got a story from there.

 She has written over twenty novels, most of which will never be published because she believed that she didn't start writing novels in order to get them published. “I wrote them because I couldn't stop the stories from pouring out of me. I’ve had four novel published so far. As stated above, there will be more,” Nnedi asserted.

She declared that Who Fears Death was the most challenging because it was a novel that she wrote from pain. “I started writing it as a way to cope with my father’s death. Then I found myself weaving in some of the most painful and passionate stories that I’d gathered from African women (some men, but mostly women) around me over the years. On top of this, many of the mystical elements of the novel are my own beliefs.”

She took six years to write Who Fears Death and she edited the entire novel over 40 times. She recalls: “It was originally over 700 pages and it took me years to bring it down to 380. And there were writing techniques I learned while writing it that I will apply to all my subsequent works. The novel is unique in many ways and I’m very proud that it’s been published and so well-received.”

She recently signed a contract with the United Kingdom publisher Hodder and Stoughten for a three-book deal. The first book, which will be her latest adult novel titled ‘Lagoon,’ is about an alien invasion in the city of Lagos in 2009 (which happens to also be the year she started writing it). It was originally called Lagos but she changed it to Lagoon (which is what the word “Lagos” means in Portuguese). “I’m very excited about this novel because it’s my most ambitious novel to date, it’s politically-charged and hilarious,” she revealed.

Suggesting on the way forward, she advised the youth to write. “Don’t talk about writing. Don’t whine about writing. Don’t spend all your time obsessing over who wins what award. Write. And then edit. And edit again. Put in the work. Put in the time. Don’t try to get published too early. Don’t focus on making money or receiving praise, focus on being the best writer you can be. And did I say you should edit? Yeah, you should edit.”

To other authors, she urged them to keep writing. “Ben Okri said that, “It is best to write when you feel the need to write.” She believes that inspiration does not always come. Sometimes you have to look for it. She advised them to listen to other people.

In terms of conquering challenges of putting words together to make a novel, she doesn’t have any problem about that because she has too many ideas.

Okorafor’s awards include: 2001 Hurston-Wright literary award, the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa, the Carl Brandon Parallax Award, a Booksense Pick for Winter 2007/2008, a Tiptree Honor Book, the Andre Norton Award, the Golden Duck Award, an NAACP Image Award nominee, the 2011 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel, the 2011 Tiptree Honor Book and the 2007–08 winner of the Macmillan Writer’s Prize for Africa.

It is pertinent to note that Nnedi short stories have been published in anthologies and magazines, including Dark Matter II, Strange Horizons, Moondance magazine, and Writers of the Future Volume XVIII.

In 2009, she donated her archive to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) Collection of the Department of Rare Books and Special Collections at the Northern Illinois University Library.

Her literary icons are Ben Okri, Stephen King, Prof Wole Soyinka, Buchi Emecheta, Octavia Butler, Hayao Miyazaki and Tove Jansson.

Nnedi’s philosophy of life is “Do unto others as you would want them to do unto you.” She unwinds by doing a lot of exercise.

Her dreadlocks, which she has been carrying for over 18 years are long and beautiful.

 As a writer, she views every step (the highs and lows) as part of the same continuum, so she doesn’t really have a “greatest achievement”.