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Writing residency turning point
for contemporary African writers By Tinashe
Mushakavanhu
IN February 2001, a
British Council writing residency held at the University of
Makerere, Uganda, became a turning point for contemporary African
writing.
A report produced on that residency by the British
poet, Dr Graham Mort, providing an analysis of Ugandan literature
showed a lack of educational opportunities for young African
writers, lack of publishing opportunities and a limited awareness of
contemporary literature in English.
This resulted in the
British Council and Lancaster University (UK) developing a creative
writing scheme, now called the Crossing Borders Creative Writing
Project.
The project is designed to link new and established
writers in Africa with experienced mentors in the UK and to develop
their work through a series of distance-learning tutorials carried
out by email.
Crossing Borders aims to break the isolation
of young African writers, promoting writing development, library
usage, cultural exchange and a greater knowledge of contemporary
literature in English.
The course does not try to create
instant "best sellers" but its real value lies in its presenting
writers with a chance on thinking deeply on their writing, develop
their works, and in doing that, share their experiences with other
people from other worlds.
Globalisation is not just a
mechanical concept. It is literary in the sense that all humanity is
one regardless of skin colour and geographical placing.
It
is therefore important for young writers to write works that relate
to themselves and the broader world surrounding them.
Through the use of Information Technology (IT), the course
will create a new kind of cultural exchange in a virtual forum which
can convey a unique liberty from spatial and temporal constraints.
The essence of Crossing Borders is that it is personal —
tutors and participants interact on a one-on-one basis.
As
writers spend long periods alone, working on their own texts, at
some point they need to have their works read by others.
Crossing Borders is just training ground for learning the
confidence to push one’s work out there, into the world.
It
also provides cultural contact between Africa and the West. What
Crossing Borders provides is the platform for cross-cultural
developmental dialogue between emergent African writers writing in
English and experienced UK based mentors, who are published writers
and poets.
The programme consists of six assignments over
nine months, after which participants are invited to a series of
live workshops carried out by one of the mentors.
This year,
Menna Elfyn, a Welsh poet will be in Harare from 23 February to 2
March conducting writing workshops. M. Wynn Thomas describes her as
"one of the most significant poets writing in Wales.Her conspicuous
moral and political commitments, international in scope, are always
underwritten by her prior commitment to language.
"Hers is a
subtle politics of parable rather than polemic, and a style in which
vulnerability is the other face of daring".
Her two
published bilingual poetry volumes are Cell Angel and Cusan Dyn
Ball. Blind Man’s Kiss.
Crossing Borders was introduced in
Zimbabwe in 2003 and has since expanded to other countries including
Cameroon, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, South Africa and Zambia.
That the project can yield results is true.
Already
some of the participants have made significant achievements. Farayi
Nyandoro, one of the first participants received a Nama honours for
the most outstanding first book published between November 2003 to
December 2004.
Late last year, a number of Zimbabwean
writers taking part in the Crossing Borders project dominated a
newly launched international prize, the Sable/Arvon Writing
Competition. Adrian Ashley won the first prize and will be going to
London in April for an Arvon writing residency.
Christopher
Mlalazi and, yes Tinashe Mushakavanhu were some of the writers who
received the ‘highly recommended’ accolade. Other former
participants include Blessing Musariri, Fungai Tichawangana,
Ruzvidzo Mupfudza, Dakarai Mashava, Ethel Kabwato, Gabriel Gidi, etc
Zimbabwe’s project administrator is award-winning author and
British Council assistant operations director, Ignatius Mabasa.
Should you have any comments or suggestions feel free to
write to tinsmush@yahoo.com.
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