Writing doesn’t know who is ‘woman’ enough

The author of ‘CEOs Wife’ book Pat Wambui signing one of her books at the Kenya Literature Bureau Stand for Rainbow Academy- Zimaman Nairobi pupils during the Nairobi International Book fair at Sarit Centre on 27/09/14. PICTURE BY GOVEDI ASUTSA.

Today, the Goethe Institute hosts some AMKA’s writers in the all-women anthology ‘The Fifth Draft’.

The forum presents a critical forum to discuss women and gender issues in the literary world.

Founded by Dr Lydia Gatirira eight years ago and hosted by Dr Nina Wichmann and Eliphas Nyamogo of the Goethe Institute, AMKA is the only regular (monthly) creative literary workshop in the country.

The three moderators are Gloria Mwaniga, who represents the ‘female’ angle (if there is such an animal in literature, a role previously played by writer/lawyer Riva Jalipa), Dr Tom Odhiambo of the University of Nairobi who acts as the forum’s learned academic and myself as the ‘bad’ Simon Cowell of the session, who brings in the real-life writer experience and slashes and burns away at weak literature, witheringly so.

Lately, though, AMKA has been at the attack end of literary critics like Oumah Otieno who think this tough approach at our AMKA scholarly debates is too macho for our ‘precious and sensitive small sisters’ whose works, even when sub-standard, ‘must be handled sensitively because they have been through so much.’

Mwaniga, the AMKA co-ordinater and convener, was intellectually dismissive of this sentiment as ‘patronising’ and gave him a whiff of the teargas of contempt by calling him a ‘pitiable literary attention seeker who smells out offences where none are intended ... and then nurses the grievance for years.’ We have experienced this type of pathetic literary creatures before, from paranoid poetesses with bi-polar disorders whose neurotic illusions they extend into the realm of reality, to returnee academia feminists from North America who land in Kenya to failure and unacknowledgement, and barren of ideas or industry, pick up cudgels to fight wars against well-meaning men; quixotic if toxic battles.

Not that I think Oumah falls in this serpentine category of ‘feminist,’ nay. I honestly believe because he is a high school teacher of English at the great Nyiwa Girls’ high school, he tends to infantilise, or at least ‘adolescencise’ every woman writer he comes across, including at AMKA.

Call Outs

Yet as writer and PEN member Faith Oneya asks: ‘Should the AMKA forum stop just because of lack of enough texts from women, even though call outs have been made through e-mail, Facebook, mainstream press and the (Goethe) pamphlet for more women to submit and attend the sessions?’

It is the classic case of cattle – that cow that you take to the river, if it refuses to drink, do you poke intravenous tubes through its udder, and force down water?

As Dr Lydia Gatirira of AMKA puts it: ‘Can we just agree that being a woman does not necessarily make one feminist? And, equally, that we have many men who are gender equity champions, including in our AMKA forum, who also believe in a just society that extends across gender boundaries?’

Well known female writer and columnist, Rasna Warah, recently wrote that one of the reasons she likes reading books written by women is because she finds that ‘female writers have a more nuanced approach to the characters they create, are more likely to look at all sides of an issue, have a better grasp of the ‘bigger picture’ and are also more introspective than male writers ...’

Reading my favourite all time novel ‘The Poisonwood Bible’ by Barbara Kingsolver, I find all these elements to be present in the best way possible, but is it because Kingsolver is a ‘Barbara’ as opposed to being Bob?

My favourite all-time short story collection is ‘When the Nines Roll Over’ by David Benioff (now world famous for his TV adaptation of the global dark smash hit series ‘A Game of Thrones’, well worth the watch, of course when not reading). Here are two critics on his short story collection.

David Annard of the Literary Review says: ‘American men are Benioff’s terrain. His style is a pared-down realism enlivened by the occasional fantastic flourish that reveals the author’s complex relationship with fiction.’

Ann Patchett, herself a well-known writer says, ‘Benioff displays a profound understanding of how single moments lead to transformation and how sadness can be illuminated by humour. In this book, he has taken the world and cut it into hard, bright diamonds. His stories are luminous.’

Which makes Warah’s wide observation, while seemingly sound on the surface when one digs deeper, to be so broad, sweeping and general a gender statement as to the point of not to be taken seriously.

Aspiring writer Corrie Kisilu says: “Women in our writing don’t tend to filter ... and, yes, it could be because of our intuitive nature. Most times when I write, I just choose to pen rawness in its pure honesty – because I feel like it is through these truths that I find self fulfillment in my literature.”

If Corrie came to AMKA, we would advice her that all professional writing is actually sieved through a ferocious ‘craft’ filter, far removed from the intuitive creativity that is the spark of all our stories.

We would teach her that ‘penned rawness’ is just for the first draft, be brutally (and hopefully, helpfully) honest about her literature and tell her ‘self fulfillment’ is for drawer navel-gazing fake ‘novelists’ but not for serious writers seeking publication and a wider audience of readers out in the world.

At this point, Ms. Kisilu could choose to do one of two things.

Go away, huffing and puffing, never to return to AMKA and continue with the writing that leads to ‘self fulfillment.’

Own Words

Or be like Muthoni wa Gichuru who, in her own words in another newspaper, moved to Nairobi in 2011 and became a regular at AMKA. “When I thought I was ready, I submitted my first short story for critique, and it was trashed. I went home furious, but then told myself I could do better. The next time I submitted a story, I heard with pride the favourable criticism. I had listened and learned (creative text technique) at AMKA and become a far better writer.”

Last year, Muthoni wa Gichuru’s short story was one of the 22 shortlisted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize from more than 4,000 entries all over the world.

This year she will be one of the three Burt Prize for African writing award winners alongside Dr. Goro wa Kamau, and myself. As we are all going for the gold, ‘may the best wo/man win.’

But that is what AMKA is all about – making winners, instead of whiners, out of our women writers.