Elechi Amadi, celebrated author:Militancy okay if leaders...

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*Says ‘I had my own share of women’
* ‘How reading culture collapsed’

IN this interview, Dr Elechi Amadi, one of Africa’s foremost writers, takes a critical look at the problem of militancy in the Niger Delta. He also laments the declining quality of education in the country, saying the military should be blamed just as he urged government at all levels to take practical steps to rescue the sector from total collapse.

Authors had recently gathered to honour him. At the event in the University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State governor, Rotimi Amaechi, an English graduate of the university, offered to build a fresh faculty of humanities in the school to be named after Amadi, an offer the body of writers under the aegis of Association of Nigeria Authors (ANA) lauded.

Mr. Miesoinuma Minima, the state chairman of ANA captured the reaction of writers in the country when he said, “Since writers are not politicians, they are hardly celebrated. This has changed from now, that was the verdict by writers and lovers of literature.

Writers are the conscience of society. And no society has developed and survived without its writers. In fact, let me use this medium to thank and heartily congratulate our visionary governor, Chibuike Amaechi, for his decision to honour a great man, Dr. Elechi Amadi, and in a very particular way. I was humbled because while we were trying to endow a literary prize in his honour, our governor thought better: he has embalmed his name in a new Faculty of Humanities.

This is not a coincidence. It is only a literary mind that can appreciate what the soul of man is. It is not food and drink and politics that make a durable society, but the bright ideas. Rotimi Amaechi knows this,. As a literary student, he sojourned amongst bright minds of old and drank of the water of wisdom.

The celebration of Elechi Amadi, has given fresh hope to the young ones, that there is something that is permanent.” Among other issues, Elechi, author of The Concubine, spoke on how he felt about the honour. Excerpts:



RECENTLY, the literary world gathered in Port Harcourt to bestow honor on you.. Tell us how you felt?

I felt very elated. Writers usually are very shy in this matter because one feels that one has not arrived. But if your friends and peers say you should be celebrated, then you just have to obey and thank them for the gesture.

How long have you been writing? And what are some of your celebrated works?

I should say about fifty years. And the celebrated works are the Great Ponds, The Slave, Isiburu Pepper Soup, the Woman of Calabar, the Sunset in Biafra, A War Diary, and my philosophical work, Ethics in Nigerian Culture

You read physics. Tell us what stimulated your love for writing ?

As I always tell people, we have doctors, architects, engineers, etc, writing. So it is not strange but the thing is that some people have the gift in them; they feel like writing and go into it.

At what age did you start writing?
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Dr. Elechi Amadi
Well, my first serious poem was published in 1953 when I was 19. I was influenced by the school I attended. We had a beautiful library full of the classics and then we read a lot.

As a growing child, did you see any writer as a mentor?
Well! Eh, we were brought up in the English tradition. We read English novels and had to pass exams on them. So we were elated for the first time when we saw Nigerians writing novels, we felt excited when Cyprian Ekwensi published his Jaguar Nana in 1954 or thereabouts, I was very excited. And then I read it straight away because that was the first Nigerian novel that I read. Later on Achebe published Things Fall Apart.

Tell us what growing was like for you?
Growing was very pleasant.I grew in the village, Aluu, in Rivers State under the loving care of both parents. I took part in village activities. I was very much at home. I enjoyed a very pleasant childhood. We went hunting, fishing, wrestling and dancing. I was not a notable wrestler but like all other young people I wrestled. So, my childhood was very pleasant and what is more that is relevant to my writing is that I imbibed a lot of the culture of my people. And when the urge to write came, I naturally wrote about them.

Were your parents educated?
Not really. My parents were not literate. But my father recognized the importance of schooling and he did not hesitate to send me to school as soon as the opportunity arose. At the age of six, I was in school already and did not look back until I graduated at Ibadan under University of London. And he did not spare any pains when it came to my education. He was a successful farmer.

Were you relatively heady as a growing child, and may be it got you the strokes of the cane?

Eh! Well I won’t say stubborn. I was quiet. And like all children, I could stick to my gun once in a while. Generally, I think I was quiet and very reserved. I remember one particular case; we were all playing as children with stones and throwing sticks at nothing in particular. One of those missiles hit a small goat which died. Then, of course, my daddy was very angry. And I ran away. He had to go and apologize to the owner. Eventually I was forced to go and say I was sorry that it was an accident.

Let us demystify Elechi, the writer a little. No doubt, with the height you must have attracted good attention in your youth days. What was it like with the opposite sex?

(Laughs long, looking shy) That is a very intimate question. Well, like many people, I had my share of women companionship. I was not shy with women. I did not find them particularly difficult to get along with. Let me leave it at that (laughs again).

Do you cook?
Yes I do because I had to live away from my village for my Standards III, IV, V and VI. I had to go to Igwuruta for my Standards III and IV, and Isiokpo for Standards V and VI. So I had to cook and fend for myself.

Tell us a few things you can cook?
I can cook vegetable soup; I can also make Ewedu and that stew that could last for a whole week; with the stew you could eat anything.

Looking at reading culture, will you say it is dropping?
Yes, it has fallen. In our days, we were brought up to read a lot outside our text books. But, today, largely because of the fallen standard of education brought about by insufficient attention to education especially by the military, reading culture gradually dwindled to a stage where there are no libraries in schools and outside. So the children read handout and text books.

This is not reading culture. And, as a result, you publish a novel, unless it is read as recommended text, nobody reads it. Unless you are lucky to have a real good novel which everybody enjoys like The Concubine which is read in and outside the school, then nobody reads it.

How will this problem be addressed?
Yes, it has to do with taking a fresh look at education and doing something about it; not just talking about it. You find our rulers will come, say they will do this for education, it is a priority; go to the primary schools, you find there is no teaching going on. Classrooms have fallen into disuse; there are no desks for the children to write.

And no teachers. So when they talk and you go to the villages to see the reality, you see that there is a great gap between what they say and what they do. The thing to do is to go back to the root. Pay teachers well. You have to start with the elementary schools, move on to secondary. Ensure there are libraries for goodness sake.

Teachers to me are the first workers in any state. They should be given every consideration, be paid promptly and be given conducive conditions to make their jobs enjoyable. When I was commissioner for education, the first thing I did was to ensure that every teacher was paid on the 24th of every month. From the beginning of the month, I was on the neck of the accountant to get his list ready. And I tell you it yielded returns.

Will you say this decline is also being witnessed in writing?

Not really. Publications are coming up daily. I know because I attend Association of Nigeria Authors (ANA) meetings regularly. My house is flooded with manuscripts from young writers who want to be guided.

Let’s look at militancy in the Niger Delta.
Militancy is fine so long as those leading the militants have the intellectual capacity to know where they are going. But, situations where you have a mob ready to pillage and kill, kidnap, then that is debased militancy. An enlightened militancy is one that gets the people aware of their rights and motivates them to fight for their rights, this has nothing to do with weapons and guns but by movements. And you get the same result and even quicker.

Going to kill people, kidnap, we don’t now know who is fighting for the region and who is fighting for his pocket. Though, militancy in the region has got government to be aware of the problem, that was in the early stages. Thereafter, the thing was taken over by brigands. The whole movement has been severely bastardized. The image of militants has worsened. They should go back to what it was before, get enlightened leadership which can now parley strongly with government

Do you support the use of force to tackle the problem of militancy in the region?
Military option at best is a half solution. The real solution is to get down and talk with the genuine militants. Because the way they are carrying on it is not even in the interest of the area. Government has not constructed roads, done this or that, government now says we want to construct road to Bonny, they bring contractors, you kidnap him, you kill some. What type of militancy is that? How can you ever get the attention and facility you want? So what we need is enlightened militancy that abhors violence, kidnapping, murder and the rest of that.

What advice do you have for upcoming writers?
What I say is, read extensively. Unless you are a voracious reader, you can hardly be a writer. You want to write poetry, read a lot of good books, poems by the master poets. Is it drama? Then read a lot about good plays by the master dramatists. If you don’t read extensively you can’t write well. My advice is, read a lot, don’t be in a rush, quietly you put down points. That way you are likely to produce reasonable books.

There is so much complaint from young writers that they can’t access notable publishing houses. What is the way out?

The way out is for you to get a publisher anywhere. There are publishers who will get a good book published and pay you royalties. But out of a thousand novels written every year, you may find only fifty good enough for any publisher to accept. You know publishing is a bet because you are saying, ‘I think this book will sell. I am ready to get funds to publish this and get my profit’. Self publishing is also bringing into circulation availability of reading materials.

Any word for the nation?
The thing that strikes my mind is the excessive materialism that is driving our nation. So much emphasis on wealth, property, flamboyance. It is not very good that we lay emphasis on the wrong things.

Curled from Vanguard Newspapers: Written by JIMITOTA ONOYUME - Sunday, 19 October 2008