‘My book is a challenge to the immigrant story’

Your new novella, Like a Mule Bringing Ice Cream to the Sun, is coming eight years after your debut novel, In Dependence. Why did it take that long to produce another book? I could answer this in many ways but let me say first, that some stories come to the boil quickly, while others require […]

Your new novella, Like a Mule Bringing Ice Cream to the Sun, is coming eight years after your debut novel, In Dependence. Why did it take that long to produce another book?
I could answer this in many ways but let me say first, that some stories come to the boil quickly, while others require a longer cooking. Morayo, the protagonist of my story was always going to require the slow simmer. Meanwhile, during the past eight years, my life has been filled with a variety of civic, community and family responsibilities in which teaching, editing and the writing of essays, articles and short stories have played a significant part. This is the ‘writer’s unique journey’, without which there would be no stories.

Is the character of Morayo Da Silva rather interesting. How did she come to you, what about her made you decide to write about her?
As I’ve grown older, I’ve begun to think more about ageing and mortality. I looked for fiction featuring older women as main characters, but found few. Yet in real life I was meeting many interesting older women. Toni Morrison once said, if you cannot find a story then you must write it. I’ve done what she suggested.

This is not a typical immigrant story one would expect of a Nigerian living in San Francisco. Morayo is very much grounded and yet retains a strong Nigerianness, if I may say so. Did you set out to challenge the immigrant narrative with this?
What is the “typical immigrant story,” I wonder. What do we mean by “typical”?  Is there a typical American story, for example, or a typical war story, or a typical love story? To me there is no “typical” immigrant story, only a paucity of stories written about immigrants. When I set out to write my latest book, I found few stories about older women, and even fewer about older, black women. These were the stories that I wanted to read, but was not finding. This was not a challenge to immigrant stories, but rather, an addition to and an enlargement of them.

A challenge it is indeed. And you specifically chose an exploration of aging as the medium to do this.
Yes, aging in itself was of interest but so was the invisibility that comes with aging, particularly in societies that celebrate youth above all else.  The more invisible a character is, the more interested I am in them. Many of the characters in Like a Mule Bringing Ice Cream to the Sun are marginalized for one reason or another – whether due to race, age, socioeconomic status or gender.

Nostalgia plays an important role in Morayo’s journey across the book, her recollections of Jos, her home city, which incidentally is yours and mine as well, and what it has become in the last few years for instance. How deeply did the unrest in Jos influence you as a person? And was Morayo a medium for conveying some of these frustrations or disenchantment?
The unrest in Jos and beyond saddens me greatly, as it does for my character, Morayo. It underlines the fact that we can never take peace and stability for granted and that if we neglect to take proper care of people in society, we do so at our own peril. America, where I currently live, is no exception.

For me as a reader, I was longing to hear more from Caesar. Why did you feel it wasn’t necessary for the readers to know more about him?
Let’s blame that on Morayo, shall we? Can’t you just hear her saying, “This was my story, not Caesar’s! And, quite frankly, it’s time that S.L.M. put women to the front and center in her work. Men have plenty to say in In Dependence and in her short stories – Mr. Wonder, Girlfriend, and Zvakwana. Enough is enough.”

One thing that stands out in this book is the prose, it is delectable. Was this something you aimed for before setting out to write the book or was it something that happened along the way?
Thank you. I was aiming to write the best book that I could and am delighted to hear that you enjoyed the writing so much.

I certainly did and I hoped it would go on for longer. Which perhaps is why I think many people will be asking you this: Why a novella? Why not a full-length novel?
To which I reply, why not? When I read a book these days, I don’t decide on what to read based on length. Do you? I simply want to read a good book. The mark of a great book to me is twofold. It must be un-put-down-able and I must want to re-read it almost as soon as I’ve finished it. I admire the 145 pages of Toni Morrison’s novel, Home just as much as I do the 672 pages of David Grossman’s To the End of the Land.

Do you think that the narrative scope of the African novelist is expanding, especially having read a lot of African novels as a judge of the Etisalat Prize, or as Ben Okri mentioned in his article for The Guardian, that the African writer is being streamlined into a particular narrative channel that focuses on certain “African issues”?
I believe that we all have a role to play in expanding the scope of African stories. If we want to move beyond the “typical,” and/or “the single story” then publishers, readers and writers alike, must insist on more variety. Just as importantly, we need to support those institutions, writers, and prizes that are trying to encourage and nurture the necessary expansion.

Did you think about this before deciding to commit to an African publisher like Cassava Republic, because perhaps you feel they will have greater respect for your story, for the merit of it, not because of certain considerations?
Yes.