This week’s guest: Ken Ike Okere. Slammaster, Abuja Literary Society

He has worked as Correspondent of This Week/Houston Chronicle – the largest daily newspaper in Texas; and as Editor of the African News Digest – the African community news weekly in Texas. For more than 10 years, Ken has been active in the promotion of the regeneration of our communities through literary consciousness and excellence. […]

He has worked as Correspondent of This Week/Houston Chronicle – the largest daily newspaper in Texas; and as Editor of the African News Digest – the African community news weekly in Texas.

For more than 10 years, Ken has been active in the promotion of the regeneration of our communities through literary consciousness and excellence.

He is popularly known as the Slam Master in Nigerian literary circles.

A Theatre and Media Arts graduate of the University of Calabar, Nigeria, Ken also holds a Masters degree in Communications from the Texas Southern University, Houston TX.

Ken Ike Okere is a poet and what makes him so profound, I believe, is the fact that he is also a big reader. In addition to his many interests, his literary pedigree sets him apart. As Abuja Literary Society (ALS) slam master, he has been grooming many young writers in Abuja for many years and providing a vibrant literary platform through ALS’s many achievers. But when I asked him what he is currently reading, his answer showed him up as a big reader. ‘What am Ireading, where?’ he retorted. ‘In the bathroom, in my living room, in the office or when I am being driven’. Okay, let’s leave it there. Enjoy!!!

CURRENTLY READING;

Onukaba Adinoyi Ojo’s The Killing Swamps; Bill Cosby’s Love and Marriage, Hilarious book; and a young writer who just won the association of Nigeria author’s prize for drama, Isaac Otah Ogazi, his book Waiting for savon.

What book do you wish you had written?

Nagoub Mahfouz’s Cairo Trilogy, ‘It blew me off the roof’. Craft, content, style and staying power above all, carrying a story from beginning to a logical conclusion over decades, over generation without losing steam. It’s a book I can read again and again.

What is that book you never finished reading?

I did not finish Camara Laye’s African Child. I don’t know why but looking back, maybe it’s about translations. It was translated from French. I found it very labyrinthine, it was not resonating. I plan to read it again after many years of trying. This is not to say the book is bad, but at the time I read it, maybe I was not in a mental state to appreciate it.

This also happened to me with The Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born, by Ayi Kwei Armah. More recently, because of the work I do in the literary world, I have received lots of books from aspiring writers, some of them frankly, I am unable to go beyond a few pages. People need not rush to publish. These books should have come to me for assessment before publication. Editors are still very key towards putting out a good book.

Five Favourite Books

1) The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. I like his applied spirituality. He just does not preach but he takes a story, tells it excellently intriguingly like a thriller and yet when you finish, unlike ordinary pedantic thrillers, it remains with you forever and can change you. The stories are so compelling and the characters visual but more importantly for the self-development one needs become apparent. His books are epiphanous.

2) In the same line for non-fiction and for the same reasons of epiphany, knowledge and self-development- In the Light of Truth by Abdul Rushin throws light on all subjects of human existence in contemporary times. I read the meanings and I get a eureka moment always. These are the books by my bedside all the time. The sheer clarity of the book is amazing.

3) For poetry, my favourite poet of all time is Niyi Osundare. Songs of My Season is one of those I like. Monsoons is my favourite collection of all time. I like his newer poems more than the older ones. Folkloric poetry at its best, the kind of poetry I love and also write. He is the master of personification. My biggest example of what it means to be culturally situated and yet be a world citizen. He is not aping any so-called foreign styles.

4) Ken Saro Wiwa’s A Forest of Flowers, one of my all time favourite short story collections. Ken, like most of the masters of the short story genre is perfect at twist of the tale.

5) Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and Arrow of God. It has always been difficult for me to choose between them. Technically Arrow of God, for me, is more proficient but I find Things Fall Apart pure, the burst of inspiration. The pure book with no affectation. A book of the spirit which touches mine. Arrow of God, on the other hand, was the book he wrote when he became conscious of his writing skills. It still has the theme of change from Things Fall Apart. When I want inspiration I go to Things fall Apart; craft of writing, Arrow of God.

Tail piece, Bonus Books:

Ezenwa Ohaeto’s Voice of the Night & Masquerade and Chants of a Minstrel

Helon Habila’s Measuring Time.

What makes you buy a book in a bookshop?

The funny things is I do not just buy books by name recognition. I usually open the first page of the book and I studiously avoid reading the blurb. I like to see if I can be captivated by the first few paragraphs. If I am then I go to the blurb to try and get an idea what the subject matter is.

What time of day do you read?

5I read all the time, my most favourite time is late at night and anytime I am in the bathroom.

What is your childhood book which you return to again and again?

I like going back to The Passport of Mallam Ilia by Cyprian Ekwensi and the early children books by Chinua Achebe.