A Nigerian Girl Abroad – the amazing story of Nnedi Okorafor
By Femi Olugbile
The invitation from the American Consul-General said it was going to be an evening of book reading by a famous Nigerian American author.
It was a while since your last visit to the Consul-General’s residence, which was set on the plush curve of what used to be Ikoyi Crescent.
The Consul, relatively new in town, spoke of how he had looked forward to his present posting. It was a delight to have Nnedi here, he said, heralding the 2024 Ake Festival, which would be taking place in Lagos over the next three days.
From that point, Lola Shoneyin took over. Lola, poet, author, moving force of the Ake Arts and Book Festival, was just as she had always been – voluble, outspoken, affable, assertive.
She introduced her friend and guest Nnedi to the audience.
Nnedi, tall, dark, bespectacled, with her braids neatly packed in a bundle above her head, was eager to talk. She attended festivals and book events in the normal course of things, as one of the most prolific and recognised writers in her genre, but Ake was her favourite festival. The crowd loved that. They applauded enthusiastically.
Nnedi went on to give a fascinating account of herself and her life. She came from a sporting family. Her parents were Nigerian athletes who had taken part in international competitions. They decided to emigrate from Nigeria to the USA in 1969. She grew up with a passion for sports. She played lawn tennis and was beginning to make a name. This was before the Williams sisters. The other passion she had was a love for insects.
She had scoliosis, an abnormal curvature to her spine, and she and her parents were informed by doctors that it might get worse as she grew older.
When she was nineteen, it was decided that surgery be done to correct the abnormality.
She had thought the surgery would be but a blimp, and she would soon be back to her tennis career.
When she woke up from anaesthesia, she discovered she could not move her legs or feel her lower body.
It was a wrench, enough to kill any spirit.
Someone gave her a book to read.
In the margin of the book, she began to scribble the story of a girl who could fly. It was her first work in ‘afro futurism’ – one of the many names that would describe a tendency in writing that has been attracting an ever-growing audience, with various sub-genres such as Speculative Fiction, Afro-futurism, Science Fiction, African futurism and African jujuism.
She has gone on since to become one of the world’s most famous figures in ‘speculative fiction’. She has written several books, hundreds of thousands of copies of which have been sold to both youthful and adult audiences. One of her books has been filmed as a series for HBO. Steven Spielberg has been talking about filming another work. She has won prizes, including the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa, the Nebula award for Best Novela, the Hugo award, and the Locus award, among several others. Her latest book, due out early in the new year, which she proudly held aloft to the seated audience at the Consul’s residence, was titled ‘Death of the Writer’. It was already public knowledge that it received an advance fee in excess of one million dollars.
As revealed by Nnedi, there was identity politics in the naming of her creative genre. ‘Afro-futurism’ was held to be an African American writing mode, and African Americans were very territorial about it. Its ultimate blockbuster was ‘Black Panther’. The grand-dame of Afro-futurism was the late Octavia Butler, and everyone was supposed to attribute their roots from her.
As a Nigerian immigrant whose parents were never transported on slave ships, Nnedi referred to herself as a ‘NaijaAmerican’ and drew on Nigerian archetypes firmly rooted in her Igbo and other Nigerian cultures. She felt compelled to delineate her creation as ‘African futurism’ and ‘African jujuism’, expanding the focus beyond the narrow prism of black experience in America, to cover Africa and the black diaspora.
Nnedi, fifty this year, like her host – Lola, was at once strong and vulnerable.
‘I have a piece of metal in my back… I cannot feel some parts of my legs…Proprioception…I have to be intentional with every footstep…’
There was passion, and money, in America and Europe in fantasy, science fiction and magical realism – from books, films, comics and cartoons. Harry Potter, Lion King, Dune, Game of Thrones and others made gazillions of dollars in print and box office.
For many African Americans, customised fantasy was, not just entertainment, but escapism and wish-fulfilment. This partially explained the avid possessiveness, even hysteria, that surrounded ‘Black Panther’. Black people were rich and powerful, this time. The white man was the villain, for a change. Unfortunately, coming out the feel-good Wakanda experience in a movie theatre onto the streets of Brooklyn to be confronted with trigger-happy policemen and a looming Donald Trump second presidency was guaranteed to I mmediately provide a reality check.
Nnedi’s stories were grounded in ‘stories of the women and girls around me and also within myself’. Social issues included racial and gender inequality, political violence, environment, genocide and corruption. Her stories went beyond the boundaries of Science and Mathematics. People could fly. Strange beings participated in the conversations and activities of human beings. Time moved forwards, backwards and sideways, defying the Gregorian calendar.
Any child who grew up in a Nigerian household and heard ‘Tales by Moonlight’ stories of how the tortoise bested other animals in a sprint race, or how the dog hid its mother in the heavens when others were killing theirs for food during a famine was already attuned to the limitless possibilities of Nnedi’s African Jujuism. It was not ‘escapism’ or ‘wish-fulfilment’. It was as real as the air around.
As the evening wound down at the Consul’s house, there was a rush for Nnedi’s books. The author sat in a corner, signing autographs and chatting with her fans.
