Yusuf Adamu on Northern Nigerian Literature

Source: http://234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/Home/5402598-146/story.csp

By Akintayo Abodunrin

Writing for the environment

The lecturer at the Bayero University, Kano, reflects his training as a geographer in his creative works because he "was trained to see things from the point of view of a social scientist and from the point of view of the environment which I believe is a balanced perspective. I also deliberately sometimes write on geographical issues, like the column I maintain in the Sunday Trust called ‘Places'. Each week, I publish a poem about a particular place and the picture of the place - since 2007," Adamu informs.

A former chairman of the Kano State chapter of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), Adamu writes in English and Hausa languages. He writes poetry and children's books in English; but his published prose works - ‘Idan So Cuta Ne', Ummul-Khairi' and ‘Maza Gumabr Dutse', are in Hausa. He writes his poetry in English. "It's harder to write poetry in Hausa because there are so many rules and regulations guiding writing poetry in Hausa, unlike English which is liberal," he says.

Although a number of his prose fiction centre on the environment, Adamu says, "They are not specifically about the physical environment; they are about what we call the social environment. My first published work, for instance, is a love story. The second one is about the challenges facing Hausa Muslim women who go to university, and the last is about ancient times."

Worth of literature

Writers are regarded as agents of change and in spite of the fact that the late Abubakar Imam and Uthman Dan Fodio wrote on the themes of conservation, environmental degradation remains an issue in Nigeria. Does Adamu feel that this genre - and literature generally - are effective?

"It is effective in its own right but it is not functioning because people don't read. Literature will only be useful and influential if those who make policies read. But if they don't read, it won't make any difference. During Utman Dan Fodio's time, they used literature for their revolution, they used their religious writings but particularly, they used poetry to mobilise people and that way, Uthman Dan Fodio, his brother Abdulahi Fodio, his son Mohammed Bello and daughter Nana Asmau, all used poetry to actively bring about revolution in Hausaland. They wrote on the environment and on almost all human endeavours. They did it so well [that] they used it to mobilise society and teach and enlighten. Later on, Hausa writings used poetry in mobilisation, politics, and it worked. But the problem we are having now is when your leaders don't read, there is no way you can address them. This, however, doesn't stop you from writing."

Writing for children

Adamu writes for children because "I realised that in Nigeria and Africa, we don't write for children most of the time. We only write for adults because we feel if you write for children, other writers will perceive you as an unserious writer. But writing for children is even more important than writing for adults because writing for children is likely to have more influence on the future of society than writing for adults who are already grown and who have made up their minds.

"That's why I feel it is more important to write for children but in particular teach them about our environment so they know more about it. That's why I wrote ‘Animals in the Neighbourhood'. I did that because some children don't know certain domestic animals when they see them."

Southern writers' dominance of literature

The author of ‘Landscapes of Reality', a poetry collection, has his own take on the dominance of Southern writers in Nigerian literature. "I think it is luck. What is happening is that Nigerian literature in English is dominated by Southerners but if you talk about Nigerian literature, I'm sure there are more published people in the North. More people in the North write in Hausa rather than in English because they find it easier to express themselves in their own language. One interesting thing is that they have a very large market because I can assure you my Hausa books sell more copies than my English books.

When you write English books, people don't read but there is an established market within Nigeria and West Africa, even up to Central Africa, for Hausa books. So, they are making lots of impact. That is the real situation; it's just that there are more Southerners writing in English.

Adamu agrees, though, that Northern writers should be concerned that works from the South are being taken as representative of Nigerian literature when there is also a vibrant literary tradition in the North:

"Well, it should give them concern because it's good to have a representation of Nigeria and I think Northern branches of ANA are now making deliberate efforts to see that they train people. As you can see in the last two, five years, there have been more writers coming out from the North. But I think they are making deliberate efforts to promote writings in English", he says.

Censorship in Kano
The crisis between writers in Kano and the Kano State Censors Board last year generated a lot of controversy. This led Rabo Mohammed, chairman of the board, to explain the government's position to writers during their convention in Zamfara. Adamu, the first person to raise the alarm on the censorship, sets out the current position.

"If anything, we have signed a ceasefire. Things are better now because we now have an understanding with the Censorship Board and they have also changed their tactics. What they intended to do was to suppress us and we showed them that we are not filmmakers; they ridiculed the filmmakers and thought they could do that with writers but I think it is good that we actually showed them that writers are not like other categories of people."

On why the writers resolved to fight the board, Adamu says, "They were being unjust because we are working with what Uthman Dan Fodio said. He said that a society can endure unbelief but it cannot endure injustice and we felt that was injustice. Saying that you are going to censor what we are going to write? In fact, they want us even to get licence! As a writer, I cannot write in Kano until I have a licence to write and when I write I have to take it to them to censor and both the publisher and distributor also have to obtain licences. So we said no, this won't work. That's why we said this time around, we are not going to respect the constituted authority because it had also gone beyond its bounds."

On younger writers
The author of Pregnant Skies and My First Book of Rhymes is happy with the ascendancy of a new generation of writers in Nigeria. "I'm very happy with it. The only thing I'm not happy with is that the critics are still worshipping the first generation writers. That's my only worry," he says with a laugh.

Women hold the ace in Northern Nigeria literature
Adamu says the Soyaya (romantic story) trend in Hausa literature has been exhausted. "Soyaya is gone. People now mostly write about what I may call family life.

For example women, they are no longer writing about a boy falling in love with a girl. They are focussing on what is happening in the home, how women are treated. What is happening in the family is what people are writing about now in Hausa. And there is no name for it because even the Soyaya is a stereotype. What we feel we should call it is Hausa Popular Fiction."

The men are happy about this trend, he informs. "We have no option; the women have taken over, at least in Hausa literature now. The women have taken over, to be sincere. If a woman writes a book and publishes 5,000 copies, she will be out of stock soon but it's not the same with men. Maybe they write what the readers want."

Adamu agrees that women writers' decision to focus on the family is a reaction against cultural and religious practices in the North.

As for the men, "We are not [angry] because if you are a family man and you read the works, you will see what is true and what is exaggerated. I think women see this as a medium to express themselves and I think it is working because a lot of women are writing.

When you read, you will hear a lot of things which ordinarily you will not know are happening in the family and in the larger society."