By Anote Ajeluorou
French journalist-turned writer couldn’t conceal his
excitement at the excellent turn of event in his career by harsh conditions in
Nigeria when he was an intern back in the 1990s in Enugu. Unlike Joseph Conrad
who saw nothing but heart of darkness, title of his uncanny genius a century
ago, Pierre Cherruau saw Nigeria’s difficulties and turned them into enduring
fiction that pay tribute to the unflagging spirit of a country in transition.
And, at the recent Port
Harcourt UNESCO World Book Capital 2014 opening, where he spoke at the
International Authors’ Forum, Cherruau spoke about the warmth and openness of
Nigerians and how Nigerians generally endeared themselves to him, taking him as
one of their own. He’d barely arrived the Alliance Francaise in Enugu in 1994
when the strikes induced by the June 12, 1993 crisis began to bite real hard.
He was stuck, and he couldn’t travel.
According to him, “I
didn’t plan to write books. I was a trained journalist. It was during the 1994
strikes. I finished reading all the books I had; I had no money; there were no
mobile phones as now; I wasn’t connected to the outside world. Then I began to
think, What should I do? I have to say, Thanks to Nigeria. No electric light
(NEPA); no fuel. I decided to write, and my first work Nene Rastaqouere came out. Other are Lagos 666 and Chien Fantome.
“Nigerians were very
open-minded; they took me to their villages and showed me things”.
Cherruau is a much-travelled
journalist and writer in Africa, who has worked and lived in many countries.
These experiences, he said, have reshaped his personality and outlook both
about himself and the continent usually regarded with mixed feelings back in
his native Europe. Now, some 20 odd years since he wrote his first novel set in
Nigeria about a hardworking woman who endures so much just to make a living,
Cherruau submitted, “The experience in Enugu was very unique. When you are in
Africa as a European, you discover so much about yourself. If I write about
Nigeria today it will be different because things have changed a lot. There’s
no one Africa, or even one Nigeria; there’s diversity and complexity, as
expressed in the music, art, dance, lifestyle.
“I try to be objective
in my journalistic work, but not necessarily in my novels. My novels are like
bridges between Europe and Africa although we have to be modest about our
achievements in this regard”.
Florent Couao-Zotti,
another of the two international authors and a neighbouring Beninoise, said he
came from a family that loves literature and read a lot. While growing up, he
said there would be gatherings in the family, and they always discussed foreign
authors from France, Russia and other places. But what led him into writing was
as dramatic as it was profound.
According to him, “It
was raining one day and my mother asked me to leave the rain. I didn’t; it was
a thunderclap that scared me out of the rain and I fled into the house. My
father asked me if I was afraid; I said, Yes, and thought that I was going to
die.
“But I thought that
before I die, I must leave something behind, as a legacy. The writers I’d read
had already died. So, to escape death and be immortal, I started writing so I
could leave my thoughts behind, as my legacy”.
His first novel, Les Fantomes du Bresil (The Ghosts from Brazil), chronicles
Brazilian returnees of the 1950s and how they segregated themselves from the
local population and married among themselves. Couao-Zotti said they bore a
feeling of betrayal against the local population for selling their ancestors
into slavery, and kept to themselves. But for once, the unthinkable happened
when one of their girls married a local, and all hell seemed to break loose.
However,
Couao-Zotti, who has written several other novels in French, couldn’t quite say
whether he has succeeded in immortalizing himself the way he’d envisaged it as
a small boy with his writings. But he said he derives immense satisfaction from
his writings. Although Beninoise reading population is about 40 per cent out of
10 million people, Couao-Zotti’s target audience, as a writer are readers
outside of his country, especially everyone speaking French the world over and
through translation of his works.
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