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The Significance of Cassava Republic Press Opening in London

In 2016, Cassava Republic Press, co-founded and directed by Bibi Bakare-Yusuf, branched out from its headquarters in Abuja, Nigeria to open offices in London. Taking place only ten years after the press first launched, this was an extraordinarily bold move: “the first African publisher to establish a subsidiary outside of the continent”.[i]What is the Cassava Republic Press? How were they able to make this move? And what might the significance be for the African publishing industry both in and outside of Africa?

Named as one of the “most radical indie publishers”[ii], Cassava Republic Press is on a mission “to change the way we all think about African writing”.[iii]It is committed to sharing diverse African stories that engage with questions about the past, present and future of African writing. Bakare-Yusuf has said, “when I go into the archive of African letters, I think it’s not as full as I would like it to be”.[iv]In resistance to this, Cassava Republic publishes a wide range of fiction, short stories (it recently established a Shorts imprint), non-fiction and children’s literature; its list features Abubakar Adam Ibrahim’s Season of Crimson Blossoms, Elnathan John’s Born on a Tuesday and Yemisi Aribisala’s memoir, Longthroat Memoirs: Soups, Sex and Nigerian Taste Buds. Cassava Republic even boasts a romance imprint called Ankara Press which, in Bakare-Yusuf’s words, produces innovative stories by putting “African or black women at the centre of the narrative and African men as a love object”.[v]Here, unlike other romances found in the Nigerian literary marketplace, the women’s desire is at the centre. 

Receiving a $20,000 grant from the African Publishing Innovation Fund means Cassava Republic can now realise Bakare-Yusuf’s “dream” of launching an imprint dedicated to African languages.[vi]To begin with, they will focus on commissions of children’s literature in Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa; translations of current stories will come later.[vii]By proclaiming the value of non-English literatures (especially to children as a way of fostering confidence in their mother tongue), Cassava Republic is asserting the demand for books in these languages, making them more accessible to Nigerian audiences, and resisting the way meanings and nuances become lost in English translations. 

Bakare-Yusuf, who had no prior experience of the publishing industry when she started up Cassava Republic in 2006,was inspired to open an office in London because it is “home to many Africans”, and the location would enable the press to simultaneously “reach out to the global market” and welcome African writers into the publishing house.[viii]The move is so significant because it has traditionally been the case that English and American presses set themselves up in Africa and then strengthen control over the kinds of African narratives that enter the Western literary market. Bakare-Yusuf therefore proclaimed launching the London base as “an intervention” into the Western publishing industry.[ix]By introducing diverse writings from Africa into the Nigerian and Western literary spheres which might otherwise not reach mainstream readerships, Cassava Republic challenges England and America’s monopoly of the industry. In particular, the ‘Big 5’ trade publishers have a reputation for only accepting a narrow range of African writers who they simplistically uphold as voices of the continent; in Jeanne-Marie Jackson’s phrase, “a handful of star “Afropolitan” names are at the forefront of global trade publishing”.[x]From their position in the UK, however, Cassava Republic is empowered to influence how Nigerian trade publishing might develop and to shape the consumption of African writing in England. This is not a solo mission on Bakare-Yusuf’s part nevertheless; she works with Emma Shercliff, former employee of Macmillan English Campus and Hodder Education, whose knowledge of Nigerian publishing was gained through working with Cassava Republic in Abuja for two years.[xi]

There are numerous distinctions between the publishing industries in Nigeria and Europe or America. Many of these inhibit smaller African presses from expanding, prevent African writers being noticed, and help Western publishers control what kinds of African writing are consumed in the global market. These include:

  • issues of expenses – “books are often too expensive for the average Nigerian”,[xii]
  • many ‘African’ books published in America and Europe are not available in Nigeria,
  • independent African publishers often don’t have the economic capital to risk investing in new voices,
  • the high degree of self-publishing in Nigeria means small local presses may feel it is safer to invest in books that are already established successes,[xiii]
  • the difficulty for many African writers of attracting the attention of agents and publishers is combined with the fact their writing might not cater to “Western tastes”.[xiv]

It is difficult to predict how many other African publishing houses will have the resources and confidence to follow Cassava Republic’s example. It may be some time. For now, however, Bakare-Yusuf’s press is expanding understandings of the global literary marketplace and giving a platform to African writers who might struggle to access it. Jeanne-Marie Jackson asks, “Who gets to document African realities? Who are the “gatekeepers” of African publishing traditions?”[xv]One answer might be that Cassava Republic is working to decentre the attempts of Western publishers to occupy this gate-keeping role by publishing distinct stories of Africa which resonate with wider audiences in a rapidly changing world. Does an expansion to America beckon next?


Endnotes

[i]Kit Caless, “Inside the UK’s most radical indie publishers, Part Three: Cassava Republic,” huck, May 8, 2018, https://www.huckmag.com/art-and-culture/books-art-and-culture/cassava-republic-inside-uks-radical-indie-publishers/.

[ii]Ibid.

[iii] Natasha Onwuemezi, “African publisher Cassava Republic to launch in UK,” The Bookseller, November 24, 2015, https://www.thebookseller.com/news/african-publisher-cassava-republic-launch-uk-317035.

[iv]Anshuman Iddamsetty, “Vanguard: Meet the Nigerian Publisher Heating Up African Romance Novels,” Shopify, August 19, 2019, https://www.shopify.co.uk/blog/vanguard-nigerian-publisher-african-romance-novels.

[v]Ibid.

[vi]Jacqulyn Teoh, “Cassava Republic to Start African Language Imprint with $20,000 African Publishing Innovation Fund Grant,” Brittle Paper, November 2, 2019, https://brittlepaper.com/2019/11/cassava-republic-press-publishing-director-bibi-bakare-yusuf-plans-to-start-african-language-imprint-with-20000-african-publishing-innovation-fund-grant/?fbclid=IwAR1vwaExKspcgRuXXrxTEnOoUB-cY5VMS831UQRdNU7Dwg2sFsctTZJ28N4).

[vii]Ibid.

[viii]Kit Caless, “Inside the UK’s most radical indie publishers, Part Three: Cassava Republic,” huck, May 8, 2018, https://www.huckmag.com/art-and-culture/books-art-and-culture/cassava-republic-inside-uks-radical-indie-publishers/.

[ix]Natasha Onwuemezi, “African publisher Cassava Republic to launch in UK,” The Bookseller, November 24, 2015, https://www.thebookseller.com/news/african-publisher-cassava-republic-launch-uk-317035.

[x]Jeanne-Marie Jackson, “New African literature is disrupting what Western presses prize,” The Conversation, October 9, 2017, https://theconversation.com/new-african-literature-is-disrupting-what-western-presses-prize-85206.

[xi]Natasha Onwuemezi, “African publisher Cassava Republic to launch in UK,” The Bookseller, November 24, 2015, https://www.thebookseller.com/news/african-publisher-cassava-republic-launch-uk-317035.

[xii]Yomi Kazeem, “There are bookshops in Nigeria – but nowhere near enough,” Quartz Afirca, February 3, 2018, https://qz.com/africa/1196458/chimamanda-adichie-and-nigerias-bookshops/.

[xiii]Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani, “African Books for Western Eyes,” The New York Times, November 28, 2014, https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/30/opinion/sunday/african-books-for-western-eyes.html.

[xiv]Ibid.

[xv]Jeanne-MarieJackson, “New African literature is disrupting what Western presses prize,” The Conversation, October 9, 2017, https://theconversation.com/new-african-literature-is-disrupting-what-western-presses-prize-85206.

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Review of “Murmur” by Will Eaves – a fascinating and poignantly imagined insight into a brilliant mind

Will Eaves’s novel imagines itself inside the mind of Alec Pryor, a fictional character based on Alan Turing – the remarkable mathematician, pioneering theorist of computer science and artificial intelligence, code-breaker and philosopher. During the 1950s he was also punished for breaking Britain’s law against gross indecency. Murmur offers a strange insight into the maze of Turing’s thoughts and genius during this traumatic time, an experience portrayed only briefly in Morten Tyldum’s 2014 film, The Imitation Game. By focusing on the significance of this period in Turing’s life, Eaves offers a queering of Turing’s story and new ways of conceiving him. 

Philosophic searching and mathematical reasoning coalesce in beautiful ways throughout Eaves’s narration of the life-altering changes Alec’s psyche and body undergo during the punitive process of chemical castration. Alec’s conviction for gross indecency results from a messy series of events triggered by him reporting Cyril, a young man he has an affair with, to the police for theft. Alec chooses to undergo hormonal ‘treatment’ rather than be imprisoned – no choice really when, as Eaves has emphasised, he did not believe he was “guilty of anything”.[i] By quoting from Ovid’s Metamorphoses in the novel’s epigraph, Eaves deftly encapsulates its concern with the changes inflicted on Alec by the hormone injections. Yet the book is simultaneously filled with Alec’s constant characteristics such as his tirelessly searching mind, love for his school friend Christopher and lack of spite for the authorities who damage him – instead of expressing anger, he examines the institutionalised, homophobic structures that enable this state-sanctioned violence.  

Alec endures the distressing treatment with dignity, wisdom and scientific probing. Physically, he unhappily notes developing breasts and fattier hips. Psychologically, the hormones erode his autonomy by distorting the lucidity of his consciousness both in the day and night. He suffers regular collapses and cannot resist becoming lost in waking, trance-like hallucinations which often overwhelm his mind with revisiting the bereavement of losing Christopher. Emerging from these traumatic visions is Alec’s stirring use of theoretical physics to conceptualise another realistic realm where he and Christopher might be reunited. Most poignantly, however, Alec fears that once the treatment ends, a part of himself will feel as though it has disappeared forever. 

Eaves chooses a fascinating mind in a state of flux through which to explore human curiosity about the workings of other people’s brains. We feel the privilege of accessing the fictionalised Turing’s mind, yet cannot help sensing that he remains allusive. A person’s psyche is an extremely private thing and there are limits to how much of his thoughts Alec is willing to divulge. This impression is particularly palpable when we become disoriented in his visions, unsure where we are in space and time. Structurally, the book seamlessly collates these dream sequences with intimate internal monologue, memories and future imaginings, meetings with Alec’s state-employed psychiatrist Dr Stallbrook, and letters to and from his friend June.

Alec asks, “Who knows what machines may end up ‘thinking’?”[ii] At the novel’s heart is also an exploration of the interconnections between machines and humans. In a fitting dedication to “Computing Machinery and Intelligence” – Turing’s seminal work on artificial intelligence – the book constantly questions what is and isn’t mechanical; it considers the future of thinking computers, mechanised brains and how these might merge in the future. The novel’s contribution to current conversations and anxieties about the rapidly digitalising world is undeniable. In fact, Alec fears the hormones are turning him into a “hybrid” and likens this to the fear of becoming a machine.[iii]

Alec’s self-description that he has “run foul of an illogical system of justice”[iv] perfectly encapsulates the senseless treatment Turing received for transgressing a discriminatory boundary written into law. If the novel operates like a murmur – a continuous yet sometimes unperceivable background noise – perhaps its legacy is in recovering a mouthpiece for the voices of all people punished by governments for homosexuality, voices that have been made almost inaudible through state efforts to govern their bodies and erase them from history. 

An apt winner of the Wellcome Book Prize, Murmur is bound to be celebrated further into the future. 

Endnotes

[i]Justine Jordan, “Will Eaves: ‘Life is chancier than we imagine: we’re never far from the edge,’” The Guardian, May 10, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/may/10/will-eaves-interview.

[ii]Will Eaves, Murmur (London: Canongate, 2019), 14.

[iii]Ibid., 62. 

[iv]Ibid., 160.

Review: “Heat Wave” by Penelope Lively

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Reading this extraordinarily perceptive novel in my garden during the July heat wave, the cover gradually fading in the sunlight and the pages getting crumpled by my fingers greasy with sun cream, I was absorbed into the world of Penelope Lively’s book: one simmering with barely contained emotions and the heat of an extreme English summertime.

At just under 200 pages this book is no epic. Instead, Lively is interested in presenting her reader with an authentic representation of the complex and messy realities of a very insulated set of characters’ lives. In particular, she focuses a magnifying glass on the intensely sensitive relationship between a mother and daughter, Pauline and Teresa.
The novel focuses on Pauline’s tumultuous dismay and empathy as she watches Teresa remain devoted to her charismatic but now unfaithful husband, Maurice – a devastating repetition of Pauline’s own historical mistakes with her ex-husband Harry.

Lively frequently thrusts us back into Pauline’s memories of her marriage to Harry. A vivid picture emerges of their passionate love transforming into arguments over his infidelity and eventual marital breakdown. Maurice and Harry bear striking resemblances: from their magnetism, egos and celebrity-like statuses within academic circles, to their total lack of any empathy or shame. Like Pauline, we can only watch helplessly as, with increasing certainty of Maurice’s adultery, Teresa retreats into herself, coming to focus entirely on her infant Luke’s care and refusing to confront her hurt.

Pauline and Teresa know each other so intimately that they sense the minute nuances of each other’s every emotion and thought, rarely requiring words for mutual understanding. One of my favourite passages depicts a silent conversation between mother and daughter in which they communicate their understanding of Maurice’s behaviour:

“There is a silence – a silence in which a wordless conversation takes place, the product of years of intimacy and of intuitive interpretation of the set of a mouth, of the flavour of a glace – the undertow of all that is unspoken. Look, says Pauline – I know. Don’t think I don’t know because I don’t say anything. And Teresa tells her – I know you know […]”

… captivating. I was infatuated with moments like these where Lively would do beautiful justice to Pauline and Teresa’s every facial expression and vocal intonation during certain conversations, as if describing them through a camera lens reduced to slow motion. She skilfully extends what would, in real time, be a split-second eye movement or vocal tone across multiple lines of text seamlessly, while skilfully avoiding any sense of dragging these moments out gratuitously. Such an impression of unspoken understandings extends to Pauline’s relationship with Maurice. The look she gives him after her suspicions of his adultery are confirmed renders accusatory words unnecessary – from here on all their conversations work at two levels, with the surface level of communication constantly undermined by the mutual understanding that Pauline knows of his deception and hates him for it.

The intelligence of this writing creeps up on you gradually. While some readers may feel that Lively drags certain scenic descriptions too far, I loved how these encapsulated the lazy heat of summer sunshine. As far as I’m concerned, every word deserves its place in the book.

Pauline and Teresa’s close familiarity is manifested physically by the fact that their houses – summer retreats in an unspecified English countryside – are adjoining. Combined with the homes being named “World’s End”, a distinct and potentially sinister sense arises that there’s no escape from Pauline’s watchful eye. She’s fiercely intelligent – her job as a copy editor has trained her to be methodically analytical, picking up on inconsistencies and mistakes – and this shines through in her self-awareness, sharp wit and watchfulness of Teresa and Luke. She has a beautifully empathetic comprehension of Luke’s innocent and inquisitive engagement with the natural world, which is so often at odds with the oppressive weight of the adults’ interactions. Ultimately, with the novel’s titular heat wave providing a background that is as stifling as Pauline’s motherly, protective impulses are potent, Lively displays sensitive subtlety in drawing the complex relationships and heightened emotions at work in this fragile family at risk of imploding under the weight of the unsaid.

Overall, this brilliantly nuanced read really moved me. It examines mistakes, rashness, human fault, healing, and the kind of fiercely protective instincts for loved ones that drive people to startling acts. Pauline certainly proves herself a force to be reckoned with. The novel’s concentrated length means the reader anticipates an acceleration towards a dramatic climax, and Lively extends this tension to the extreme, waiting until the very final pages to assault us with the drama we believe, naively, we are ready for.

Review: “Tinderbox” by Megan Dunn

Megan Dunn’s debut book is a candid, self-aware record of the struggle for success. 

Tinderbox is above all an examination of the creative and financial difficulties inherent in the process of novel-writing in the digital age. Resisting classification to a defined genre, Dunn’s autobiographical creation is a knot of converging narratives. At the forefront is her valiant effort to write a feminist re-imagining of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451suited to the modern age. However, obstacles to her creativity emerge as she endeavours to determine the nature of her story, meet high word count targets, and avoid breaching copyright laws. This creative struggle is set against her unstable career as a bookseller at Borders during the time when it was entering liquidation. The combination of the dreary reality of her job, bleakness of her imminent redundancy, and breakdown of her marriage is however alleviated consistently by pearlsof her amusing wit. Moreover, Dunn’s accounts of working for Borders are punctuated by references to the monopolizingrise of Amazon and the Kindle, thereby depicting a rapidly changing digital landscape that may leave readers feeling ill at ease about the future of bookselling. Tinderbox is a self-referential report of Dunn’s process in writing it. The book’s form is highly experimental, carving out a space for different kinds of literary outputs. For example, as a homage to Bradbury’s classic, symbols of flames permeate Dunn’s book with a sense of unbearable urgency. Despite this visual motif being somewhat overused, it effectively conveys a palpable sense of the pressure Dunn swelters under. 

Indeed, the heat of Tinderbox is characterised by disillusioning struggle, and the book that emerges from the flames is testament to Dunn’s resilience. 

Huguette Caland at the Tate St Ives

A large canvas of intense red paint is the first artwork visitors to the Tate St Ives’s exhibition on Huguette Caland encounter. Soleil rouge (1964) is exactly that, a red sun bursting with energy manifested in slightly paler tie-dye-like rays that reach out in rippling waves to the very edges of the canvas, evoking an outpouring of vitality and vibrant colour. There is something intoxicating in the potential of the fiery central ring of sunlight to hold the viewer’s eye, drawing our attention into the red centre so intensely that we decipher limitless variations of red hues within what initially appears to be a solid block of colour. This we are told was Caland’s first painting and it came after her father’s death, a piece of knowledge that imbues the work with a sense of encoded anger and pain, and yet the uncompromising vibrancy of colour evokes a celebration of the value of life and enjoyment the eye can take in encountering such a compelling mass of red. 

Caland is a Lebanese artist who has worked in a range of mediums including paint, pen, sculpture and textile kaftans. She has gained a reputation for carving out a space for exploring an interest in unconventional perceptions of beauty, intimacy and the body. She pays particular attention to female bodies and her personal experiences of looking at and depicting her own body. Celebrating all kinds of female body shapes in abstract styles and using a variety of mediums to experiment with rendering bodily shapes, Caland engages with questions around the best ways to depict bodies and bodily desires. Her works range from canvases of bold colour with indications of voluptuous shapes and generous curves to minimalistic line drawings presenting faces and bodies in ways that are both estranging and familiar. 

The line drawings in her Flirt(1972) collection demonstrate a sensitive interest in faces and their constituent parts of eyes, mouths and noses. Sometimes depicting faces as if deconstructed – for example, with the nose of one face reaching out to touch the opposite face’s lines intimately, such as when a nose fills the space where another figure’s mouth ought to be – Caland suggests how humans feel compelled to reach out and connect with others. The technique of minimalistic dark lines enables Caland sometimes to allude elusively to more erotic connections of bodies in ways that still convey an innocence and playful tenderness. Sometimes she depicts blurred boundaries between figures whereby their constituent lines merge into each other’s in indistinguishable ways, essentially a mass of lines conveying a whimsical shared connection between humans. I was drawn to the way her drawings were for the most part coherent but were often moving towards the edge of incoherency, as if balancing on the edge of decision about whether the viewer should be allowed access to a clear depiction of interacting figures or whether they should be encouraged to enjoy a lack of clarity and explanation. 

One wall of the exhibition was imprinted with a quotation in which Caland had expressed: “I love every minute of my life…I squeeze it like an orange and I eat the peel, because I don’t want to miss a thing”. There was certainly an undeniable impression of her zest for life and relish of its colours, shapes and forms. It’s high time her work gained the appreciation it deserves and it seems to have taken a new wave of attention directed by curators at the narratives of middle eastern and female artists for this to be the case. 

Coping with Exam Stress and Being Kind to Yourself

The end of Easter marks the return to university and the inevitable cranking up of my revision schedule. As much as I was diligent with revision during the holidays, driving back to Exeter filled me with a certain sense of fear as I began doubting how well I’d prepared myself so far and dread when I imagined how stressed I would be during the two weeks leading up to my first exam. As a self-confessed worrier, this was far too typical of me and so in an effort to combat my heightened anxiety during this period, I’ve been making a strong effort to improve my methods of combatting stress which I hope might inspire some others to ease their minds and bodies.

Photo by fotografierende on Pexels.com

Above all, I know that I must be kinder to myself! ‘Self-care’ is certainly a buzzword of the moment and it’s one I try hard to internalise the necessity of. I go about caring for myself in a variety of ways which look after my mental and physical health. Little things such as taking mindful enjoyment in the birdsong outside my window gives me some sense of peace. I use cooking and baking as a kind of therapeutic time to enjoy myself and frequently have a period of pampering time in the evenings, whether that’s having a long shower, a candle-lit bath, giving myself a hand massage or even using a face mask. I always have a novel on the go for pleasure and even if I only manage to read a couple of pages at night, my mind is taken somewhere else which has the added effect of reminding me why I love my English degree. Winding down before going to bed is crucial so I try to ensure I have at least an hour between finishing any evening work and getting ready for bed. I tend to gravitate towards funny, light-hearted TV and films or ones I can generally lose myself in so have recently been loving the “Celebrity Painting Challenge” and “Fleabag”. Other ways I lose myself are simply by sitting back and listening to an album I love, perhaps scrolling through a thought-provoking and beautiful blog like “Brain Pickings”, or listening to a podcast such as my beloved Desert Island Discs (there’s something about the effect of people speaking softly into a microphone which really soothes me – I expect it’s a sort of ASMR enchantment). 

Keeping a regular sleep pattern or at least getting enough sleep is so important therefore as someone who struggles to get to sleep, I make an effort to tire my body out physically to a degree by attending a couple of exercises classes a week, taking walks to clear my mind during revision breaks and enjoying my walks to and from campus. I find yoga-like stretches at home before bed to be really helpful for relaxing my muscles of the tension I carry around during the day. Meditation isn’t for everyone but for those who also struggle to shut their mind off at night, I’d recommend trying muscle relaxation therapy when lying in bed. This involves tensing and relaxing every muscle in your body, from your feet to head or vice versa, which makes me feel a bit like a jelly-fish melting into my mattress. 

Being brave enough to talk about how worried I get with my housemates and friends at uni and from back home is always cathartic. I have plenty of phone calls and facetimes with my mum and sister too; we’re a very tight unit so even a quick chat is a refreshing boost of mental support. 

The revision period is tricky to navigate and at times quite painful. But I know that by continuing to be kind to myself, I’ll pull through just fine and be able to bask in the liberating freedom and pride which comes with finishing the exams.