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Cyprian Ekwensi
Tribute to a "Nationalist" Novelist

by Obi Akwani, MGV Editor

One of the important passages which took place at the close of the year 2007 was the death of Cyprian Ekwensi, the well-known Nigerian novelist and broadcaster. Ekwensi was trained as a pharmacist, but his natural calling was writing or story-telling. He began writing short-stories and novels at a time when Nigeria was yet to find itself. He was a natural storyteller. It was natural that he should apply his talents for story telling to the project of helping Nigeria find itself.

Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka are two other Nigerian writers who attained more international acclaim than Ekwensi even though Ekwensi was ahead of both, as a published writer, by at least one decade. It is therefore quite easy for the public to think that Ekwensi was any less important as a writer than these others. Achebe and Soyinka have very different focus, as writers, from each other and from Ekwensi. Achebe was first published in 1958 with the release of his masterpiece, Things Fall Apart. In that novel, Achebe was focused on explaining the challenges of colonialism and the introduction of Christianity to the African society. Soyinka's forte, on the other hand, is personal and communal self-discovery. Their narratives, even when critical of the effects of colonialism, do not threaten or challenge but remain accepting of the arising conditions and focused on adjustment with the inevitable. Ekwensi's writing has less artifice. Like all natural storytellers, his tales always carried a moral theme. He tended to emphasize the normalcy of Nigerian cultures and to demonstrate their similarities.

Though Ekwensi did not quite attain the same level of international recognition as did Soyinka and Achebe, it is impossible to ignore his writings or make light his unique and consistent contribution to the richness of Nigerian literature. His writing career spanned seven decades from the late 1940s to the year of his death in 2007. His writings included radio and television scripts, children’s stories and adult novels. He also published a number of short story collections.

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Critics
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Those critics whose assessments helped to elevate Achebe and Soyinka had labeled Ekwensi’s writing, dismissively, as "journalistic" or "episodic". Such characterization detracted from his international critical acclaim, but his novels remained most popular among Nigerian readers. He had the rare gift of writing in the English language in a simple style that captured and stimulated his readers’ imagination to the wonders of surrounding history, culture and contemporary times. In very subtle ways he was helping the people of a new country gain consciousness of their evolving nation understand and appreciate each other and their expanded environment.

In the "Burning Grass" Ekwensi brought home to Nigerians, young and old, the romance and wondrous nature of nomadic life in northern Nigeria. In "Jagua Nana" he revealed the essence of the bustle and heartaches of contemporary modern Nigerian city life through the trials and triumphs of the intelligent, determined but ill-educated heroin of the novel.

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Nationalist Writer
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These elements combine to make Ekwensi standout as a "nationalist writer" for Nigeria. This is a term that, perhaps, has never been used before now in reference to any Nigerian novelist. It is my belief that this nationalist quality of his writing is one of the chief reasons that cooled the enthusiasm of earlier critics for Ekwensi’s literature. His nationalistic themes which tended to normalize and make uniformly acceptable the various strands of the Nigerian nation were coming at a time when the political emphasis was on accentuating the particularities; and this put him at odds with the establishment.

Nationalism is a necessary ingredient for nation building, especially in a country like Nigeria that did not come about through the express will of its citizenry but through the devises of colonialism. For those countries which emerge naturally through the competing political ambitions of its various leaders and impinging outside influences over time, national consciousness congeals naturally, imperceptibly, and is taken almost for granted. This was not the case for Nigeria. In the late 1950s and early ‘60s Nigeria was in dare need for national self-consciousness. A number of enlightened elements began at that time the titanic struggle to rouse and sustain that national-self consciousness. Most of that effort was expressed politically through the formation and activities of the Nigerian Youth Movement and the NCNC party. Ekwensi was the first writer to express that nationalist ambition for unity and a sense of oneness through his literary output. And just like his counterpart nationalists in the political sphere, Ekwensi was at odds with the establishment; and this seriously affected his ability to gain befitting returns on his novels. Though he remained a dedicated writer, the effect on him was profound. The experience informed his later admonition to his children never to take up the pen to earn their living as novelists. This is not an advise given during the colonial era. It is thus surely an indictment of the Nigerian publishing industry. In the colonial period when Ekwensi began flourishing as a writer, Nigerian publishing - the production and marketing and distribution of books - was essentially outside the control of Nigerians. Today, nearly fifty years since the end of colonialism, the local industry remains hamstrung, unable to support Nigerian writers or allow them to flourish.

Calling Ekwensi’s novel style "journalistic" was distracting in the same way that the life-work of, Nnamdi Azikiwe, the NCNC leader and nationalist politician was marred by what critics and political analysts called his "personal failure". In both cases, the critics succeeded in reducing the acclaim of these personalities before the Nigerian people, which resulted in a public failure to fully appreciate the value and worth of their contributions to national development. While there may, perhaps, be justification in the lowered estimation of the politician – where it is understood that there is failure in those who knew enough at the beginning to aspire for a nation but ended up settling for less; no such justification ever arose in the case of the creative writer.

Ekwensi provided us with a panoramic view and appreciation of the varied ways of life of different Nigerians. His stories transport you into the lives of the characters, enabling you to feel what they feel and know what they know; understand their prejudices and sympathize with them. Such is the merit of his creativity. What is more, as a nationalist writer, Ekwensi’s work is like mortar that cements together the varied building blocks that constituted the emerging Nigerian nation.

Cyprian Odiatu Duaka Ekwensi came of Igbo parentage from the southern part of Nigeria, but he was born on September 26, 1921 in Minna, the capital of present-day Niger State, in the central part of the country. Ekwensi’s father was one of the many clerks and artisans who migrated from the south to the north of Nigeria in the early part of the 20th century to trade and work for the British colonists. Ekwensi wrote about the life and culture of the far northern Fulani nomads and succeeded in making them come alive for every Nigerian.

Cyprian Ekwensi died on November 4, 2007. He was 86 years old.