Stephen Derwent Partington on the Caine Prize

Two quotes pulled from the piece in the East African:

A recent blogger, Carmen McCain, has argued that much of the present debate over the Caine Prize and African writing in general, puts the writers themselves in an impossible position, stuck between having to: a) write for a UK-based prize that might represent a Western readership that likes poverty porn; b) satisfy Africanists-in-place that they’ve not pandered too much and sold out; c) satisfy the new liberal Western academics who are pussyfooting around poverty porn ; d) be “true” to the social situation on the ground in vast parts of Africa, where some people (the majority) really do still often suffer.

And:

 Of course, it is your pleasant task as a reader to pursue these matters further and make up your own mind, and so I’d urge us all to visit two websites: a) that of the Caine Prize itself, where all of the stories can be easily and freely downloaded; b) the Zunguzungu blog, which is hosting a Caine Prize blogathon, and which lists all of those diverse readers — general and academic — who are participating in a wider debate over 2012’s shortlist. I’d also ask you to participate there, and by doing so reclaim: This is, after all, our African and world literature, and not only that of any UK-based panel.

Read the article.

The Caine Prize and Literary Tensions by Sokari Ekine

In her essay for Pambazuka, the Nigerian blogger Sokari Ekine starts with these words:

Towards the end of last year, Nigerian writer Ikhide R. Ikheloa published a series of essays in which he accused the Nigerian author Chris Abani of Graceland fame of telling lies and engaging in exaggerations relating to his admitted imprisonment in Nigeria’s most notorious hell hole prison, KiriKiri in 19xx.

“It is one thing for Abani to tell a lie and then move on with his life. It is another thing for him to continue to perpetuate the same lie at the expense of Africa. It is obnoxious and offensive, and if he was white, it would be considered racist. Since the confrontation/intervention in 2003, Abani has gone on to conduct moving interviews and given speeches expanding in graphic detail his alleged experiences. As I said earlier, the details get more fantastic in the re-telling and details and dates change each time. It is comic really.”

In a follow up blog post he repeats his allegations against Abani and further accuses, but does not name [I would like names please--if Abani is to be outed as a liar why not the rest?] “a tiny cabal of African writers” who “seem willing to wheedle, lie and steal their way into stardom on the tortured back of Africa.”

Read on.