Kokende Liboso Eza Kokoma Te: On Contiguous Narratives and Poetic Cosmologies is a project by Laboratoire Kontempo, curated by Dzekashu MacViban. You can read the announcement in French here and in German here. The theorization of contemporary art and art history in Kinshasa is currently mainly formed by contemporary witnesses, oral traditions, discussions and collective […]
On Contiguous Narratives and Poetic Cosmologies Read More »
So many are asleep under the ground, When we dance at the festival Embracing the earth with our feet. Maybe the place on which we stand Is where they also stood with their dreams. They dreamed until they were tired And handed us the tail with which we shall dance. Excerpt from “Cycle”, Mazisi
Kokende Liboso Eza Kokoma Te: On Contiguous Narratives and Poetic Cosmologies Read More »
“Great poetry lives in a state of perpetual transformation, perpetual translation: the poem dies when it has no place to go.” (Weinberger, 1987) Poetry translation is an endeavour of passion, for it may bring cultural enrichment but seldom economic riches, the challenge once undertaken will likely be professionally rewarding but rarely satisfying as there
Nineteen Ways of Looking at Awono Read More »
La nuit est agitée. L’eau se brise sur la falaise ; le sol tremble sous la puissance des pas des danseurs ; l’air vibre sous la voix des chanteurs ; mon sang pulse à chaque coup de tambour. Mon corps n’est plus que sensations, mon esprit tendu vers l’invisible. « Où es-tu ? » Les yeux clos, j’exécute les figures les
La Mémoire de l’Océan Read More »
Grace was not like us: she skipped goat-roasting gatherings when our children got jobs outside Sugartown; when our children were getting circumcised and we erupted in ululations on the surgeon’s final whistle; when one of us gave birth and we visited to see how ugly or beautiful they were, with oxtail for the child’s bones;
It was she that taught her father, how to speak. He did not know the language of fathers and daughters. It was she that taught her father, how to be needed. He did not know necessity beyond daily bread. It was she that taught her father, the feminist tongue. He did not know that the
Teaching Her Father Read More »
Every evening, your father tore a page off the Bible, steeped it in water, and chewed. Every evening, he mumbled the same two-minute prayer before eating the Word of God. He chewed gingerly, steadily, reverently. It may have dropped forewarnings before it started, this thing, but you must have missed them all. One evening, as
Things the World Didn’t Tell You Read More »
“Who is your aunty? Shift from here, let me not slap you!” Those were the words Maru, the Form Five dormitory prefect, flung at me when I greeted her with Aunty Maru a couple of weeks into my new life as a boarding school student in Bamenda. I’d been sent back to Cameroon for “correction”
The white flag floating at City Hall said it all. With the symbol of a mango fruit in the centre of the flag, Tumaranda—the Big Mango City—was juicy, wholesome, and edible for those hungry for plunder. All roads led to Tumaranda because it was a port city and had OPEC membership. From Kabogasa, Ya Salaam,
Twilight of Crooks (Excerpt) Read More »
“What’s in a name?” The often-quoted question rings on in an age of post-enlightenment. When I think of the vision promulgated by the late emeritus Professor Bernard Nsokika Fonlon, echoes of “Shall We Make or Mar” seem to continue to haunt us today. Having professed the gentleman’s profession of journalism for over three decades across
The Mwalimu Palaver Read More »
