Tour co-sponsored by the British Council. Click on the below for more information.
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dreadlocks and seeing him without, takes some getting used to. The author doesn’t know what the fuss is about. He grew the locks while writing his last book, Burma Boy, and now that it’s finished... (a new book in the works? Hmn...) 
did we first encounter them?” These are the questions posed in the new issue, in which writers and publishers talk about the book that made them. Chaired by Robert Fraser, readers on the night grappled with the same questions after reading from the books that ‘made’ them. 
The new edition of Wasafiri dropped in the post a couple of days ago and, though I am yet to read much of it, I can already tell this is going to be my best issue for a long time. The theme is 'The Book in the World' and features readers, writers and publishers. 15 writers talk about the books that changed them. Hence Biyi Bandele and his editor, Ellah Wakatama Allfrey share the same page as they discuss the books that changed things for them. I reasoned very much with Bandele's choice of early 80's Nigeria reading of numerous titles by James Hadley Chase - "an English writer now completely unknown in England (in nearly twenty years of living in London, I'm yet to meet a single British person who admits to having heard of him)." Tell me about it, Mr Burma Boy! Coulda said the same meself! Who'd have thought it, all those years we were chomping down James Hadley Chase? Still we were hooked on the stuff (my own early teenage reading went in stages: some 400 Mills & Boon titles from which I graduated to James Hadley Chase from which I graduated to Harold Robbins - with Sidney Sheldon and Jeffrey Archer stuck in-between; and when I left each stage, I could never bear the novel that marked that stage again. It's a good thing I read my fill of populism before the age of 16, because I couldn't abide populist novels from then on). I digressed. We were talking of Bandele's impression of James Hadley Chase novels, some of which he names: Like a Hole in the Head, You're Lonely When You're Dead, This Way for a Shroud, The Doll's Bad News, The Way the Cookie Crumbles, Well Now My Pretty, An Ear to the Ground, & The Vulture is a Patient Bird. Funny, I read them all too, though I don't recall the 'Vulture' one at all. I was somewhat disappointed Bandele didn't mention, Tell it to the Birds, Miss Shumway Waves a Wand and the one that had me completely gobsmacked all those years ago, 'Believe This and You'll Believe Anything'. Ah, bless!
Blake Morrison's choice would probably be mine, if asked - Midnight's Children. And here's how I discovered Salman Rushdie's 'Booker of Bookers'. The writer was just someone I knew from TV bulletins including words like 'blasphemy' and 'fatwa'; none of which particularly made me want to rush out to buy his books. And so I was on a Bakerloo Line tube train in January 1992 and there on the seat beside me in an empty carriage, was a brand new copy of Midnight's Children. Finders Keepers, ehn? Dear blog reader, I alighted the train with the book, and it's as if I've seen the world through perforated sheets from then on. I still have the copy.
Anyway, back to Wasafiri, which embraces all of those Journals any reader worth his or her salt in Africa ought to read these days: Kwani?, Farafina... there's even an interview with Chimurenga 's editor, Ntone Edjabe.
And there's a short story by Nigerian Uzor Maxim Uzoatu, 'Cemetery of Life'. I've read the story and I'm intrigued by it, seeing as I love all that magical-mystery stuff. I remember E.C Osondu telling me in an interview, that 'Jimmy Carter's Eyes' was his own "attempt at allegory". Perhaps 'allegory' would describe Uzor Maxim Uzoatu's offering in Wasafiri. Loved it, but still scratching my head as to what it really means...
Meanwhile, I'm off to read more of the magazine.
There's a brief run-through of the birth and ascent of Nollywood across Africa, and mention of a Nollywood classic, Living in Bondage. Bandele's piece is also very up-to-date, touching on a very public spat between Nollywood star Zeb Ejiro and an actress, Ibinabo Feberesima over a film titled - wait for it - "A Night in the Philippines." Bandele arrived for his pre-arranged interview with Ejiro to find the premises closed. A call to the star led nowhere, and then the line went dead. Even well known playwright-novelists can get the run-around in Nollywood.
Biyi Bandele read from his new novel, Burma Boy @ the Lewisham Library, London - on publication day, 21 June. The author later discussed the book, about West African involvement in World 
War II - possibly the first novel on the theme. It was inspired by (but not based on) his own father's experience in Burma. Some in the audience also had African/Caribbean fathers who served in WII, and whose contribution and sacrifice has largely been overlooked in writings on the war. Wale Okediran (President of ANA - Association of Nigerian Authors) was at the reading as was Ellah Allfrey, Bandele's editor. She knew the author always wanted to write Burma Boy, so she pushed and encouraged him until he did. If everyone had an editor like that.
To the left is Alan Morrison of the Lewisham Library who organised the event. The library is laying on regular book events, many of which will be of interest to blog readers here. Malika Booker launches her book, 'A Storm Between Fingers' at the venue tonight. So those who can make their way to Lewisham High Street, London for 7.45pm, should do so.
Wale Okediran with Bandele at the reading. Okediran also held a meeting with Book Aid International at their offices in London during his brief visit to the UK (BookAid pics at the next blog update). 
In Ali, I tried to capture the innocence of the African soldiers, set apart from an ideology that forced them to fight a war about which they knew nothing. But Ali is not angry; he is a boy excited by the prospect of war and a new country. Isolated by his youth and keen to impress, he allowed me to explore the humour that surrounds a group of young men and the horror that comes with being African Chindit soldiers in Burma. The story I wanted to tell is not just the story of my father. It is the story of every African soldier who fought, of everybody who was touched, however unknowingly, by the exploits of the Chindits.
- Biyi Bandele on his new novel, Burma Boy. Read more on his Myspace page.
From Giles Foden's review of Biyi Bandele's new novel, Burma Boy... 
I'm the son of Dawa the king of well-diggers whose blessed nose could sniff out water in Sokoto while he's standing in Saminaka. I'm the son of Hauwa whose mother was Talatu whose mother was Fatimatu queen of the moist kulikuli cake, the memory of whose kulikuli still makes old men water at the mouth till this day. Our people say that distance is an illness; only travel can cure it. Do you think that Ali Banana, son of Dawa, great-grandson of Fatima has crossed the great sea and travelled this far, rifle strapped to his shoulder, to look after mules?'" 
Femi Osofisan, James Gibbs & Biyi Bandele - photographed @ the British Library, 16 October 2005 © MW
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In my article published last year (July 30, 2006; The Guardian, Lagos)Bandele talked about Burma Boy. Excerpt...
Bandele’s novel, The Street, is set in multi-ethnic Brixton, South London, where he once lived. "A lot of novels about Brixton tended to be by people living elsewhere," and ended up being "superficial takes" on the area. "When I lived in Brixton, there were a lot of creative people there who couldn’t afford to live elsewhere." Bandele wrote about such people.
Segun Afolabi's first novel, Goodbye Lucille, is now out in the UK by Jonathan Cape. The novel was reviewed by fellow Nigerian Biyi Bandele in last Saturday's Guardian Review. Bandele, playwright and author of The Street, was born in Northern Nigeria to Yoruba parents from the Southwest - like Afolabi. 
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