Sefi Atta interviewed in Per Contra

Writer Sefi Atta is interviewed by Miriam N Kotzin in the new issue of Per Contra online.

Excerpt
I’m an African writer published in the West. I have seen how publishing industries in the West accommodate African writers. For a start, our stories are either about post-colonial traumas or human and civil rights abuses. As an American writer once said, which surprised me because he sounded so Nigerian, “For an African book to be successful here, a leg must cut.“ I laughed so much. Some writers can do whatever is necessary to get published and win awards, and the marketplace here rewards you if you meet its expectations. All I can do is keep on telling stories that interest me in honest ways. Now, it’s hard to define honest, but it’s very easy to tell when a story lacks integrity.

• Read the interview here

New Read

Chika Unigwe's short story, Waiting, is in the current issue of Per Contra. This was one story of Unigwe's that I'd somehow never read before now, although I'm sure I've read about it someplace. Oge is heading home from a shopping trip, after buying a few things that her son Jordi may not actually need. Her husband Gunter thinks she spoils the boy. Gunter has changed somewhat. Why? Waiting has a neat surprise at the end.

Excerpt
She should have made a list. She is always forgetting things and Gunter used to find it endearing. My little forgetful wife, he used to say, laughing. My little forgetful wife. One day you’d forget your head. And then where would we all be? And she had laughed with him too. Now, when he laughs it is because there is something funny on TV. She never watches TV with him, especially not when there is a comedy on because they do not find the same things funny. She finds his humour dry. It had never mattered before: this difference but now, like all the other ways in which they are different, it bothers her and she wonders why she ever married him in the first place.

Unigwe is the author of the novel, Black Sisters' Street.
Read Waiting here.

Miriam N Kotzin, one of Per Contra's editors, has been very good at showcasing new fiction by African women writers over the last few years. She has an interview with Chika Unigwe in this edition.

New Read

Victor Ehikhamenor's story, Riding Monkey With Pako, is published in the new summer issue of Per Contra.

Deboy is a village boy who begins to yearn for the city after the arrival of the headmaster's son, nicknamed Fedra Gorment. The no-nonsence Pako, Deboy's best friend, is unimpressed by Fedra Gorment's tales of the city. In Pako's company, Deboy takes part in all manners of exciting activities. All goes well, until they decide to ride 'monkey'.

Excerpt
We became suspicious of Fedra Gorment’s city tales when one day he started telling us stories from his books without pictures. Every storybook we had came with pictures. Primary Two Reader had David and Mr. Dauda driving a lorry from Ibadan to Lagos. Primary Three Reader had Mr. Giwa the trader standing in front of his store, and our own Primary Six Reader had the dubious Mr. Ali selling ashes instead of sugar to strangers. So where did Fedra Gorment get his two small books called Eze Goes To School and Chike And The River?

Fedra Gorment spun story after story from the books, claiming that his elder brother in St. John Bosco College, where white men and Indians were teachers, told him these stories. Though we did not believe him, the tales were interesting. That was until the day the albino stepped on a sore by narrating to us the story of a boy whose father was killed by a leopard in a thick forest. The story sounded similar to how a snake killed Pako’s father. From then on, Pako warned me to avoid the headmaster’s son for good.

“Very soon he will tell us he eats rice everyday and plays football with white children,” Pako grabbed my hand and dragged me away from Fedra Gorment’s court.

• Read Riding Monkey With Pako

Per Contra Prize

From Per Contra

Per Contra has featured winners of The MacArthur Award, the Caine Prize, the Orange Prize, the Walt Whitman Award, the Flannery O'Connor Award, the Pushcart Prize and more. Per Contra has published authors from the United States and North America, South America, Europe, Africa and South Asia .

Our March 2008 issue features former poetry consultant to the Library of Congress (the position now known as the U.S. Poet Laureate) Daniel Hoffman, Pulitzer Prize Winning former poetry consultant to the Library of Congress (the position now known as the U.S. Poet Laureate) Maxine Kumin, Pulitzer Prize winning author and poet John Updike, poetry consultant to the Library of Congress (the position now known as the U.S. Poet Laureate) William Jay Smith and O. Henry Prize winner Stephen Dixon, as well as great emerging writers from around the world.

You may have seen our ad in the Fall 2007 Edition of Poets and Writers.

We are now accepting submissions for the 2008 Per Contra Prize. Because of the public interest generated by our lineup for the Spring, we are working hard to find talented emerging writers to submit manuscripts for the Prize. The grand prize winner will be published in our Spring 2008 issue.

Grand Prize is $1,000 and publication at our regular professional rates. The top ten stories submitted will be published at our regular professional rates during the 2008 editorial calendar.

Deadline for Entry is January 31, 2008. This is an excellent opportunity for an emerging writer to be published with several elite writers and poets.

• How to enter.