Circumspecte

I had come home to find a stack of papers and brown envelopes in my laundry basket. Assuming it was my sister’s, I ignored them. That is, until I needed the laundry basket. They were mine: college applications, recommendation letters, letters from high school, the works. I ignored them still. Until I needed yet another excuse to delay my packing (procrastination becomes your best friend when you absolutely dislike packing). So, leafing through the stack of materials I’d long forgotten I had, I time-traveled to younger versions of myself and of my parents. Among the things I found were invoices, letters and notes from my first real job… straight out of high school. Now I must say that I didn’t get my job as an administrative assistant and sub-editor the traditional way. Applications? No siree. Connections – mum tells distant-not-really-a-relative aunt of so-so and so that her all-grown-up-distant-not-really-related-niece is all done with high school and looking to keep busy – nop...

Today was a blog waiting to happen. Only, it’s not going to be about the Ghanaian and African Embassies in the West as I’d intended – don’t worry, it will have its time too – but rather about contemporary books, libraries and reading in major African cities like Accra, Lusaka, Jo-burg, Lagos, Dakar. It features some   great insights from people on Facebook   and Twitter on   Africa’s reading culture   and access to contemporary books. Yesterday I participated in a very fruitful Virtual Americanah Book Club meeting with two of my friends – one in Accra, Ghana and the other in Maputo, Mozambique – and we had a swell time reflecting on Chimamanda Adichie’s latest, how it resonates with us, the different themes and so on. I posted some of my thoughts and a tweep asked where they could get the book. I have gotten this question so many times this year – especially after   my “summer reads” blog   - and so I automatically responded “Amazon” and sent a link. T...

I woke up this morning to news that Nigeria's prolific author Chinua Achebe had passed. I'm sad, but I'm also grateful - for his life, his work and more importantly, his influence. Prior to attending Wesley Girls' High School in Cape Coast, I had virtually no idea about what "African literature" was. If you meant the stories submitted by readers to The Mirror , a Saturday weekly in Ghana, then maybe. But if you meant stories that capture the sometimes mundane details of daily life in an African country, complete with the kola nuts, local proverbs, and complexities of traditional and contemporary African life,  then not really. Then came Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart and Efua Sutherland's The Marriage of Anansewa - and a whole new world was opened up to me. I can't recount the number of times I read Things Fall Apart , it was just that good. Achebe's descriptions of Okonkwo, Unoka and Obierika - some of the main characters - were al...

It's my great honor to introduce this young lady to those of you who might not have heard of her, and for those of you who have, to hopefully share one or two things that you probably didn't know about Deborah Ahenkorah and her journey so far. The Visionnaire Series begins. -- Privilege Vs Responsibility At 24 years, Deborah Ahenkorah is living proof of the heights a person can reach just by trying. A native of the Eastern Region, Deborah grew up with her parents in Ghana’s capital Accra. She attended North Ridge Lyceum, and later enrolled at Wesley Girls’ High School in Cape Coast. Consequently, she proceeded on scholarship to Bryn Mawr College in the USA, for her university degree. “I had no reason to want to come back to Ghana. I’m going to America, why would I want to come back to Ghana? But in the four years that I was in school various experiences, you know, switched my mind 180 degrees,” Deborah recounted. According to the self-proclaimed adventur...

Hi Folks, Hope this week went well for you. Mine was totally out of wack aka nothing really went the way I expected. But anyway, it's all good, we're still staying positive through it all and looking forward to the possibilities which abound. That said, I'd like to extend a personal invitation to each of you to tune in to the Writers Project of Ghana (WPG) CitiFM (97.3) radio show this Sunday, June 12, 2011 at 8:30pm GMT . I'll be a guest on the show and will be sharing the highlights of my journey as a writer, some tips and lessons from my writing experiences, as well as reading some of my creative writing pieces from right here on Circumspect! The Writers Project of Ghana is an amazing creative writing and literary initiative that was started in 2009 and is based in both Ghana and the US. In addition to organizing creative writing projects and workshops around Ghana and in particular, with the youth, WPG also encourages literary culture through public readings,...

Sometimes all it takes for you to affirm who you are, is to see a glimpse of yourself in someone else. Two weekends ago I had exactly that opportunity when my friend Arame and I spent the afternoon interacting with some writers, poets and painters at the beautiful Goree Island- including Goree Institute cofounder, distinguished writer, painter and South African poet Breyten Breytenbach , renowned Tunisian painter Emna Zghal , acclaimed NYU professor, author of "Joe the Engineer", and poet Chuck Wachtel, Coordinating Editor of the Piroque Institute and Imagine Africa Cultural Fellow Adam Weidwitsch , as well as up and coming Senegalese poet and author of " Les Raisins du Baobab " Ibrahima Amadou Niang. During our time there we discussed a lot of things - the act of writing, the different styles and forms, how to draw inspiration, what it means to be a writer, the question of who forms/tells history, the act of documentation and preservation of art and history, etc. I...

Y'all know how much I adore Paulo Coelho. Well, saw this on his blog , and I just had to repost it here! His description of the writing process and himself as a writer just take my breath away! If you haven't read "The Alchemist" yet, please put it on your list of URGENT to dos!! Simple words with so much weight! Enjoy!! -- Google Alerts is great. Sometimes I found things about myself that I did not expect. Today I found an old interview for an Indian newspaper – and here are some Q&A Could you recall from your life where you felt the feminine face of God? It was in 1992, when I was sitting inside of a grotto, in Lourdes. Since then, I try to accept my feminine side. When I write, I am a woman. I got pregnant from life, and I don’t know how the baby looks like. My pregnancy cycle lasts for two years, and I don’t take notes, I don’t make plans. The only thing that I know is that life put inside me a seed that will grow when time comes. Then, when time comes, I...

Okay, here we go with module 1. If you wanna develop your writing skills, there's another skill that you should probably think about developing at the same time: reading skills. You don't have to love reading, and you're not even expected to read an entire novel or two a day, but you do need to cultivate this habit. Why? For a number of reasons, including: - It helps you develop your grammar - You pick up on new vocabulary AND you get exposed to the various *contexts* in which they can be used - It helps you identify what style of writing you like to read...which could also be helpful in figuring out what kind of writing you might be inclined to -You become more adept at sieving through data and retrieving relevant information: which will help you prevent long-winded explanations etc in your own writing - It offers you a chance to identify with the characters (if its a novel) or the author - Great source of inspiration and creative ideas -It's a great hobby Personal sto...

Hi Everyone, Ok, most of you know me, some of you probably don't. But it's never too late to make acquaintances. That said, I have been thinking about doing this for a while now, but have never actually had the time. Guess what? It's summer, I'm done with college, and I'm willing to do this with whoever is interested. By "this" I mean writing workshops. Yes, writing workshops. A number of people on facebook and off, have mentioned to me that they are interested in writing, but are not really sure about how to go about it. I believe that like everything else, writing can be a fulfilling experience...if you make it your own. Sure, there are general standards that are recommended like good grammar, vocabulary, sentence structure etc, but at the end of the day, you own your style of writing. That said, if anyone is interested in these writing workshops, just leave a comment below this note or send me an email at jabdulai@gmail.com, with your main email address...