Wanjiku wa Ngũgĩ

Wanjiku wa Ngugi (born 1970s) is a Kenyan writer, who has lived and worked in Eritrea, Zimbabwe and Finland. She is the founder and former director of the Helsinki African Film Festival (HAFF). Also a political analyst, she is a member of the editorial board of Matatu: Journal for African Literature and Culture and Society, and has been a columnist for the Finnish development magazine Maailman Kuvalehti. Among journals and newspapers in which her work has appeared are The Herald (Zimbabwe), The Daily Nation, Business Daily, Pambazuka News and Chimurenga She is the author of a novel published in 2014 and a contributor to anthologies including New Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Writing by Women of African Descent (2019, edited by Margaret Busby), Nairobi Noir (2020, edited by Peter Kimani). Quotes I come from a family of storytellers, and we grew up listening [to] and making up stories. When my father was thrown in detention without trial and then was forced into exile, I was 10. I remember times when his effigies were set alight around the country, and when people, relatives included, were afraid of even mentioning his name. But even under such trying times, and they were difficult times, we continued with our own little tradition of making up and listening to stories. Seasons in Hippoland is about the narration of history as living stories told by a young woman coming of age in a land caught between a colonial past and neocolonial present, figuratively and literally. The action of the novel takes place in and across three fictional valleys, and unfolds through flashbacks that evoke a folk-tale atmosphere, part realism and part magic realism. I loved writing this novel. I loved it even when it was most difficult to weave the stories Aunt Sara tells into one coherent narrative. I loved it through the tonnes of revisions I had to do to make the characters come alive the way I envisioned them in my head. It was certainly not happiness the entire time, but it was very meaningful. I come from a family of storytellers. My aunt told us stories when we were young on most evenings, whenever she came visiting. Her brother, my father [celebrated author, academic and activist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o] is a writer so in a way we grew up ‘watching’ books being written and I think their influence is the reason why four of my siblings are also published authors. In addition, when my father was thrown in detention (for writing) and later went into political exile, we told each other stories, mostly made up on the spot as a means of survival and meaning making. External links