Edwige-Renée Dro

Edwige-Renée Dro (born 1980s) is an Ivorian writer, translator and literary activist. Quotes We are saying that in our country, Côte d’Ivoire, we read We often hear that Ivorians don’t read, but if they don’t read, who are those people standing in front of newspaper stands every morning reading the titles? They are called titrologues We decided that the sounds of guns were going to overwhelm the sounds of literature I identify first and foremost as a writer and I love writing, and reading I moved into literary translation because I wanted my father to be able to read what I was producing so that we could talk about it There is no point editing something that is not written, and no point translating something that is not written or edited translating goes beyond just reading something There is so much literature out there, so much of it beautiful, varied and producing different kinds of conversations I even want to learn Spanish so I can access more literature, because can you imagine what else is out there that we are not accessing? Not every book produced by an African writer is going to be translated into English or Portuguese or Swahili Publishers are not charities the climate we have today should be seen as an opportunity that has been afforded to us as literary actors from Africa We accuse the West of only wanting literature from Africa that does the apology of poverty, we bemoan the fact that African literature is being discussing in London, etc etc. But let’s go beyond bemoaning now. What are we doing? let’s not behave the way we ourselves do, and then get up in arms about what the West is promoting We should be deliberate about the literature we want to come out of this continen I read more books by writers from Africa when I lived in Europe than I do here At the moment, Ivorian literature is going through a mediocre phase, and the reason why is because the other bits of infrastructure that are necessary for creating good literature are non-existent There is talent however; I want to believe it. We just need to unearth it, and unearth is the operative word here Literary activism in Côte d’Ivoire: Edwige-Renée Dro explains the Abidjan Lit phenomenon 7 August 2017 I got also tired of the rampant misogynistic and sexist attitude in my country I wanted mentality to change. I want mentalities to change We want the community and the whole country to realize just how much African and black women contributed to writing the stories of these women As for African literature, I want people to cite names of women’s writers and for those names to roll off the tongue Interview | Feminist Library in Abidjan Challenges the Erasure of Women from Africa’s Political History 2 April 2020 50 percent of the population is illiterat The old writers are not just the gatekeepers; they have entered and they have shut the gate firmly behind them so no one else can enter Another big problem is that when books are launched, it’s in a gentrified area, so nobody else knows what is happening It is a shame that we do not know who is making the news in Guinea, in Burkina Faso, in Mali, or in Senegal We are just writing and writing, and I think we are writing enough. Let’s now think of ways of building strong publishing houses on the continent, so our books can get to people People talk about how there is good internet penetration in Africa, but it’s only in the urban ­areas Africa is not rising. If Africa was really rising, you wouldn’t have so many migrants dying in the Mediterranean seas But for the majority of youth in Côte d’Ivoire, the official unemployment figure is 5 percent but, whatever, please do not lie to people. It is not 5 percent. The majority of people, they have qualifications, they cannot find a job As Africans, we need to be questioning ourselves: What is our model of development? Is it having these big buildings and these beautiful wide roads? The Ivorian novelist Edwige-Renée DRO talks about the wealth of writing talent and the weakness of Africa’s publishing infrastructure 24 February 2016 there were many more books from the African continent available in England than in Africa itself I don't like the term "indigenous languages", I just call them "languages Mobile phone penetration is very high across Africa, but podcast penetration is not When people talk about French being a colonial language, I say no! For me it is not a colonial language I want to write in French! But I want that Ivorian French we speak here to make its way into the dictionaries What I hate is when people expect African writers to write in their indigenous language A problem about our African languages is that people often feel ashamed of speaking them Our African languages give us an identity. This is very important, but we shouldn’t wear our identity on our back as if it is the only thing we have If we want to be competitive, we need to understand that publishing is a business I want to get books in translation read, so that everybody has access to literature, whether you finished school in grade two or you have a doctorate. Everywhere we struggle! We are always hustling! We have day jobs and side job “French is not a colonial language” 8 August 2022 The success of African literature will be based on a pan-African approach to literature I learned that perhaps as African writers we complain about the whole tag of being African writers, or the whole ‘poverty porn’ issue because we don’t have a lot of vibrant publishing houses on the continent I have no qualms about being called an African Writer. I’m an African Writer. Now if someone wants me to write about war and famine only, I might well ask them if they think that we reached 1 billion mark through immaculate conception Writers need to have spaces where they can talk about their books/work but I also think the main thing is to get away from this intellectualisation of story writing EDWIGE-RENÉE DRO: I AM AN AFRICAN WRITER! n.d External links Category:Authors from Ivory Coast Category:Women from Ivory Coast Category:1980s births