African literatures and beyond : : a florilegium / / edited by Bernth Lindfors and Geoffrey V. Davis ; cover image, Brenda Lindfors, Gordon Collier.

• TeilnehmendeR: Lindfors, Brenda.; Davis, Geoffrey V., 1943-2018.; Lindfors, Bernth.; Collier, Gordon.
• Place / Publishing House: Amsterdam, Netherlands ;, New York : : Rodopi,, 2013.; ©2013
• Year of Publication: 2013
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Language: English
• Series: Cross/cultures ; 168; Cross/Cultures 168.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (427 p.)
• Notes: Description based upon print version of record.

This tribute collection reflects the wide range and diversity of James Gibbs’s academic interests. The focus is on Africa, but comparative studies of other literatures also receive attention. Fiction, drama, and poetry by writers from Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Eritrea, Malawi, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Ireland, England, Germany, India, and the Caribbean are surveyed alongside significant missionaries, scientists, performers, and scholars. The writers discussed include Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe, Kobina Sekyi, Raphael Armattoe, J.E. Casely Hayford, Michael Dei-Anang, Kofi Awoonor, Ayi Kwei Armah, John Kolosa Kargbo, Dele Charley, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Okot p’Bitek, Jonathan Sajiwandani, Samuel E. Krune Mqhayi, A.S. Mopeli–Paulus, Kelwyn Sole, Anna Seghers, Raja Rao, and Arundhati Roy. Other essays treat the black presence in Ireland, anonymous rap artists in Chicago, the Jamaican missionary Joseph Jackson Fuller in the Cameroons, the African-American actor Ira Aldridge in Sweden, the Swedish naturalist Anders Sparrman in South Africa, and the literary scholar and editor Eldred Durosimi Jones in Sierra Leone. Interviews with the Afro-German Africanist Theodor Wonja Michael and the Irish-Nigerian dramatist Gabriel Gbadamosi are also included. Also offered are poems by Jack Mapanje and Kofi Anyidoho, short stories by Charles R. Larson and Robert Fraser, plays by Femi Osofisan and Martin Banham, and an account of a dramatic reading of a script written and co-performed by James Gibbs. Contributors: Anne Adams, Sola Adeyemi, Kofi Anyidoho, Awo Mana Asiedu, Martin Banham, Eckhard Breitinger, Gordon Collier, James Currey, Geoffrey V. Davis, Chris Dunton, Robert Fraser, Raoul J. Granqvist, Gareth Griffiths, C.L. Innes, Charles R. Larson, Bernth Lindfors, Leif Lorentzon, Jack Mapanje, Christine Matzke, Mpalive–Hangson Msiska, Femi Osofisan, Eustace Palmer, Jane Plastow, Lynn Taylor, and Pia Thielmann.

Table of Contents

Preliminary Material -- Cultural Studies, Power, and the Idea of the Hegemonic in Wole Soyinka’s Works / Mpalive Hangson Msiska -- Interpreting the Interpreters: The Narratives of the Postcolony in Wole Soyinka’s The Interpreters / Sola Adeyemi -- The Enduring Relevance of Kobina Sekyi’s The Blinkards in Twenty-First-Century Ghana / Awo Mana Asiedu -- The Agony and the Ecstasy: Sierra Leonean Dramatists’ Confrontation with the Sierra Leonean Landscape / Eustace Palmer -- The Rev. Joseph Jackson Fuller: A ‘Native’ Evangelist and ‘Black’ Identity in the Cameroons / Gareth Griffiths -- A Modest Plant, Easily Crushed: Radio Drama in Blin, Eritrea / Jane Plastow -- Through Determination to Happiness?: Eastern African Slavery in Life and Literature / Pia Thielmann -- “Shine your light, Zimbabwe” / Geoffrey V. Davis -- From Mqhayi to Sole: Four Poems on the Sinking of the Troopship Mendi / Chris Dunton -- Fieldwork as Translation: Linnaeus’ Apostle Anders Sparrman and the Hottentot Perspective / Raoul J. Granqvist -- Orality and Performance: A Source of Pan-African Social Self / Kofi Anyidoho -- Africans and Ireland History, Society, and the Black Nexus / Innes C.L. and Collier Gordon -- Ira Aldridge in Stockholm / Bernth Lindfors -- “Who’ll get my library after I’m gone?”: An Interview with the Septuagenarian Afro-German Africanist Theodor Wonja Michael / Anne Adams -- Into the Heart of Whiteness: Performing African Moon in Krefeld: Gabriel Gbadamosi in Conversation / Christine Matzke -- Von Jenseits des Meeres: Romantic and Revolutionary Visions of Caribbean History / Eckhard Breitinger -- “But it will have to be a new English”: A Comparative Discussion of the ‘Nativization’ of English among Afro- and Indo-English authors / Leif Lorentzon -- African Literature Today and African Theatre The James Gibbs Connection / Currey James and Lynn Taylor -- He Spoke Truth – Quietly / Kofi Anyidoho -- The Carwash, Clifton Moor, York: (For James and Patience) / Jack Mapanje -- Crosscut / Charles R. Larson -- Kariba’s Last Stand / Robert Fraser -- Odùduwà, Don’t Go!: A One-Act Play For Col. Adékúnlé Fajuyi, who gave his life / Femi Osofisan -- Mosquito!: Or, Addition, Vernacular, or Rat? A Railway for Freetown / Martin Banham -- James Gibbs’s Pinteresque Diversion / C.L. Innes -- Notes on Contributors.