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Momodou
Denmark
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 Posted - 27 Aug 2010 : 21:46:13
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Baaba Sillah Launches two books
By Ousman Sillah
27-08-10
Baaba Sillah, a Gambian Writer and Literary / Social Critic, will be launching two new books entitled “Pencum Taakusaan” and “Dabali Gi”, a sequel to “When the Monkey Talks”, which was published in 2005.
In the book “When the MonkeyTalks”, the author has charted the 70 years history of colonial rule in The Gambia and in the build up towards the anti-colonial struggle. This was after the carving up of Africa.
“Pencum Taakusaan” is a collection of 71 poems.
“Dabali Gi”, which covers 11 years of Gambia’s history, from 1940 to 1951, is a change of technique from the linear to the parallel narratives. Sillah believes that this allows him greater latitude to go in and out of history and to fuse that history in stories within stories and that is a technique more akin to our story telling cultural and oral tradition.
The poetry is a departure from the conventional poetry writing.
Sillah looks at poetry with a different set of lattices. He believes that we must shift away from the very abstract, mechanical-type poetry. The poetry that resonates more with our own ‘Taasus’, raunchy rhythms and the bounce and articulation prevalent in our ways of articulating issues, stories and events.
Sillah said there is more to come as he is working on two more books that cover Gambia’s history from 1951 to Independence and from Independence to date.
The launch of the two books, “Pencum Taakusaan” and “Dabali Gi”, will take place on Saturday, 28 August, 2010 at the Paradise Suites Hotel at 10 am.
Below are the blurbs from two literary critics on the two books.
Pencum Taakusaan is a collection of seventy-one poems expressing moments as epitomes of the lives and general conditions of the African, particularly the Gambian. Unlike poets before him, Baaba Sillah has not only added a new voice to the rich Gambian collection of poetry but he has also distinguished himself as the first Gambian poet to take a revolutionary departure from the standard style of poetic expression. Sillah makes a clean break away from convention and tells his stories in rather unorthodox ways. He fuses the coloniser’s language with cultural expressions coated in a powerful élan of oracular quality and vernacular imagery. This is shown in the use of the local words and autography to make the reader relate to and engage with the issues. These seventy-one poems are also full of fertility and deftness of images and phrases expressing true African values and concerns. They tell stories. They make us look at ourselves, our society, our influences and our environment with a different set of lattices. Poems like ‘Misspent Youth, Penda, The Little Girl Next Door, Gaza, Makumba and several others are interconnected with other poems to appreciate their full meaning. There is great freshness and elegance in the mature and confident attitude of the writer/poet in his reappraisal of the African cultural heritage. Baaba Sillah has set the pace in his poetic expressions that can best be described as a paradigm shift in poetic creativity in The Gambia and beyond. One should definitely not miss the opportunity to read them.
Cherno Umar Bari
Literary critic
University of the Gambia
Dabbali Gi is the sequel to “When the Monkey Talks”. It too is a socio-political historical novel that takes up the most significant issues and developments that engaged the people of Kataminaland and the rest of Africa in the period spanning the beginning of the decade of the nineteen forties through to the early fifties. It follows the fortunes of three distinct communities within a wider community: Those that were sent to fight a war that did not belong to them; the vicissitudes that were the lives of the families, friends and communities they left behind; the decisions made by the colonial government on the community’s behalf. The novel highlights the issues and debates that were raging, not just at the level of the Legislative Council chambers, but through print media and other fora. This book therefore canvasses important landmark events of this exciting period in Kataminaland’s history.
Dabbali Gi derives from the Wolof word “Dabbali” - meaning, in the context of the lives of the everyday farmer - the loan from the middleman to whom the farmer will mortgage his crop - at times for several years in a row. Consequently, both he and his loan-agent trader are ensnared in an unholy and inextricable bind – to which the farmer becomes a debt-slave.
Much like its precursor, the book takes up important issues and events, whose impact are still being felt today in Africa: Colonial welfare and development, the Atlantic Charter, we must make up our minds before the world leaves us stranded at the shore. As the tides recede, leaving us without the wherewithal of eking-out an existence in a hostile terrain; with a sail-less boat, a map with neither beginning nor end, no cardinal points and no compass pointing towards a positive destination. Africa must therefore find the solutions to her unique problems’.
Anita Simon, Durban, 2009.
Source: Foroyaa Online
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