Creative writers are introspective people. When you meet one such as my sister, the award-winning Nigerian novelist, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, you’ll get what I mean. Chimamanda was talking on BBC’s 100 Women the other day. As she did, giving answers in a philosophical manner to somewhat mind-tasking questions, the depth of her mind was obvious as usual.
Now, one notable thing about the human mind is its complexity. In fact, each human being is a complex machine, with awesome outputs to make if only we would put a bit more of our mind to use. Thinking through complex issues, proffering viable solutions is the stuff of great minds. People with simple personalities, simple worldviews, but a mind that works through complex problems can be found in the sciences and the arts. I mean simplicity combined with a first-rate mind. That describes Chimamanda. In my last piece on her exactly two years ago (“As UN unmasks the real Chimamanda Adichie”, December 13, 2019) I noted that my sister “doesn’t carry loads.” Chimamanda is herself and she enjoys the company of people, her kind, rather than the swollen-headedness as well as the selfishness that accompanies fame which is found in many. I reached this conclusion in 2009 within the first two days of contact with Chimamanda at the creative workshop she held annually. The latest BBC interview further confirms it. Here though, I call attention to what has happened to her over the years, the weight she has added.
What were the things Chimamanda was saying that time? Although her face is slightly fuller now, it’s in connection with the depth of the things she says that I conclude that she’s added weight. I mean her views are more introspective, more philosophical, sounding the way only elders do. In fact, she says that these days what has happened to her and around her has made her have no time “for rubbish.” I suppose she means she concerns herself with more thought-provoking life issues. Actually, such were the topics and questions she responded to in the interview and her latest published work, Notes on Grief, was at the centre of it.
The work is Chimamanda’s take when one loses a loved one. This one concerns her father. Sadly though, her mother too passed away not too long after. The first and only time I saw Chimamanda’s parents was in 2009 during a dinner party held for participants at the end of the workshop. They were seated together, watching proceedings in the posh restaurant used for the occasion. From time to time, I looked at the elderly couple across the room thinking that they were showing their daughter so much support, something I admired a lot. One other thing I also recall that calls attention to her infectious simplicity was that as we were seated in the restaurant, Chimamanda walked in, sat beside me and playfully announced: “Uncle Tunji, you’re the class captain so I’m sitting beside you.” How she started calling me “Uncle Tunji” throughout the workshop though she called the other twenty participants by their names is another story entirely. The playful tone, like that of a sister teasing her brother, with which she regularly said “Uncle Tunji” during the workshop was such that till today I also call myself “Uncle Tunji”, in my private moments, laughing as I do. This happens whenever I recall something awkward I did or had said in public but which I choose to laugh about rather than be burdened with. (I do with the teasing tone Chimamanda used to call me “Uncle Tunji” , still so fresh in mind in spite of the years). It’s one of my personal therapies, meant to ensure I don’t take myself seriously even though I take what I do most seriously. This, I think, equally describes Chimamanda.
In the course of the interview on BBC and while talking about the passing of her father, Chimamanda said she’s been thinking “more about life.” She said her life changed after her father died because “something catastrophic happened.” She notes that this is the case because her parents played a major role in her becoming who she is. They were wonderful people, she added, and their passing made her think more about the hereafter: “I don’t know how much time I have left.” Their passing made her realise that for everyone “death is so close.” For this reason, she’s been asking herself questions such as, “Who do I want to be?” and “What do I want in life?”
Why did Chimamanda write Notes on Grief? She did because everyone who loses a loved one grieves and she hopes her own experience would bring some comfort to other people. But the book is also her way of expressing her own grief. In her words, in the course of the interview as well as the narrative in Notes on Grief, the talent of the award-winning storyteller showed as ever; here a sombre matter was fluidly and sensitively rendered, making it much easier to read.
Nonetheless, some of the things Chimamanda was saying in the interview and the depth of the thought process which fuelled them reminded me of an encounter during the 2009 workshop, which I wish had happened after Chimamanda’s latest interview. In the course of the workshop, Chimamanda allowed participants to share their personal experiences with regard to topical issues in the literary materials we were treating. I spoke about the literary works that I had read as a teenager and up to a point as an adult. Chimamanda asked me a question regarding this. I gave her an answer. But that wasn’t the main reason. She nodded sympathetically. It’s like her to be sympathetic towards others; it’s ever there in her words, her interventions, her writings, something I notice many public figures with their shallow, self-centred mentality starkly lack. On that occasion, I gave Chimamanda the answer I did because I imagined she wouldn’t understand me and that she might misunderstand me if I gave the main answer.
What transpired during that workshop setting was similar to what transpired between me and the instructor who trained me from white belt to black belt in taekwondo as well as issued my instructor certificate, Mr George Ashiru. He’s the President of International Taekwondo Academy, former Vice-President of the World Taekwondo Federation as well as the past President of Nigerian Taekwondo Federation. I wasn’t in touch with him for some time. One day I met a fellow taekwondo player and asked about Ashiru. From our discussion, I concluded that he would be able to understand what I would want to explain to him. I did, and Ashiru said he understood, and he would have if I had explained much earlier. With the manner Chimamanda was talking during the course of the latest interview, I think when next I see her I will voluntarily give her the real answer to her question because now I’m confident she would understand. It’s also possible she would tell me that she would have understood if I had given her the real answer back in 2009.
Still thinking about the intelligence and depth in her responses to the interview questions that time, I believe now Chimamanda is overqualified for the accolades the late Nigerian novelist, Chinua Achebe, once showered her with. Achebe commented on the ancient wisdom displayed in her book Purple Hibiscus at a time she was still in her twenties. In the latest BBC interview, I thought Chimamanda talked with the kind of depth associated only with wise elders who’re in their nineties. Years and her personal experiences have broadened her philosophical views. I think Chimamanda is a young elder whose voice should now be heard clearly wherever sages proffer solutions to some of the challenges confronting our nation.
Meanwhile, the 2009 Class had asked me to send a letter to Chimamanda to condole her over the loss of her parents. Ever since I’ve been thinking of how to draft a grand letter with grand English that I imagine the occasion deserves (though Chimamanda writes simple English and did teach us to write simple English). But what grander platform could there be for me to do this than here? Do accept our condolences, sister.
