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scholar of literary & cultural studies, editor of poco.lit.
This graphic novel is a fascinating marriage of mainstream appeal and postcolonial-type concerns. Set in the Marvel universe, it follows the Black Panther’s younger sister, Shuri: scientist extraordinaire and uncompromising young woman.
more...August Gondiwindi has been washing dishes in miserable grey London for ten years, when the death of her grandfather Albert causes her to journey home to Massacre Plains in Australia. Thus begins the story told by Tara June Winch in The Yield: a book both very beautiful and very sad.
more...Last week, Bernardine Evaristo was in town for the Internaionales Literaturfestival Berlin, and we were lucky enough to get an opportunity to chat to her at She Said Books.
more...Musa Okwonga’s book is a captivating journey in three parts. Let the narrator take you with him for a spell; you won’t regret it.
more...Many of us who love literature might like to think of it as untethered from the mundane aspects of the real world, but books emerge and circulate in a literary market much like other markets, and literary value – however one might define it – is definitely not the sole determinant of what gets a book published and read.
more...Nana Oforiatta Ayim’s prose in her debut novel The God Child feels like poetry: vivid, associative, beautiful – and sometimes a little confusing. The story navigates between Ghana, Germany and the UK, following its young protagonist Maya from childhood to her early twenties, and is a narrative rich in history, complicity and complicated relationships.
more...Recitatif is a writerly experiment that sees the acclaimed Toni Morrison toying with her reader as she frames an insightful commentary on racial categorizations. First published in 1983, it is famously the only short story the Nobel-laureate ever wrote.
more...This Mournable Body is undoubtedly an important book, but it’s more than a little difficult to read. The deservedly renowned Zimbabwean novelist, filmmaker and playwright Tsitsi Dangarembga presents a devastating portrait of her country after independence has finally been achieved, but has failed to produce the equitable utopia that the struggle seemed to promise would follow liberation from colonial oppression.
more...My favourite thing about this book is the way it approaches serious problems with a light touch, while still granting them their gravity.
more...One of our aims with poco.lit. is to try to demystify some of the core ideas in and around postcolonial studies and the ways in which postcolonial literatures have been read. In this post, we take a look at Orientalism by Edward Said and some of its key contributions to thinking about colonial practices.
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