Sentinel Nigeria takes poetry to Abuja

By SYLVA IFEDIGBO

Writers, literary enthusiasts and budding poets in Abuja turned out in good number to enjoy an opportunity of getting the guidance to hone their skills on Friday 18th June 2008 in what can be best described as an evening of literary splendor.

The event was the third in the series of free poetry workshops organized in cities across Nigeria by Sentinel Literary Movement of Nigeria (SLMN), publishers of Sentinel Nigeria, an online magazine of contemporary Nigerian writing.

The first two workshops held in Asaba on May 15th and in Lagos on June 5th.  The Abuja Workshop, facilitated by Unoma Azuah, an acclaimed Nigerian writer, professor of Creative Writing at Lane College in the United States of America and Poetry Editor of the Sentinel Nigeria Magazine was held in collaboration with the Abuja Literary Society (ALS).

A Large Turnout
Strategically scheduled for the evening hours to allow civil servants and workers a chance to attend, the Zanzibar Venue, located in the Asokoro district of the city, saw participants turn up promptly and patiently wait for a few logistic issues to be sorted out so that by the time the workshop eventually started, it did so to a full house of literary enthusiast including young children and their parents eager to get the feel of what contemporary poetry writing is all about.

The evening started with the Slam Master of the Abuja Literary Society, Ken Ike Okere, who recently published a poetry collection ‘Spirit Walk’, welcoming all to the workshop and then introducing Richard Ali, the Editor-In-Chief of the Sentinel Nigeria Magazine of Contemporary Nigeria, to set the agenda for the evening.

Richard Ali, who stated that he came in from his base in Jos due to the strategic importance of the Abuja literary community to the activities of the Sentinel Literary Movement of Nigeria, expressed his joy at the number of people who had turned up for the event. He explained that while many Nigerians have excelled and have been celebrated in literary spheres globally, there are many more great talents who never get mentioned owing to the peculiar problems of writing and publishing in Nigeria.

He stated that Sentinel Nigeria was setup to provide a platform where budding writers of all genres could showcase their work to a wider audience – an important step to literary success. In taking this further, he stated that the Magazine decided to pick poetry as a pilot genre for its national series of workshops and this followed an observation that while a lot of people desired to write poetry, quite as many did not know how to.

He thanked both Unoma Azuah, who graciously offered to use the period of her annual vacation to run the series of workshops across the country at no cost to the participants, and the Abuja Literary Society, under whose aegis the workshop was holding, for all the support they had provided towards making the event a reality.
An Interactive Session

The workshop focused on “The Techniques and Critical Appraisal of Poetry”.  Unoma Azuah, in the true manner of a teacher, mostly stood through the session as she introduced various areas of emphasis and shared out materials from which the participants made notes and provided feedback. The areas discussed included the major elements of poetry which include Figures of Speech and Imagery, both very important in writing good poetry, as well as poetic forms and styles. The poems ‘Balance’ by Niki Giovanni, ‘The Quarrel’ by Linda Piston, ‘As the Cold Deepens’ by Elizabeth Holden, ‘The Plain Sense of Things’ by Williams Carlos Williams, and JP Clark’s “Night Rain,” amongst others, were used as examples. The participants also got to try their hands at poetry writing with emphasis on experimenting with the new knowledge they had acquired.

No Money in Poetry
The last part of the workshop was a question and answer session as well as general discussion on poetry writing and publishing. Among the remarkable comments by Azuah was that poetry was not a money spinner and that people should not approach writing poetry with money or awards in mind. She stated it was important that budding writers patiently learn the rules of the genre before trying out their own styles and aspiring to get published.

In response to questions on mentoring, she stated that she has undertaken to review poetry manuscripts and poetry pieces from participants of the workshop, pointing out also that the hard challenge of getting published and being read by a wider audience is being thawed by the efforts of the Sentinel Nigeria Magazine and similar organizations.
Selected poems from the workshop participants will also be published in the maiden Sentinel Nigeria Poetry Anthology due out later in the year, said Unoma Azuah.

She stated that the audience in Abuja was the largest she has facilitated since she began the series and praised the efforts of the Abuja Literary Society for the publicity and support, specifically appreciating the effort of the Slam Master, Ken Ike Okere, for keeping such a vibrant group running.

The evening ended with a vote of thanks by the Slam Master, Ike Ken Okere, who thanked Sentinel and Unoma  Azuah for  undertaking to run the workshop for free. He highlighted the effort of the Abuja Literary Society in nurturing new writers and providing them a platform to excel, using the ‘Emerging Voices, Rising Stars’ Series, which will debut on 25th June 2010, as an example. He stated that the ALS would be happy to collaborate with Sentinel Nigeria in all her future activities.