/ARTS WEEKLY/BOOKS-UGANDA/: The Power of the Pen

By Evelyn Kiapi Reprint | | Print |

Evelyn Kiapi Matsamura

KAMPALA, Jan 20 2003 (IPS) - Goretti Kyomuhendo, 37, discovered she could write after her first attempt to get an article published in a local newspaper. She had submitted a creative piece, which she was not sure would get published. That was in 1994.

When she saw her byline in the newspaper, Kyomuhendo knew she could do it. She holds a diploma in marketing, nothing near writing or literature.

”It was my first attempt and I was successful. I got a full page published,” she recalls.

When Kyomuhendo went to pick her payment she found a message from the editor, requesting her to write another story. ”Everything I wrote got published and this raised my morale,” she says.

Kyomuhendo decided to keep a notebook where she jotted down every inspiration and ideas that crossed her mind. She never liked her stories edited and ‘twisted around’. Soon it was a long story that could not be a newspaper article. A friend asked her to get it published and that was how her debut novel, ‘The First Daughter’, started to grow.

Today it is one of Uganda’s most popular books read at secondary and university levels. Her publications focus mainly on the plight of the African woman, her surrounding and her struggles in life.

”When I was in form six, I used to tell my teacher that I wanted to do something related to writing. And I had no idea what it was. So the teacher told me to choose literature if I went to the university,” she says.

Kyomuhendo did not make it to the university, but did a diploma in marketing, a discipline that, thanks to her determination, failed to kill her dream. For Kyomuhendo knew she was born a writer.

Kyomuhendo has written a few more books, three of them got to the top of the charts. ‘The First Daughter’ was published in 1996. ‘Secrets’ is her second book published in 1999, while ‘Whispers From Vera’ is the latest, and is currently being serialised in a local newspaper, ‘The Monitor’.

‘The First Daughter’ is about the challenges faced by young African girls as they grow up.

”The African girl is growing up in a setting which is typically polygamous, with limited resources, where you do not make a choice of whether to go to school or not. Will it be the boy or the girl?”

Kyomuhendo writes about how a young girl relates to her stepmother, the suffering, seeing her father’s divided love, and why she cannot go to school.

”In such a situation, there is a decision to be made, whether to send her, or the boys to school,” she says.

Kyomuhendo has a strong rural background.

”I grew up in a rural setting. And, first novels are always from the heart. It’s like you have something more to tell, and before you tell it, you cannot look at a bigger picture. So you cannot avoid putting yourself in it,” she says.

Kyomuhendo grew up in Hoima district, western Uganda, going through what she terms ‘injustices’ where the whole community shuns a girl who gets pregnant. The girl may even be dismissed from school while the boy continues with his studies.

”When one gets pregnant, they all say, ‘You have ashamed us. You are no longer our daughter’. And I am trying to put the question forward; who is to blame? The school, the education system, or the parents who never taught her about the facts of life?” she says.

‘Secrets’ is another of Kyomuhendo’s inspiring books, this one based on the 1994 Rwanda genocide, something she had keenly followed from the local newspapers.

Ugandan journalist Dismas Nkunda, from whom Kyomuhendo gathered information, covered the tragedy. She also bought books on the pogrom.

”I was experiencing this kind of tragedy for the first time. It was so close to us. Uganda has so many links with Rwanda, including marriages. We share so much,” she says.

”I would read a newspaper article ‘500 massacred in church’. I would wake up expecting to find a change on the street, maybe people demonstrating, crying or in groups discussing, but Ugandans were just getting on with their lives,” she recalls.

”What kind of people are we, I thought to myself?” Kyomuhendo decided to write a story based on her observation of the genocide.

”I had read a lot of books about the genocide, but they were all talking about politics. There was no human touch to it,” she says.

Kyomuhendo’s latest publication, ‘Whispers From Vera’, published last year, is also based on a woman. Written in light, simple language, the story keeps the reader in suspense as he, or she, reads on. In it Vera, a modern woman, tells about the trials and tribulations in her life; confiding and sharing with the readers her wisdom, mistakes, stupidity and successes.

Kyomuhendo says what affects the rural woman can also affect the urban woman. She might have a car, a good job, an education, a husband, but she too has problems, fears and challenges. And can she not get hurt and affected just like the rural woman?

Will the urban woman kneel down while greeting her in-laws? (In some Ugandan societies the practice is still common). Does she have to adopt her husband’s name?

”There is a conflict between modernity and traditional values here,” she says.

”I think Goretti’s writing style is good,” says Philo Gumikiriza, a fan, referring to ‘Whispers From Vera’.

”The story is realistic because she talks about things that happen in real life. It’s a down-to-earth story, with no exaggerations, making you feel part of it,” she says.

”I read a lot of novels, but I think ‘Whispers From Vera’ is quite genuine. Although it may be fictitious, at least much of it is believable. The narrative technique is also appealing,” says Gumikiriza.

Bernard Tabaire of ‘The Monitor’ newspaper, says Kyomuhendo ”criticises the traditional conception of a woman, and the archaic system that treats women as an object”.

Kyomuhendo tries to inspire women by creating strong characters to overcome their difficulties, Tabaire says.

Tabaire, a book reviewer, has read most of Kyomuhendo’s novels.

”It’s an old story that she tells. It tells that much as you are educated, society still controls you in terms of tradition. But that’s really an old story. I guess, really, today we should see more stories about HIV/AIDS and more of the contemporary issues.”

Kyomuhendo, a mother of two, is the coordinator of Female Writers (Femrite), a local non-governmental organisation (NGO), which offers opportunity to women writers to expand their talent. In her spare time, she says, she loves reading novels.

Looking back to her marketing course, Kyomuhendo says, ”I think it was lack of career guidance”.