By Karani Kelvin.
There is a problem.And no Binyavanga, no one has fallen asleep in the toilet. Its not the kind of thing you want to try in Mpeketoni. But let us talk about that some other time.
About a week ago, Prof. Evan Mwangi fired salvo after salvo at Tony Mochama, the Literary Gangster, over the wanting crafting of Nairobi: A Night Guide (2013). The overarching question of the article is this: What is Tony Mochama saying in his book? How is he saying it? According the good Prof, Mochama is saying nothing and is making no attempt to whitewash this fact.
As expected, Kenyans are up in arms against Evan Mwangi for writing what they claim is a personal attack on Tony Mochama. They are angry that instead of using his position to "encourage" Kenyan writers, Prof. Evan Mwangi is demoralizing them and killing their spirit. One Stanley Mitoko even goes ahead to offer a guide to reading a book with nothing to say.
The foregoing debate raises a few questions on the role of the critic. It also invites us to re-look at our works of art and offer an assessment on the "acceptability" of such works. It appears that the critic's role today is to pat a writers back with phrases like "nice work", "keep it up", "I didn't know you could write like this" and other such encouraging words that massage the writers ego.
Writers are sometimes so full of themselves. You'll see them chest thumping all over social media and exclusive joints after giving us mediocre work that they pass off as world class literature. Let us be honest with ourselves: there is no way in hell that we are going to reach our literary Nirvana like this. How can we when some of the short stories, poems, plays, novels - whatever! - seem to have no other objective than killing your reading spirit.
One of the things I have learnt over the years is this: no matter how good you think your work is, let someone else have a critical look at it. And don't take seriously those guys who tell you that whatever you have written is "nice"! How on earth is that supposed to make you a better writer? Find an Evan Mwangi, a Tom Michael Mboya, a Peter Amuka or whoever who can honestly, bluntly, tell you that what you have written isn't yet ready.
