On International Literacy Day, Ama King on the power of community libraries.
For International Literacy Day, Poda-Poda Stories interviewed Ama King, the founder of Sierra Learners and Congo Town Community Library in Freetown. King spoke about the importance of early childhood literacy and how parents, teachers, and other community members can help children become good readers.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Ama King, founder of Congo Town Community Library in Freetown.
Poda-Poda Stories: What got you interested in childhood literacy in Sierra Leone?
Ama King: I worked at Lismore Library in New South Wales, Australia for 16 years. And while I was there, I decided I would like to bring books to children in Sierra Leone. I am a living example of how education can transform a person. I came from a challenging background, and I was able to raise myself to a level where I can advocate for other people.
When I was a young girl, I didn't even know about the Sierra Leone Library Board when I was in primary school. I didn't know anything about libraries, but I loved reading. And I know how important it is for everyone to be able to read. And so, I thought that's the area I would like to help children in my country.
I started collecting books from people, and luckily my library in Australia helped me quite a lot. I also got a lot of resources and support from Lismore and the whole Northern Rivers community in New South Wales. In 2014, by the time I finished studying for a film and writing degree, I had collected a lot of books, and I started working on raising funds to ship these books to Sierra Leone.
I started an organisation called Sierra Learners and was able to ship a 20-foot container filled with books in 2014. I partnered with PEN Sierra Leone, as they were working on book clubs in schools at the time.
After the PEN Sierra Leone project, I worked with other schools to donate books. So far, we’ve distributed books to over twenty schools both in Freetown and in the provinces. We’ve also set up a classroom library at St. Anthony's Girls School and another at the FAWE Primary School in Kroo Bay.
Then we converted a container into a library at Grace Brethren School in Brookfields. And we also have another container library at Mokombay village near Russell in the Western Area Peninsula.
Poda-Poda Stories: And what has been your experience running that project?
King: When I set up these school and container libraries, I employ teachers to assist the children in their reading and manage the library. Even when I was in Australia, we communicated via WhatsApp, and I would ask them to send me a monthly report about how the project is going.
They still send reports on how many children went to the library daily. For me, it's not about just going and giving the books to the school. "Oh, yes, I gave the school books, I gave the school books." No. It's about following up and making sure that all my efforts, the purpose for which I put all this effort and resources into this project, are actually effective.
Setting up these libraries is good, but it’s not just about having community libraries. I want to make sure that the children are actually reading the books. So, I follow up with the teachers, and I follow up with the kids. I still have a lot of books to donate, so schools can reach out to me if they want to set up classroom libraries.
A container library established by Ama King at Grace Brethen Primary School in Brookfields, Freetown.
Poda-Poda Stories: How did you start the Congo Town Community Library, and how does it work? I was so excited when I learned about it because I don’t see spaces like this around Freetown.
King: I believe that every community should have a library. Every school should have a library. The kids in the community who come here are amazing! And they need attention and care when learning how to read. I started putting books in this space when I registered my literacy project in Sierra Leone. It’s actually owned by my mum, and I’ve rented it from her. This space was officially created in 2020, and I’ve been running it full-time since 2024.
The children come here when they have free time, so that’s usually over the weekend and during the holidays when schools are closed. When they’re here, I usually ask them to choose a book that we’ll read together.
I teach them lots of phonics because it’s the magic tool. Once a kid can understand phonics, they can read anything. And when kids can read, they are able to articulate and express themselves better.
I remember a girl, Mariatu, who would get so frustrated because she had difficulty reading. And with time and patience, I was able to get her to read sentences easily, and when she finally got it, her face lit up as if to say, "Oh, I get it. Wow." You know? And moments like that bring me so much joy! We’ve had issues with funding and sponsorship, so right now it’s self-funded, with other support from a small group of friends here in Sierra Leone and in Australia .
Poda-Poda Stories: What challenges do you think children face in terms of literacy in Sierra Leone? And what do you think are some of the solutions to those challenges they face?
King: The statistics, not only in Sierra Leone but worldwide, show that many children cannot read. That is not only in Sierra Leone or in Africa, but worldwide.
I wonder how many children who have access to technology spend time reading, as opposed to how much time they spend on social media. So, there are a lot of forces or distractions that have pushed reading and literacy to the background.
I often go to our Sierra Learners container library at Mokombay village near Russell to monitor and help children with their reading. There, I found that even children in Class Six could not read the first few words of a paragraph.
So, on this World Literacy Day, I want to ask people, partners, organizations, and even individuals who are really interested in children's literacy to help organizations like us that are trying to get children to read and write. Support us so we can help fill the gap. The teachers cannot do it all in school.
Parents also have a huge part to play in their children's learning, so I want to encourage parents to also be a part of their children's reading journey. It goes a long way. Teachers can do their bit, but parents should also be invested in ensuring their children have a good foundation. Sometimes I’ve seen a lack of interest because the parents also cannot read, but that should push them to ensure their kids have a better chance. Let’s do it for the legacy that we want to leave behind and to see our children's faces light up when they know they can read.
Poda-Poda Stories: Thank you, Ms. King. A final question: How have books saved your life?
Books have made me who I am- confident and articulate. I started reading at an early age. In secondary school, I used to read books with dictionaries. Even though it often interrupted the flow, the dictionaries helped me to actually understand what I was reading. For children, books can take them to a whole wide world, and they can just immerse themselves in whatever story that's been created. So, books are beautiful.
Questions and interview by Ngozi Cole.
“A Blank Page Will Always Be Worse Than Anything You Could Write,” Hafeez Taqi on Being A Published Author
Hafeez Taqi is a writer based in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
Hafeez O. A. Taqi is a 21-year-old graduate with an LLB Honours degree from Fourah Bay College of the University of Sierra Leone. He is a student of the arts who discovered his love of reading at a young age and, subsequently, a talent for writing. Born in Iran and spending a significant amount of his childhood in Cambridge, England, before finally returning to Sierra Leone with his family, Hafeez was exposed to many written works growing up and, with the support of his parents, family, and teachers, has broadened his understanding of literature. He began writing short stories from an early age, dabbling in a variety of genres and winning writing competitions at the inter-secondary and national level.
The following interview took place via WhatsApp between Taqi and Poda-Poda Stories’ administrative intern, Mayenie Conton.
This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Poda-Poda Stories: Welcome to the Poda-Poda, Hafeez Taqi. Please tell us a bit about yourself and your book, Divine and Other Short Stories.
Hafeez Taqi: I'm a recent graduate from the Fourah Bay College, University of Sierra Leone, holding an LLB Honours Degree. In the past year, I completed and published my book Divine and Other Short Stories, with help from several people, for which I am supremely grateful. Divine is a compilation of short stories and poems that I had been working on for some years, some having foundations that I thought up when I was as young as 10. With encouragement from my family and my own desire to write, I made the decision to make the final effort to share my work.
Poda-Poda Stories: When did you first realize that writing was something you wanted to do, and what steps did you take to make that goal a reality?
Taqi: I always had a love of reading growing up, which was heavily encouraged by my family and teachers. I was always at my happiest reading a multitude of books from various genres, so when I eventually began to write, it seemed that it came naturally to me. I was about 12 when I began to have an inkling that publishing a book was something that I would like to do, but there was no real urgency to it. By the time I was 19, it solidified into a concrete goal, so I compiled the first drafts of my works and contacted the Sierra Leone Writers’ Series. They were impressed with the collection and were happy to publish the book after a few rounds of rewrites and fine-tuning, which I will always be grateful for.
Poda-Poda Stories: What inspired you to write Divine and Other Short Stories in particular?
Taqi: Well, being able to put down ‘Published Author’ on my CV was definitely a plus, but I would say that my overarching inspiration was my parents. They always encouraged my siblings and me to read, and are avid readers themselves, so we always had a well-stocked library of books at home to keep us occupied. Their bookshelves were always filled with great and celebrated African authors, and a part of me wanted my name to be up there as well.
Taqi and immediate family at book launch celebration.
Poda-Poda Stories: What, in your opinion, makes your short stories and poems uniquely Sierra Leonean?
Taqi: I always inject a bit of myself and my own experiences into any story I’m writing. So any detail, from the smallest to the most obvious, would most likely be something that I’ve pulled from my own life. My work is uniquely Sierra Leonean because I’m uniquely Sierra Leonean.
Poda-Poda Stories: The short stories in your book range from fantasy to horror, with many of them pushing the boundaries of a singular genre. What would you say is your most prevalent genre, and how would you describe it?
Taqi: I wouldn’t say I write from any specific genre. My stories have most commonly been described as ‘Speculative Fiction’ with a focus on what-if scenarios. The way I see it is that I write from perspectives and points of view that might otherwise be overlooked, but when some thought is given to them, it opens an entirely new outlook. With all that being said, I’ll admit to having a soft spot for fantasy stories.
Poda-Poda Stories: Who are some of your writing influences or role models?
Taqi: With the amount of books and authors I’ve gone through, pinpointing specific role models is difficult, but the writing styles of Rick Riordan and George R. R. Martin definitely helped me with my writing, as well as Chinua Achebe and the raw emotion that his works provoke.
Poda-Poda Stories: As we all know, writing short stories is an amazing feat of its own, but it is an entirely different thing to decide that you want to publish a collection of short stories. What was it like to make that decision, and what was the process of publication like?
Taqi: I knew that I wanted to have my stories out there, and it just made the most sense to put them in one place so people could enjoy them easily. The process itself wasn’t too hard, all things considered. The SL Writer’s Series handled a lot of the details that go into publication, so it was smooth sailing for the majority of the journey.
Poda-Poda Stories: What was the editing process like? How did you decide what stories and poems would make the cut, and the order in which they would appear?
Taqi: I made sure to put my best foot forward when going to SLWS, so I’d already gone through them beforehand to take care of any obvious errors. I worked with an SLWS editor for 4 to 5 months to fine-tune the stories and make sure they were suitable for public consumption. I placed them in the order that I thought would keep a reader most engaged with the stories and eager to see more.
Poda-Poda Stories: Which one of the stories was the most challenging to write, and why? Which one was easiest?
Taqi: I would say that ‘Growing Up Sierra Leonean’ was probably the most difficult to get right. It was my only non-fiction work and was a direct retelling of my own experience as a Sierra Leonean, so I felt that I had to take extra care to do myself justice, as well as make the work engaging for the reader.
Poda-Poda Stories: You’ve mentioned that these stories were written over a span of many years, with most of this work being done while you were simultaneously a student. How did you navigate the duality of schoolwork and creative writing?
Taqi: Creative writing is more of a hobby for me, so there was never really any threat of it interfering with my schoolwork (which, as many Africans know, would not have been tolerated if it did). Whenever I had a quiet moment to myself or an idea that I just felt the need to write down, I would pen it down and let my imagination run wild. With the stories being written over the years, I never found myself rushing or putting too much pressure on myself, which I think is a big factor in why I was able to retain my love for it.
Taqi signing copies of his book.
Divine and other Short Stories is available for purchase
Poda-Poda Stories: Do you have any advice for young, up-and-coming writers?
Taqi: Just write. Take any idea you have, then put pen to paper. You may doubt yourself and your work, but a blank page will always be worse than anything you could write. Above all else, make sure that there’s passion behind your words.
Questions and interview by Mayeni Conton.
“We know we are relevant,” Dunstanette Bodkin on childhood reading and why libraries matter
Dunstanette Bodkin, the Deputy Chief Librarian of the Sierra Leone Library Board.
Dunstanette I.O. Bodkin is the Deputy Chief Librarian of the Sierra Leone Library Board. In this virtual interview with Poda-Poda Stories, Bodkin spoke to Ngozi Cole about the importance of childhood reading and why public libraries will always be relevant, even in the age of AI.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Poda-Poda Stories: Dunstanette Bodkin, welcome to the Poda-Poda. Can you tell us a bit about yourself?
Dunstanette Bodkin: I've been working for the Sierra Leone Library Board for the past seven years. I studied Library Information Studies at Fourah Bay College. I started with a diploma program, then moved on to a BA Honors degree, and finally earned my Master's in the same field. I started as the children's librarian and then became an administrative assistant. But I continued working with the children's department because it is my special calling. No matter where I find myself, I always ensure that I work with kids, encouraging them to read and teaching them how to read as well. Recently, I was promoted to the Deputy Chief Librarian of the Sierra Leone Library Board.
Poda-Poda Stories: Congratulations! What made you want to become a librarian in the first place?
Bodkin: It’s quite a story. I never really intended to become one. I loved books, and I loved reading, but there was nothing about librarianship because, growing up, you’re taught to aspire to become a lawyer, doctor, or engineer. But after my GCE O-Levels, I looked out for different programs at Fourah Bay College where I could start a diploma course, and then I got to know about the Library Studies department, and I was like, okay, this sounds nice. The moment I started the diploma program, I just knew there was no turning back because I fell in love with it. After that, I enrolled in the BA program and graduated as a top student. But back then, no one saw the value of librarianship. I had to promote and advocate for Library Studies students to be valued and appreciated on campus.
Poda-Poda Stories: I'm a huge fan of librarians and libraries. My dad worked briefly at the Sierra Leone Library Board, and I got a library card really early on. Thank you so much for your work! As a librarian, how do you see people, especially children, using libraries? What are people using the libraries for, and how is that translating into literacy and reading in Sierra Leone?
Bodkin: The Sierra Leone Library has 24 branches across the country, and our key patrons are children. We have a special department in our libraries called the children’s department or children’s corners. We have been able to partner with Book Aid International UK, and they have been very supportive of the children's corners and children's department. When you come into these libraries, you'll notice that the children's department is a special place, very well organized with books, toys, and games, designed for children. We always organize activities for them because having the children come in is one thing, but what would make them stay? It is activities across all our libraries, and we have several planned throughout the year. As long as you can get children reading when they’re young, it's best.
Getting adults to use the library is a bit trickier, but we do have them coming in, especially from colleges and universities, because we have those who understand the value. We have research materials and historical materials. Sometimes, people doing research struggle to find certain information, but when they come into the library, we have all these materials ready for them to use. That's the kind of service that we are providing for everyone.
Even though we are now competing with technology, we still know our place in society. We know that we are providers of relevant information. We know that we are curators of historical knowledge. In fact, we have a policy that all authors, both within and outside Sierra Leone, who write about Sierra Leone, should deposit three copies of their book with the Library Board for free. It's called a legal deposit, and all those who comply have their materials in the library.
Poda-Poda Stories: What are some of the challenges that the library is facing currently?
Bodkin: A big challenge is finances. Sometimes we have late allocations coming in or allocations being cut off, so we have to manage resources all the time. An important thing about libraries is our programming; if we don't have the support we need, we lag and need to catch up with trends, but that’s difficult because of funding. For instance, for now, we really want to see how best we can go digital with our resources and how we can change our acquisitions department from traditional to digitized. But we can't do that. We still have to go through the hard labor of stamping them and punching cards, even though that's what makes us librarians. We also want to offer more programs for adults, like workshops on leadership and climate change, but we don’t have the funds.
Another challenge we are facing is transportation. We have 24 libraries across the country, and it’s hard to monitor them. We also need to take books to rural areas all around Sierra Leone. That’s why we are still trying our best to get our job done and stay relevant in the midst of all the challenges.
Dunstanette Bodkin also runs a non-profit organisation advocating for early literacy development and children’s welfare, Dunamis Kids Organisation.
Poda-Poda Stories: Can you talk a bit more about the organization you started, Dunamis Kids Organization, why you started it, and some of the initiatives you guys are working on?
Bodkin: I used to have some family members sending me books because they just knew I was passionate about books and reading. So, they’ll look around to see what books they can collect and send to me, and I’ll make donations and distribute them to schools. So, with the knowledge from the Early Literacy course I took with the African Library and Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA), I decided to team up with colleagues to see how we can put our limited resources, knowledge, and passion together to reach more children. Since we launched, we have been targeting schools and communities. So, for schools, we normally try to see how best we can help them set up the school library and support them in running it. And then, for the community, we normally organize pop-up libraries and reading activities with children. We’ve also been going as far as the children’s hospitals, where we launched a bibliotherapy initiative, emphasizing that even books can support healing. We’ve been to some hospitals, where we share stories with the children and also donate a certain number of books for the nurses to keep in the children’s wards, so the children can access and read them. We’ve also had community play-day activities where we merge play and reading, often during the Christmas break. In fact, we have a school where we set up both a computer room and a library, using computers donated to the organization from someone in the UK. We just blended that with some books we had, and we teamed up with the school authorities. They welcomed the idea, so now they have a library and computer room up and running, and that has helped to boost literacy in the school and engage the children in learning activities.
Poda-Poda Stories: Why are libraries so important, not just for kids, but adults as well?
Bodkin: We tell people to see the library as a hub and a space that can provide many opportunities. People are not aware of how rich our collection is, and the whole idea of saying “Oh, I can just go to ChatGPT and get all that I want”, for example, isn’t really true. People have to understand that these things are not human. They make mistakes. There are so many errors, and for people to even use this tool successfully, they have to learn how to use it properly. As librarians, we have the capacity to know how to arrange information and how to determine relevant information for use. Not everything available online is true. You have to know how to verify and analyze your information. These are all things people aren't aware of; they just feel they don't need the library, but we keep telling them to come to the library. In fact, not everything in the library is online. We have some historical records in the library that you cannot find on any digital database. We know we are relevant, but then even within the field, we have colleagues who no longer want to be librarians. Now we have many colleagues with first degrees in librarianship, but they are rushing to pursue other fields because they don't feel comfortable in their own skin. But we try to have conversations where we can tell ourselves how much we matter.
There’s a lot of talk about Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs. You cannot leave libraries behind in that because there is a way the library can help to reach those goals, whether it is education, climate change, or entrepreneurship. We are a space where people can think together and offer solutions. The moment we gather for events and workshops, there's going to be a spark of ideas and solutions.
Poda-Poda Stories: Thank you, Ms. Bodkin. A final question: How have books saved your life?
Bodkin: If I didn’t have access to books and stories growing up, I don't think I would've been able to get to where I am right now, because there is something about childhood reading that never leaves you. It helps you dream and imagine where you want to go and what you want in life. Sometimes people say, “Oh, you speak so well”. And I believe that didn't even happen in school or university. It's from my childhood, having access to good books and stories. I am where I am because of the books I read as a child.
Questions and interview by Ngozi Cole.
Nationhood, Narrative, and Naming: Foday Mannah On Writing and His Debut Novel, ‘The Search for Othella Savage’
Foday Mannah is a British-Sierra Leonean writer and educator based in Scotland. Raised in Sierra Leone, he studied English Literature at Fourah Bay College and later earned advanced degrees in conflict and creative writing in the UK. His debut novel, The Search for Othella Savage, won the 2022 Mo Siewcharran Prize. His fiction has been recognized by the Bristol Prize, Commonwealth Short Story Prize, and others, and published in Wasafiri, Doek, and others.
The following interview took place via Zoom between Mannah and Poda-Poda Stories’ associate editor, Charmaine Denison-George. This transcript has been edited for clarity.
Poda-Poda Stories: Welcome, Foday. I’ve been looking forward to this call with you.
Foday Mannah: Thanks for having me, Charmaine.
Poda-Poda Stories: When did you first realize that writing was something you needed or wanted to do?
Mannah: I think in high school. I went to Bo School in Sierra Leone. In form six, we had a current affairs club that also had a newspaper. We called ourselves the Satellite Newspaper. By then, because the country was going through a civil war, we focused on the activities of the war from the perspective of us students. So, my first entry into writing would be nonfiction, whereby I was the editor of the newspaper articles we wrote. I also had this strong tradition of reading quite a lot and later, when I became a teacher, I was exposed to a vast array of literature, so I ended up more or less reading and writing.
Poda-Poda Stories: Every writer has a unique preoccupation with certain themes or tropes or arguments. What are these for you? Which ones have you explored in your already existing work and which ones do you hope to explore further?
Mannah: I think it's power, definitely power. I’ve tried to examine the representation of power, both the domestic and political, especially in our societies. You would know this yourself, Charmaine, that as a child growing up in Sierra Leone, you hardly have a voice. Whatever the adults say is gospel. I’ve always been intrigued how that more or less translates to the political sphere. When I was a young man in Bo town, I remember that a government minister once arrived five minutes into a football match. I remember him walking in and the stadium with thousands of people went quiet. Then the Chief ran towards the referee saying, “stop the game, stop the game.” So, we restarted the game just because the minister had come. It was things like that that always got me thinking about how power operates.
Also, if you live in a society like Sierra Leone where almost everybody believes in Christianity or Islam, if you can harness that power and convince people that you are a proxy, that translates into astronomical power. And I think a lot of the times women are at the center of it, because women who don’t have a husband or children for example are seen as being defective, and sold remedies that they need to go to church and get prayers so they can get pregnant. So even though religion is at the center of my novel, and even though it's a crime novel, my obsession or my main focus is power, and how power can get manipulated both in domestic situations and political situations.
Poda-Poda Stories: Who are the writers—African, diasporic, or otherwise that have informed your craft?
Mannah: Oh, that's a difficult one. Charles Dickens had a big impact on me. I remember reading Great Expectations when I was in form four in Bo School. I say Charles Dickens also primarily because his novels focused on the industrial revolution with themes like poverty and deprivation and abuse of children.
From an African perspective, it has to be Chinua Achebe. He was massive with books like Chike and the River, Arrow of God, and No Longer at Ease. And moving on to modern times, I would say Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I think she's phenomenal for her fiction and nonfiction (which I teach in my classes). I teach in a Scottish high school with predominantly white kids and it's interesting exposing them to her brilliant text titled, We Should All Be Feminists for example.
Poda-Poda Stories: Do you write with a specific audience in mind or does it come to you as you write?
Mannah: My default position has always been Africa. I was born in London and went to Sierra Leone when I was six. I went to school there and then university before returning to the U.K. So, I think with that in mind, a lot of my context, a lot of my background has to be more or less Sierra Leonean. Other pieces I write look at the immigrant experience, about us Africans in the diaspora and how that translates.
There’s an activity I do with my students called Fantastic Tales whereby I get them to pretend they're animals for example, and so write a creative piece from that perspective. I'll say you could even write this from the perspective of a dog. For an European or American dog, you write about going to the vet or being taken for a walk, but those things cannot apply for an African dog, because an average African dog doesn’t go to the vet and nobody takes it for a walk. They'd go over their own walk. So I think with writing about humans and even things or ideas like feminism, the context alters depending on where the person is.
Poda-Poda Stories: You’re active in writing short fiction and recently, long-form with your novel—what’s the main challenge for you in switching between the two formats?
Mannah: Well, I think short stories are fascinating, Charmaine, in the sense that most of them require quite a specific skill where you have to work within a word count. They also give you an opportunity to produce something that you could view holistically as an achievement. It's almost like a rapper’s mix tape which can serve as a precursor to their main album. I have that same perspective with writing in the sense that short stories give you a chance to dip your toe into the writing and put yourself out there. Short stories, I think, are a very good way to get validation.
And then the correlation between short stories and novels is that a lot of the times, my short stories are actually sections from my novel even though quite a few are stand-alone pieces. While editing a whole novel for example, you remove bits from it but you can't throw it away, so that becomes a short story of its own. So that's more or less what I tend to do.
Poda-Poda Stories: Have you ever struggled with the idea of genre? I know some diasporic African writers are sometimes peeved by the classification that their texts receive, especially as a work of fiction can bleed into so many different things. Do you believe in classifying texts? And if so, what should the first order of classification be? Is it where the author is from or genre?
Mannah: I think there's a kind of snobbery at times with these issues. I think that the books that win the big prizes tend to be termed literary fiction and I find that's really quite problematic in the sense that I don't think genres are mutually exclusive. Frederick Forsyth, for example, whose phenomenal spy novels I grew up reading, never got nominated for the Booker Prize. He wrote The Day of the Jackal, which is about a secret assassin who wants to assassinate the president of France because he has granted independence to Algeria. That's a rich, political topic which won't get recognition because it's labeled a ‘spy’ novel.
I think increasingly, I am quite happy that the lines of genre appear to be becoming a bit more blurred. Black Panther is another brilliant example, where on the surface, it is like a big Marvel movie, but when you look at it, it's deeply political. Wakanda, this secret African country with all this technology, is a brilliant metaphor about race and blackness. It was quite interesting to see it nominated for best movie at the Oscars because normally, a superhero movie might not get those accolades, but at least the academy realizing that genres are not mutually exclusive is good. And I'm a bit afraid of myself, the very fact that I've written something that's termed crime fiction because where we come from Charmaine, it's automatically seen with suspicion. And I get that a lot from my friends who say, okay, so you've written this and what does it mean? If I, for example, had written about the Sierra Leonean civil war or political corruption, they’d easily understand but crime, they don't know how to take that seriously.
Poda-Poda Stories: What was the order in which your novel, Othella Savage, revealed itself to you? Did you first aim to write into the genre of crime fiction or did the characters reveal themselves to you first? How was the idea born?
Mannah: An opportunity came for a short story competition, and they wanted crime fiction. That's when I thought about a horrible case in Scotland about a nurse in December 2008, who was abducted in the winter and locked in the boot of a car. I also remember watching a documentary over a decade ago about rinsers and it was about these young girls who would find older men who could lavish money on them. So more or less, the reasoning of the story was the rinsers documentary, the woman in the boot and the whole idea of religion which I merged.
Poda-Poda Stories: I wanted to talk about the idea of names and naming in your work. I’d read the story you published in Afritondo where the protagonist’s name is Amadu Palaver and immediately, I knew he was going to be a problematic character and then, of course, there's Othella, Ronald Ranka and others in The Search for Othella Savage. What’s the effect of those names and specifically, how do you use it in your writing?
Mannah: I think names can be hugely symbolic, and a kind of way to represent something. For example, Amadu Palaver is a real person. That’s actually what people called him behind his back because nobody dared to say it to his face. He was a very violent and aggressive man who was always fighting people.
With ‘Othella’, I just liked the female version of Othello. If you read Othello, it's more or less a black man in a white society. So, I quite liked that correlation that these women in the story are black women in a white society. With the other names like ‘Ranka’, you would know in Sierra Leone that the word suggests that he is not what he seems, and that he has a proclivity for corruption. There’s also ‘Elijah Foot Patrol’ who doesn't drive, also inspired by a similar name from the African community here… and of course there’s a jolly and happy fellow so his nickname is Santa.
Poda-Poda Stories: What was publication day like?
Mannah: You’re a writer yourself, Charmaine. You just have no idea how things are going to be received. Seeing a review in The Guardian was unbelievable because I was in the same article as Stephen King. People have also been ever so supportive, buying the book and even the students and teachers at school ask me to sign it, saying do you mind? And I thought, do I mind? Of course I’ll sign it!
And like I always say, with writing, a lot of the time you exist on the margins, but then something finally switches to the limelight, and it opens so many doors. It’s also an industry where you don’t see many people who look like us. Even recently in Edinburgh, Scotland, you get to a literary event with hundreds of people but maybe only one black person. It's a fascinating dynamic.
Poda-Poda Stories: So, I read elsewhere that this novel was ten years in the making. What do you now know ten years on about the process of writing a book from start to completion? What has this new aspect of authorship taught you?
Mannah: I think I’ve learnt that you have to persevere. I don’t think you should have this attitude that people owe you something. You cannot have a chip on your shoulder. I, for example, applied to the University of Glasgow to do a Creative Writing degree and I was rejected so I applied somewhere else, and I got accepted. During that course, they paired us with people and there was someone who, when we produced our first piece, the lecturer found a problem with it. The person ended up quitting because of the feedback. So, my advice will be that you need to try hard, and it has to be something you enjoy.
In terms of writing a book, it's a long, hard process. I finished the degree in 2014, I didn’t get shortlisted till 2019, didn't win the competition till 2022 and then I finally got published in 2025. These are massive gaps of time. So, it's not easy at all. You need to take your time and see where it takes you.
Poda-Poda Stories: Now that The Search for Othella Savage is out in the world, what conversations do you hope it sparks?
Mannah: Well, I don't think the themes are revolutionary but themes like the abuse of women or the insidious nature of religion would be good ones for discussion.
For religion, I have nothing against religion. I think in society, religion can become this soft, easy target to attack, but I also think that religion can be tied to so much good in the world like education. Some of the best schools, globally, are religiously founded. Like in Freetown, some of the best schools like St. Joseph’s Convent, The Annie Walsh Memorial School, and The Sierra Leone Grammar School, these are all Catholic or Christian schools. So, I do not subscribe to the view that religion is more or less a dark thing. I however believe that human beings sometimes take the reverence we ascribe to religion to dark places.
For example, when my stepmother visited Scotland years ago, she refused to wear trousers or long johns even though she was cold. She said her pastor back home said women should not wear trousers. When we took her to church, and we asked her how she found the service, she said, well the service was okay but the only problem was that the woman Pastor was wearing a trouser suit. Similarly, my sister died at 21 of a serious strain of malaria because family members took her to church instead of a hospital till it was much too late. So, I think we need to challenge ourselves and we need to ask questions. We need to question our politicians, we need to question our religious leaders, we need to question our parents.
Poda-Poda Stories: What do budding Sierra Leonean and African writers need to know about the craft of writing?
Mannah: We should try not to be restricted by genre. I think a lot of our conversations are still mired in the past: Achebe and Ngugi and Beti. And there’s nothing wrong with that; these are phenomenal writers, but some of these books were written in the '60s and we need to move it forward. We also have to move away from this concept that it's all about age whereby older writers resist reading works by younger writers. I think that's ridiculous. I mean, I've got here Nightcrawling written by Leila Mottley which was longlisted for the Booker Prize. I think she was like 20 when she wrote it, but good literature is good literature. It can come from anywhere, and we need to look beyond age. It cannot also be that we always write about big things like slavery and immigration and Windrush. There is nothing wrong with these things, but we can expand them into other spheres.
Our writers also need to look at other art forms like movies. The movie, Get Out, for example, is a horror movie with a brilliant message about race in America. As, writers and creatives, we need to expand our sphere in terms of themes but also in terms of genre.
If you think about the competition I won, it was specifically for ethnic minority people because the thinking is that ethnic minorities do not write crime. The following year, the same competition was for children's books and then fantasy books. So, my advice would be more or less that we need to open it up. Let's write crime, let's write fantasy, let's write magical realism. And there are so many stories. And we as a people know so much about magical realism like mami water, devils, and the supernatural. We have this in a folklore, so why should we not tap into them?
Poda-Poda Stories: Foday, thank you so much. It's my wish that you continue this path not only for personal fulfillment, but also to put Sierra Leone on the map with your writing.
Mannah: Thank you, Charmaine. It's been a pleasure. That Poda-Poda is a magazine that is our own (Sierra Leonean) is absolutely fantastic. Thank you so much.
Purchase a copy of The Search for Othella Savage here: https://www.quercusbooks.co.uk/titles/foday-mannah/the-search-for-othella-savage/9781529437065/#
Questions and interview by Charmaine Denison-George.