ATO QUAYSON (Ghana)

Ato Quayson - a revered African academic and critic

By M. I Soqaga

Think of the best of Ghanaian literature or writing; and many automatically latch on to the likes of Kofi Awoonor, Ayi Kwei Armah, Ama Ata Aidoo...but others like Ato Quayson are world class too.

It is categorically not surprising to see African literature flourishing so considerably in the world of letters today.  Actually its optimal influence and popularity in the world is completely fascinating.  Obviously, from the outset African literature subsisted as a result of enormous diligence and invaluable efforts which African writers have shown over the years.

To accentuate, Africa has passed through the uphill situation or period were things were thoroughly unwholesome.  Sometimes, in the past Africans were mistakenly degraded as barbaric animals that cannot do things independently.  Specifically, the situation and delusion-myopic theory which linked Africans with cannibalism, was utterly proven erroneous by the African themselves, through their nifty efforts.

To reminisce, inevitable about “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe, certainly one will always be inspired.  The illustrious book caused even the belligerent adversaries of Africa to re-examine their belief concerning African people.  Chinua Achebe deserved much kudos because of his remarkable efforts and many other gem of African writing too.  The eminent prominence of African wordsmith breathtakingly influenced the near-sighted detractors of Africa to retract their uninviting belief.

What about today?  Many of us, we are completely impressed by the world where human beings are equally recognised, where things like books are readily available and accessible.  Absolutely, Ato Quayson serves as a consummate example.  Ato is the pre-eminent academic and critic.  One thing should be realised is that African academics are not alike.  For instance, there are those who understand the situation which is pertinent to Africa.  Frequently, you will see them write books of fiction, poetry, essays, criticism etc.  In addition, their dazzling books and their literary contribution are more familiar to the people.  Ato Quayson is such kind of outstanding African writer.  Unlike overweening academic African writers whose artistic works are curtail to certain people and are subsequently unpopular.  Africa although it has achieved world recognition but developmentally is gradually progressing.  Lack of literacy, civil wars, brutal violation of human rights and dearth of many other important things apposite for human survival are actually procrastinating headway in Africa.  Without books, education, technology, schools, teacher’s etc Africa will demise and be depreciating to debris of ashes. 

Of course Ato Quayson literary contribution which is simultaneously cum with his profound erudition is dramatically awesome.  Definitely, he is one of the exceptional African writers who deserved countless compliments.  His striking book’s, essays and so on are idyllically ravishing.  Certainly, Africa should count itself fortunate to have arresting writers like Ato Quayson. 

Books

·         Oxford Street, Accra: City Life and the Itineraries of Transnationalism, Duke University Press, 2014. Draws on a variety of concepts and disciplines such as anthropology, urban geography, literary theory, and spatial theory to retell the history of Accra from the perspective of a single street from the 1650s to the present day — the first such interdisciplinary study or urban life African urban studies.

·         Cambridge History of Postcolonial Literature, 2 vols, ed. Cambridge University Press, 2012. The first attempt at bringing together essays dealing with the literary history of postcolonial studies, with 42 contributors covering a wide range of topics, divided equally between geographical topics (Postcolonialism and Arab Literature; Postcolonial Literature in Latin America; Canadian Writing and Postcolonialism) and thematic ones (Indigenous Writing in Canada; Orality and the Genres of African Writing; Postcolonial Auto/Biography).

·         Aesthetic Nervousness: Disability and the Crisis of Representation, Columbia University Press, 2007. Focusing primarily on the work of Samuel Beckett, Toni Morrison, Wole Soyinka, and J. M. Coetzee, the book launches a thoroughly cross-cultural and interdisciplinary study of the representation of physical disability. The first book to fully bring Euro-American writers alongside postcolonial ones for a discussion of the ubiquitous trope of disability, it is now an acknowledged classic in the fields of disability and postcolonial studies, and chapters from it have been anthologized in various collections.

·         Strategic Transformations in Nigerian Writing: Orality and History in Rev Samuel Johnson, Amos Tutuola, Wole Soyinka and Ben Okri. Oxford and Bloomington: James Currey and Indiana University Press, 1997. Seeking to trace Nigerian literary history from the perspective of a Yoruba matrix of cultural resources that informed the work of the writers in the title, the book fundamentally critiqued a by-then standard idea in the field that there was a natural relationship between orality and literacy in the work of African writers and rather argued that the presence of orality in African literature was due to the exercise of strategic aesthetic choices, some of which had nothing to do with orality but more to do with the pressures of identity-formation in the evolving nation-state that is Nigeria. The book has gone on to become a classic and is to be found in all African literature survey courses worldwide.

·         Blackwell Companion to Diaspora and Transnationalism, ed. with Girish Daswani, New York: Blackwell, 2013. A co-edited volume that brings together for the first time essays dealing with both diaspora and transnationalism, normally kept apart in the literature. It clears the ground for seeing the two as mutually interrelated for our understanding of multi-ethnic liberal polities that have been shaped by the presence of diasporic communities.

·         The Cambridge Companion to the Postcolonial Novel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016)

·         Oxford Street, Accra; Urban Evolution, Street Life and Itineraries of the Transnational (Duke University Press, 2014).

·         Blackwell Companion to Diaspora and Transnationalism Studies (with Girish Daswani; New York: Blackwell, 2013).

·         The Cambridge History of Postcolonial Literature, 2 volumes (Cambridge University Press, 2012).

·         Labour Migration, Human Trafficking and Multinational Corporations (with Antonela Arhin; New York: Routledge, 2012).

·         Fathers and Daughters: An Anthology of Exploration (Oxford: Ayebia Publishers, 2008).

·         Aesthetic Nervousness: Disability and the Crisis of Representation (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007).

·         African Literature: An Anthology of Theory and Criticism (with Tejumola Olaniyan; Oxford: Blackwell, 2007).

·         Calibrations: Reading for the Social (Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 2003).

·         Relocating Postcolonialism (with David Theo Goldberg; Oxford: Blackwell, 2002).

·         Postcolonialism: Theory, Practice or Process? (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000).

·         Strategic Transformations in Nigerian Writing (Oxford and Bloomington: James Currey and Indiana University Press, 1997).