African Writers Find Inspiration at Workshop
By Isobel Stevenson, chief editor of the creative programs for Langham Literature
Josephine was fascinated by the problems faced by the Boni women of Kenya, whose society had swung from matriarchal to patriarchal in one generation. Emily had been a witness of the riots in Kenya in 2008. Lubungu had witnessed the devastation wrought by conflict in the Great Lakes region. David had dealt with grief as a theoretical construct, and then had to face it in his own family. Others were wrestling with issues affecting the young: How does the church help teenagers enter adulthood if it forbids traditional initiation? Should Christian parents ask a bride price, and should their children pay it? Still others were dealing with academic problems: What is the relationship between Christianity and politics in Africa? How does the Christian understanding of God relate to the traditional African understandings of who he is?
Participants of the Langham Literature Writers Workshop in Kenya, January 2009
These issues, and others like them, were close to the hearts of the fifteen academics from Kenya, South Africa, Congo, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Ethiopia who met for a writer’s workshop sponsored by Langham Partnership International (LPI) and the Overseas Council at the Nairobi Evangelical Graduate School of Theology in January this year.
LPI and the Overseas Council recognized the needs of these and other Christian writers and students and combined forces to offer a writers’ workshop in Africa. Interest was high, but the numbers were kept down to ensure maximum effectiveness. The writers met at the Nairobi Evangelical Graduate School of Theology in January this year. Each of the fifteen was under pressure to write, for they had signed a contract committing themselves to produce a book in two years.
Pieter Kwant and Isobel Stevenson of LPI helped the writers to sharpen their focus with questions like, Who are writing for? What do you want to tell them? How are you going to catch their attention? (and, not least, How are you going to catch a publisher’s attention?). Tim Stafford, the author of more than 20 books and the vice-chair of the board for John Stott Ministries (U.S. office of LPI), discussed the practical details of living as a writer – and stressed the need to spend time at one’s desk, writing! Accordingly several hours each day were set aside for sitting and writing. Then the participants had to expose what they had written to their small groups for critique and encouragement. Some of these groups will continue to meet via the Internet until their books are finished.
The result? By the end of the week most of the participants had honed their ideas, produced an outline of the contents of their books, and drafted and redrafted their introductions. Now we can look forward to seeing their textbooks for seminaries, their manuals for pastors, their guidance for ordinary Christians. By training these authors, LPI is helping to magnify their effectiveness as pastors and teachers, and is giving them access to a far wider readership than they could have reached before.