#BookChaser: The thin line between poets and novelists

Many believe that the lines between prose fiction writers and poets are sometimes blurred with time. But how true is this? 

By Nathaniel Bivan

I have heard many times that most writers start out as poets. I don’t know where you stand on this, but I also think so, and maybe it’s simply because I am in that category. I started out writing poetry from my university days. Friends and roommates along the way might remember the exercise books I poured out my heart in daily and how my voice rose as I recited to them. Yes, Friends like Henry Tokula, Eson Alumbugu, Kingsley Tagowa and several more. They will remember those times.

But years after school, something drew me to prose that I can’t exactly put my hands on. Maybe it was because I was tired of writing in ‘riddles’ or trying hard to hide meaning when in reality what I needed was for readers to understand what I was saying, no matter how hard I worked at blurring those lines. At a point, verse took over and remained with me (up till now, guess). But in the end, prose did really take over.

I can’t say other writers had similar experience though. Nigerian poet Jumoke Verissimo, known for her collection ‘I Am Memory’ and ‘The Birth of Illusion’, finally released her debut novel, ‘A Small Silence’ in 2019. The story revolves around Prof, a former academic who returns home after serving a 10-year jail term, and Desire, an undergraduate student of Lagos State University.

“Verissimo, unlike me and several others in my category, didn’t transition to prose. She is still very much a poet and may probably be always recognised as the latter.”

It’s not news that poets can be fantastic writers of prose fiction or vice versa. You don’t want to not read Abubakar Adam Ibrahim’s poems (author of short story collections ‘The Whispering Trees’, ‘Dreams and Assorted Nightmares’ and the novel ‘Season of Crimson Blossoms’), which he sometimes shares on social media. They are awesome, so much that you’ll wonder why we don’t have at least two collections of his on our bookshelves. Well, time will tell.   

Even the publisher and CEO of Masobe Books is a poet. Yes, that author of ‘Odufa’, ‘Aviara’ and the soon-to-be reissued thriller ‘A Conspiracy of Ravens’. In his own case I can’t say he transitioned into a novelist but I remember seeing (don’t ask me where though) and surfing through an entire collection he’s written.

The US-based Nigerian writer Tope Folarin once told me in an interview how he went back to read and (if my memory serves me right) write poetry in order to accomplish the feat of writing his long-awaited debut novel ‘A Particular Kind of Black Man’.

Currently, two poets have hinted that they are working on prose works. One of them is Olumide Olaniyan, author of ‘Lucidity of Absurdity’ and ‘Akimbo in Limbo’. Yes, he dropped a hint on social media. But Abubakar Sidi, author of ‘The Poet of Sand’ and ‘The Poet of Dust’ did more than drop a hint – his was official. We’re expecting a novel!

There’s also not forgetting Richard Ali who is well-known both as a poet and novelist. It’s hard to say where his loyalties lie (I’m speaking for myself) the most as is the case with some writers, but his debut novel ‘City of Memories’ was published in 2012 and his poetry collection ‘The Anguish and Vigilance of Things’ in 2020.

“Whatever the case may be, whether prose or poetry, one thing seems clear – writers blur the lines of their art for anytime they want to and for different reasons. Sometimes the reasons are clear, other times they aren’t and remain as abstract as a poem that’s hard to decipher.”

I’ll conclude my column this week by sharing a few interesting positions regarding poets writing novels. On Quora, one Sharmeka Victoria Hunter wrote: “I always say a novel is just a narrative poem that have been expanded in all the areas that make a narrative poem and sometime more parts add (like additional climaxes and problems and other characters and places). Before tackling a novel you should really have learned what a narrative poem is, learning the structure of a narrative, will make writing the novel easier in some ways.”

Still, on Quora, one Nadine Gallo opined: “Poets sometimes do write novels. My own novel, ‘Impetuous Heart’, is full of poetry. Novelists use poetic language often. Dostoevsky did it. If the ear is tuned in to poetic language, it can only help the novel.”

I rest my case.