Poet from Cameroon, Paul Dakeyo was the guest of honor Akwaba Culture for the award Ivoire for Francophone African literature. Between commitment and struggle for his people''live and dream of light,''he is an advocate of the book industry in Africa.
Do you think it is important now that Africa has other literary prizes?
Yes. To the extent that we had the Grand Prix of black Africa, the President's Award of the Republic to Senegal and here and there, some unknown price. In establishing the Prize Ivoire Akwaba culture is given the chance to authors of the continent to participate in their hatching. It is a means of promoting books and African literature in Africa and beyond Africa.
In time African poet, what do you look today in your texts?
I started writing in high school like any African. I could publish when I was at university in Paris. I write today to say Africa altogether. To say what happens to sing love to boast of friendship, singing fraternity. It is the goal of writing for me.
What is the role of writing in Africa?
words continent. What continent is not left lagging behind other continents. It changes how the world works like any other. If there is democracy and development in others, there is no reason why there is not here. If a French publisher is able to do a book, there is no reason that in Africa we are not able to do the same in the same graphic quality. The writer must have a word that is involved in educating the people. He expressed the economy, the imagination of African people. It transmits the contemporary world today what he knows, what he has learned what is ours.
Are you listening to by African leaders?
Certainly not. Because I have a few people I worked with when they were in opposition. And now they are in business, there is a bifurcation. I'm waiting for a head of state say: we must support the publishing house. I expect not give me a check. That takes into account the work being done. Tell me, for example, a play by Wole Soyinka, Nobel Prize in Literature 1986, setting the curriculum. It would be an important support for the survival of the publisher.
Finally, do not you think that what Africans away from the book is the question of language? Do we not sign long term, to write in our language?
In Cameroon in the years of independence, there were lessons in language local region. I who am Bamileke, I was in the coastal countries in Douala. I learned to count and combine in Douala. Unfortunately, the experiment did not last. Is political will. This is not the people who must impose it. When you go to a public school, the program is not established by the parents, but by the government.
What is your literary news and what do you specifically for the book in Africa?
I wrote about Soweto in 1976, published in 1977. I have written other texts in love. I hired a component, a component of personal, autobiographical. I am especially in publishing. I have a project for the creation of a large publisher with Pan-African broadcasting opportunities. I practice a policy of selling books at discounted prices for Africa. I installed a publishing house in Dakar. It is a struggle. We can not conduct other than home. I did put the price of all the big books of authors Senegal to 5,000 CFA francs.
What advice do you give for a better dissemination of the book in Africa?
There was, in Africa, African cultural centers. All these centers have disappeared. The only places where we can go recharge is the inevitable French cultural center. We must have our places where we can find our productions.
What are your views on literature with rose water, which invaded the continent?
is a matter of education and intellectual. Each produces what he wants. Me, I'll write about what I see, what I saw, what I want to live. But I will not write about the rain and time. The book is a product like a sardine. So if we can sell this literature rose water, why not (why not).
Interview by Sanou A.
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