Reading is Liberating

Every night just before I sleep, I stare up at the ceiling and think about my future. I can already see my house. It will have a large room converted into a study. Oh, the books I’m going to keep in those big shelves! Milan Kundera, Mariama Ba, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Charles Mungoshi, Pixley Isaka Seme, Dambudzo Marechera, Assata Shakur, Marcus Garvey, Vladimir Lenin, Kaoberdiano Dambara, Ama Ata Aidoo, Wole Soyinka,Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Chinua Achebe, Amilcar Cabral, Aime Cessaire, Dr Chinweidzu, Isabelle Allende, Paulo Coelho, Peter Stiff, Buchi Emecheta, …
I can already see that room! The nice couch overlooking the window, where I’ll sit under a starry night, every night, leafing through the pages of books I’ve always wanted to read! In the background, I’ll have Dave Koz “Cuban Highway” or Vusi Mahlasela’s “Silang Mabele” playing silently. I can see the small table beside the couch where my Ethiopian Coffee will be placed as I navigate through the labyrinthine complexity of Petrarch-an sonnets, odes and iambic pentameter. The pentatonics will whistle silently. The flower from a strong bloodline will be seated just across. And quietly we shall review the books, with different view points certainly. The Sonnets of Pablo Neruda will guide us.

Reading is liberating and to some of us who think that Africa is a country, we get so much from reading about societies. My last post could be mistaken for a zimbabwean because of the mini reviews I was making on the country but actually I am a Ugandan who loves reading. Reading helps us understand societies from a social political context. The reason I have been able to make friends from across the continent is because there is something to talk about and that is mostly written in a book.

Reading is like eating to some of us, we cannot therefore be praised for doing and loving something obvious.

In October last year, I was spotted by Afrobloggers a platform for emerging digital voices in Africa and this has bettered my writing. I have been a guest blogger on some blogs and made amazing leaps in my blogging so today I celebrate Afrobloggers.