The Magic Doll by Adrienne Yabouza, illustrated by Élodie Nouhen (tr. Paul Kelly)

cover of magic doll with young girl illustrated and doll and chickens

a nutshell: narrated from the perspective of Adjoa, a young child, this exquisite book shares a deeply loving story of her mother’s journey towards pregnancy and birth through the support of a Akua’ba fertility doll

a line: “Words do not have legs, but sometimes they can run fast!”

an image: one of my favourite parts was when the mother goes to the market to buy rice, millet, yams (see a glimpse below)

a thought: without a shadow of a doubt, this is the most beautiful book of all those I’ve read during my project – on its arrival I couldn’t stop turning each page to study the drawings and I loved how the story gently portrayed a struggle which many women face globally, often in silence

a fact: Yabouza closes with some fascinating insights into the geography and history behind the story – including her relationship with an Akua’ba doll that she came across in Bangui, the capital of her home country the Central African Republic, during childhood

want to read The Magic Doll? visit here

‘In Which Language to Write’ by Odete Semedo (tr. Alejandro Aguilar)

a nutshell: alternating between languages, these poems reflect Semedo’s dislocating experience of living in both Portuguese and Guinea-Bissau Creole (‘Criollo’)

a line: “But what signs to leave | The grandchildren of this century?”

an image: the poet declares that she’ll leave a message on parchment in this Portuguese language that she misunderstands

a thought: I found it interesting how most of the verses are formed of questions (not statements) – such as whether the poet will talk in Portuguese despite it denying her art or muse, which led me to learn from Wiki that Guinea-Bissau Creole is the country’s language of informal literature

a fact: born in 1959, Semedo went on to assume prominent roles including Minister of National Education and Minister of Health

want to read ‘In Which Language to Write’? visit here

Two Poems by Marie-Léontine Tsibinda (tr. Nancy Naomi Carlson)

a nutshell: as a pair, these evocative poems juxtapose Tsibinda’s memories of village life in Congo-Brazzaville – both the beauty and the brutality

a line: “Do you feel how the daytime air vibrates | and feel the shudder of lush land | when the rushing train rattles the silence of mountains?” – ‘The Village’ (the first poem)

an image: in the second (darker) poem, ‘In My Village’, Tsibinda portrays the more sinister elements of village life, for instance how each brother becomes an enemy, each laugh an arrow, each word a shoal – these images are particularly powerful with the knowledge that Tsibinda fled her homeland in 1997 due to ongoing conflict and was ultimately resettled in Canada with her family

a thought: I enjoyed reading the translator’s note in which Carlson describes her process of first creating sound maps to highlight Tsibinda’s patterns of assonance, alliteration & rhythm to try to honour the music infused in these lyrical poems, e.g. imitating the pattern of repeated sibilants around snakes (“hirsutes où se tissent des serpents”) with “thickets where snakes intertwist”

a fact: until reading these poems I’d never heard of a ‘pirogue’ and had to look it up – Merriam-Webster records the same definition as for the word ‘dugout’, that is, a boat made by hollowing out a large log

want to read Two Poems? visit here

History Shelves by Sassy Ross

a nutshell: this extraordinary poem explores a father-daughter relationship, opening with a frail memory of volumes kept and closing with a frail memory of volumes lost – it’s a poem whose every line is exquisite & complex & powerful

a line: “I, | a junkie for words I could not pronounce”

an image: in the first verse the poet portrays her father skimming hieroglyphic texts, and I loved how she described his thumb as a hummingbird hovering above the page

a thought: I was deeply moved by this poem despite feeling like I was only scraping the surface of its multilayered meanings, then I learned that Ross’s father struggled with addiction – only then did I realise why I relate so strongly with her fears about being cut from the same cloth and her line about how her dad fought demons in his sleep

a fact: born in Castries, St Lucia, Ross grew up speaking a mixture of English and a French patois – she migrated to the US aged 10 and began writing poetry while studying at Pennsylvania State University

want to read ‘History Shelves’? visit here

The Dancer from Khiva by Bibish (tr. Andrew Bromfield)

cover on kindle (back of plaited hair) with fern in background

a nutshell: written while Bibish was a street vendor in a province of Moscow, this unique & spirited memoir records an Uzbek woman’s determination to live independently despite all odds

a line: “The state is like an X-ray machine, it looks right through me”

an image: with the moon in Central Asia shining brightly at night, Bibish recalls how she used to read a wide range of books while everyone slept (despite her mother’s scolding)

a thought: the author vividly documents her struggles to earn enough money to provide food for her sons, such as her raw despair at being unable to buy bread to ease their hunger as late as 10pm – this evoked horrible parallels with the current situation in my homeland, the UK, where parliamentarians refused to allow meals to be given to children needing food over the upcoming holidays during the pandemic

a fact: Bibish shared many fascinating details about her childhood in a kishlak, and particularly moving was her account of the forced labour & production quota system that pervaded Uzbekistan’s cotton fields – when I googled this I was horrified to learn from HRW that it continues to this day

want to read The Dancer from Khiva? visit here

Journal of a Superfluous Woman by I. R. King

red cover with mandorla, plant in background

a nutshell: prompted by a cancer diagnosis, these introspective essays embody the author’s attempt (‘essai’) to probe the life she has led over four decades

a line: “the Caribbean experience is one of shared kinship amongst a people of varied appearances, but when we laugh, it is with one laughter”

an image: as seen in the image above, the cover features a mandorla (Latin for almond) – an ancient symbol of wholeness, in which the overlapping signifies the healing of the split; this symbol is of importance to King’s self-examination

a thought: King reflects heavily on her lifelong difficulties in knowing what she wants, commenting often on how many people seemed to stay on the heels of a dream that was not ours – the American dream, whether American or not

a fact: born in Curacao, King grew up in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines – at one point she mentions how US residents regard her island as a source of domestic help

want to read Journal of a Superfluous Woman? visit here

Moments of Nil by Flora Tavu

a nutshell: gathering poetry & short stories side-by-side, this is an accumulation of thoughts from Brunei-raised writer Flora Tavu

a line: “leave us cold with the coldness of lost hopes and dreams raining down our sanity” – ‘Unthink’

an image: a disturbing reference to a chopping board recurs throughout the pages – the first time it appears is in ‘Lullaby’, a disconcertingly gentle title for a poem that includes blood-spattered walls

a thought: on the inside flap, Tavu expresses her hope that after reading this, a reader would be able to know the person that she is – a vulnerable statement of self-exposure given the subject matter that follows

a fact: the contents of this book were written over the span of a decade and half, 1998 – 2012; at times Tavu’s mind would go blank – from three days to three months, even a year – then at other times the writing would rush out like a hurricane, she shares

want to read Moments of Nil? visit here

‘Melting Sun’ by Laila Neihoum (tr. D Mohamed Hassan and Neihoum)

a nutshell: over five short verses Libyan writer Neihoum probes the notion of familial expectations against a setting of unnaturalness, from an unturning tide to an eclipsed noon

a line: “What if I had not been my parents’ sculpture”

an image: halfway through the poem, the narrator faces an abandoned cave where a tear is the only water spilled into emptiness

a thought: I couldn’t help but pick up on how the poem’s first three words, things fall apart, echo the title of Chinua Achebe’s debut novel published in 1958 (over forty years before this poem was written), suggesting a broader significance to its themes – namely the influence of colonialism on African families

a fact: Neihoum was the first writer from her country to be accepted to join the International Writers Programme at the University of Iowa – she wrote a poetic manifesto for Libya which can be read on Words Without Borders

want to read ‘Melting Sun’? visit here

‘From where the voice is born’ by Carmen Naranjo

a nutshell: this fifty-line poem by Costa Rican poet & novelist Carmen Naranjo is a beautiful reflection on voice, silence, presence and absence

a line: “I have goodbyes in my hair | and forgetfulness in the eyes”

an image: towards the end, the poet describes being in front of the stars opposing a challenge to be brilliant

a thought: Naranjo’s line about a voice naked of ‘yes’s and ‘no’s made me think about my own commitment to balancing my ‘yes’s and ‘no’s – for so long I have said yes to everything and finally I’ve come to realise the sense in knowing how not to

a fact: born in 1928, Naranjo enrolled in a writers workshop following her return to Costa Rica in 1964 (having worked for the UN in Venezuela) and soon began publishing both poetry & prose

want to read more of Naranjo’s poetry? visit here

Bahrain’s Uprising ed. by Ala’a Shehabi and Marc Owen Jones

Bahrain Uprising book against yellow wall - cover shows Pearl Roundabout

note – as this project is about reading writing by women, this review focuses on the chapter ‘Shifting contours of activism and possibilities for justice in Bahrain‘ by Ala’a Shehabi and Luke G.G. Bhatia; Shehabi is a Bahraini writer and researcher who co-founded Bahrain Watch, an NGO that advocates for accountability and social justice in Bahrain

a nutshell: this powerful chapter shares valuable insights into Bahrain’s ‘advocacy revolution’, the topography of opposition actors, and the emerging possibilities for the fight for human rights and, crucially, self-determination

a line: “the sense of self-emancipation experienced in the euphoria of mass protests can be a life-changing personal transformation”

an image: nicknamed ‘the Butcher of Bahrain‘, British officer Ian Henderson makes a brief appearance in this chapter – a figure I learned of (with horror) during my time at the Bahrain Institute for Rights & Democracy

a thought: once again, like so often happens in this project, I was ashamed of my homeland – the UK has consistently enabled the regime’s increasingly ‘acceptable’ mode of repression, for instance, as mentioned here, advising on improved discourse, better surveillance technology, fewer physical marks following torture, and fewer journalists covering developments

a fact: the authors share a bleak statistic from Eric Posner’s ‘The case against human rights‘ – 150 out of 193 countries continue to engage in torture and the number of authoritarian countries has risen

want to read Bahrain’s Uprising? visit here