Quintessence, last night

Doreen Baingana, Toyin Akinoso and Toni Kan face the audience at Quintessence last night. The theme in this East-meets-West dialogue was love and desire. The discussion was wide-ranging, from the bawdiness of local languages vs the conservatism (thus far) of much African writing in English (what would happen if there were more 'translation' into English?); Toni Kan’s mother-son portrayals; whether there is any moral aspect to the two writers’ sex scenes; the question of Africans writing for Africans not Europeans; women as the-chasers and the idea of writing sexual desire for desire’s sake (not for love, nor marriage, nor babies). A thoroughly nourishing evening and perhaps the most interesting exchange between two African writers on the planet yesterday. Pix are here (Abuja and Lagos events).