"Being An Artist Is Being A Hustler-Omotosho Yewande

Yewande Omotosho comes from good literary stock and is the author of the award winning novel, Bom Boy described as “a well-crafted, and complex narrative written with a sensitive understanding of both the smallness and magnitude of a single life.” Her father is ‘the’ Kole Omotosho, polymath, academic and novelist while her brother is film maker Akin Omotosho, the man behind the blockbuster movie, Man on Ground. In this interview with Toni Kan, Yewande talks about her first book, the weight of expectation as daughter of Kole Omotosho and other issues.

Toni Kan: They say the first novel is always autobiographical but now you write about a male character. Why? Are you trying to just flip the script or something?
Yewande Omotosho: No it wasn’t that calculated. I think it was just the kind of story I wanted to tell, this is the story that came to me about a young man. Despite the gender being different one can still introduce certain experiences, feelings of struggles, in the character. Some things are more similar than different at times, gender aside.
TK. If you put away gender, how much of it could you say is autobiographical?
YO. It is not autobiographical and I didn’t begin it thinking I was writing something that was my story but I think that anything you write you will put some bits of you in all the characters not just in the main character and I think that was what happened. So, it’s not autobiographical at all. There is very little that resembles my story apart from the fact that I have lived in South Africa and I have lived as a Nigerian in South Africa and I have experienced some sort of estrangement. Sometimes I wanted to fit in.
TK: Do you think you are going to be the new face of Nigerian literature?
YO: That’s a big question, I can talk for myself. I don’t want to be a new face. I think there are local Nigerians, incredibly talented writers that are writing about Nigeria, and I think there are a crop of writers who live outside Nigeria and there are a bunch of them who live here in Nigeria and have a lot to say about what it takes to live and what the challenges are. I don’t know Nigeria well enough to write about it. I don’t think it’s my place, so I feel a lot more honest and authentic. I still write about Nigeria because my characters are always part Nigerian. My characters will always be part something because that is what I know and so it’s a bit of a tentative relationship and there is a lot of passion and love for Nigeria but the reality is that there is a bit of a tentative relationship because I have lived in South Africa for the past 21 years.
TK: So, you are Yewande Omotosho, daughter of ‘the’ Kole Omotosho. Was there any pressure to follow in his footsteps?
YO. No, because I don’t have that kind of relationship with my father where I feel pressure. There is a lot of freedom to do what you want to do.
TK: So, why did you use that title “Bom boy”?
YO:  I will be honest; it wasn’t my idea. It was either my supervisor or the publisher. I wrote the book as my Masters’ thesis at the University of CapeTown; Masters in Creative Writing. Somebody suggested it and I though it was a good idea, the word was used a lot in the book in reference to the main character. His father calls him that, and I think it works as a title. It’s more common here but it’s strange in South Africa
TK: In Nigerian movies and books and culture, there is always a traditional angle and it’s here in this book despite you being so modern.
YO: I think I am interested in my culture and I am interested in that aspect of my culture. I am not disparaging, I don’t know enough. I don’t dismiss it. I don’t dismiss its powers or its potency. I just find it intriguing and if you read the story there is no conclusion as to whether the stuff works or not. I am still left with mostly riddles because with most beliefs you have to figure it out yourself.
TK: How much of this do you believe in, as a person?
YO: As a person, I am afraid. I am very confused. I am a seeker. I love to find out stuff. I love to read and explore but I have very little answers so I can’t really answer that straight forwardly. I read about it, I hear about it but I can’t say whether it works or it doesn’t work. I don’t really have any first time experience on it but I can’t dismiss it either and I don’t have any other belief that suffices,  because when it comes to beliefs and religion I am scattered so I am open to quite a few things.
TK: So, that was just a thread employed to fulfil your purpose for the book. It’s not as if you believe or not?
YO: No, I think as a writer you don’t necessarily write based on what you believe. You want to tell stories. You look at your society and what is happening and you tell stories about different aspects of the society.
TK: Has there been criticism from people since the book came out about Nigerians and curses?
YO: No. It’s so funny I didn’t think of it maybe because I don’t live here. I wrote the book in CapeTown and I didn’t think this is such a common thing. I will like to take it exactly in the state we are approaching it but that’s my fault. I think the readers and the critics will have to decide for themselves. I think it is a compelling story line and that is why it’s being repeated but there are different ways to look at it and comment on it and I hope that I have been able to do that.
TK: So, from class work to an award winning book, how does that feel?
YO: I am grateful for the award and we must take it with a pinch of salt. Awards are complicated. I don’t need an award to tell me I have written a good book. I take what the readers say and what a few critics say.
TK: What are they saying?
YO:  I liked Tade’s [Tade Ipadeola] review because I found it honest. He was critical of certain things and he had certain readings of the book that I appreciated, some people find the book quite dark, they find it unsettling, slightly disturbing, sad, not always satisfying at the end. They struggle a bit with the structure of the story and I think that is fine. One of the things I am interested in is pushing the lines of it, so I take note of the critiques and next time I will do better.
TK: So what is next?
YO: Another story
TK:  Sisi? We already had Bomboy?
YO: (laughter) No, not Sisi. I am writing a story on friendship between two octogenarians living in Cape Town, two women whose husbands are dead, they hate each another but they need each another.
TK. Are they Nigerians?
YO. There is a Nigerian connection.
TK: What do you do full time? Do you have a job or what?
YO:  I hustle. I am an architect by profession but I am not working at the moment.  I write, yes I hustle because being an artist is being a hustler.