Taban Lyong's sentiments that Africa is barren of literary quality, or rather a desert of literary quality still holds some water. My little understanding of what is going on in the literary field in Africa is that literary works are no longer taken with much seriousness that they deserves as seen in other sectors like science and phillanthropological works.
A case study in Kenya for instance has it that the writers are never appreciated, that environment that can favour their works is not there at all.
Last week, Ngugi Wa Thiong'o a renown writer and a Nobel prize winner in literature, said a sentiment that caught my attention. `` Fifty years after independence, the Kenyan government does not understand the power of writing in building the economy, am best celebrated outside Kenya than I am in Kenya``