An Americanah morning in Dubai

Dubai — Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie hadn’t slept. The Nigerian author who had a session on the second last day of the Emirates Airline Literature Festival had just flown in from Washington. She cautioned author, broadcaster and interviewer for the session, Paul Blezard, that she “won’t be entirely coherent.”

Turns out, no such thing. Coherent? She even managed humour. Blezard got her to read a passage from her novel Americanah, also the name of the session. “Princeton, in the summer, smelled of nothing…”, Adichie read out from the first page of Americanah.

When she started out in America, Adichie had received a total of 27 rejections before a publisher said, “I am willing to take a chance on you”. She says she will never forget those words: ‘I am willing to take a chance on you’. The publisher had said to Adichie: “If you were Indian it would be easier”, as America seemed to then be discovering talents in the subcontinent.

She spoke about her novel, about her experience in America, about how for a few years she had put on a false accent so Americans didn’t have to say “wh--aaat?”. And in mouthing the “wh-aaat?”, Adichie nailed the rising intonation so common in America.

When Blezard asked her, “What’s with the hair, all that hair (in the book)?” she laughed and said, “it’s really not that much about hair”, but elaborated on the “wonderfully shallow level of hair”. She said she doesn’t understand why in the US a relaxo (the hair straightening treatment) is so expensive. She spoke of how Black women’s hair have meanings that go beyond ... just hair. She spoke of assumptions; of how if a White woman doesn’t colour her hair and it’s grey, it might mean that “she does ... yoga ...  and likes granola ... and probably won’t get a job on TV”. Laughter ensued and there were claps all around.

Despite it being “stupid and sentimental”, she really did believe “Love is the most important thing about being human.” Adichie said, to the mock horror of Blezard, that of the Mills And Boons novels published between 1979 and 1988, she had read every one of them. But she never identified with the women in the Mills and Boons. “…if anything I felt more like the man,” “Why can’t desire be shared equally?” she asked to more applause.

Adichie, admirer of Barack Obama, touched upon the loaded subject of identity, of race, of how she didn’t feel black till she came to America, how it made her happy that in the US, after this book came out and did well (to her pleasant surprise), she was told that people had begun to rethink hiring practices. There was again, applause at that. As there was often in the next 45 minutes when she spoke a simple, deep truth. Whether it was “I was born a feminist”, or “ For many women, love is to give. I want a world where women give and take” with emphasis on the ‘and’. That got loud claps, too.

That the audience loved her was no surprise. The chairs were all taken. People stood at the back of the packed ballroom to listen to see her and listen to her voice. They had paid Dh70 a ticket. And when Blezard conducted a quick poll, ‘how many here have read Half of a Yellow Sun (or Purple Hibiscus or Americanah?), a majority of hands flew up, if mostly female. She spoke of how she is likely to turn into a recluse at 80, and then she changed that to 45. When Blezard asked why oh why would she do such a thing, she said, “I just ... like staying home more and more.” She said she was ‘happy to sit (at) home and mumble to myself”.

Her popularity was easily gauged. In the laughter and applause of the audience as much as in the length of the queues after the session: people waited in line for 45 minutes and longer to get their books signed by the writer. And she obliged, courteously signing even four-four books that fans had brought to the table.

When a reporter in queue asked her the question: why is she not granting interviews to the media, Adichie sighed and said, “I’m just tired of hearing my own voice.”

nivriti@khaleejtimes.com

• UAE