ImageNations

Search Sweet Country (Heinemann, 1986; 352) is the first novel by the Ghanaian poet, Kojo Laing. It expanded what the author had already started started with his poetry, his unique use of words, his ability to make words turn, somersault, split and do some weird, but adorable, gymnastics. As is the foibles of poets, Laing's poetry seeped unrelentingly into his prose in a lovely kind of way. This is a book that does away with the straitjacket novelistic requirements, those narrow rules requiring a plot, an arch, and such and such. Laing is the persona in that famous Frost's poem, for he takes the road less travelled, weaving his words in unique patterns to tell our story and it is this boldness to chart his own course that sets him apart from many other African writers and which has seen a renewed interest in his works leading to the re-release of his books. Some readers - including me when I first encountered his writing in Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters  - find...

Today I bring you some quotes from Kojo Laing's latest novel, Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters . Destiny is such a selfish thing: it not only achieves itself when particular things happen, but also when the opposite of everything is realized. The minute you locked yourself in ultimate certainty you lost a great deal of your freedom. The minute you thought there was greater excitement in uncertainty and in determinacy then you were severely limiting your freedom. When all facts get finished you then entered the insights. The thing about divinity was that the minute you discovered or invented such presence, it took on a life of its own and exhorted worship and doctrine as constant means of re-creation and re-experience.

Yesterday evening was an evening to remember. It is the dream of every budding writer to meet other writers who have published their works and whose name is common to all. Yet, greater joy comes from not knowing who the person only to be told that he is an award-winning writer.  Yesterday evening, at the American Corner of the Legon Centre for International Affairs (LECIA), I had the privilege of meeting two great writers of our time: Kojo Laing, whose latest novel, Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters, I reviewed on this blog and the Kenyan author Binyavanga Wainaina. Binyavanga Wainaina Binyavanga Wainaina is a Kenyan author, journalist and a 2002 Caine-Prize winning author of Discovering Home . He is also the founding editor of Kwani?, a literary magazine in Kenya. He is also the Director of the Chinua Achebe Centre in New York. Binyavanga read from his yet to be published memoir. His reading captivated us all and left us laughing with its humour and character...

Title: Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters Author: Kojo Laing Genre: Novel (Sci-Fi?) Publishers: Woeli Publishing Services Pages: 366 Year: 2006 Country: Ghana Set in the 'weird' year of 1986 in Gold Coast City, Big Bishop Roko and the Altar Gangsters is a novel that borders on Science Fiction with Gothic representations. It tells the story of an Anglican bishop (Bishop Roko) who is deeply involved in genetic engineering with shark sperms with the ultimate aim of causing a general mutation of the human race to "free all the truths locked up in the different cultures, to free all the divinity locked up in different religions, and to free and learn from the most complex ethical beings of the universe. ..." However, the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury are both against but are unable to prevent this from happening. The Archbishop's outfit was even carrying out a different research but one that would lead to the mutation of the rich folks first and ...