Dr Ibrahim Malumfashi, July 1, 2006
This year, specifically this month of June marks the 25th year of
the demise of Abubakar Imam, the foremost Northern writer and journalist. On the
occasion of this anniversary, I wish to use this medium to highlight the
comatose nature of Hausa written literature since that time and have a look at
the inheritors of Imam and his age that permeates the Northern literary
landscape. In doing that we hope to be able to lay things bare as far as the development
of the literature is concerned. I think there is the need for this kind of soul
searching from time to time so that we can come to terms with the reality of
our times and construct a future without hiccups for our nascent literature.
I will begin this discourse by repeating the well-known axiom I
have been articulating for the last 15 years. I have this belief that in the
North and among any age group of writers that once existed or still exist, there
was none like Imam, none like him today and there will never ever be one like
him in the near or distant future. This may sound unpalatable to many emerging
or established writers that litter our landscape today. That is the bitter truth.
Imam was not just like any caricature or muddled up writer that penned down
anything to be regarded as great writer. He was not like the writers of today
that some of us are busy glorifying and eulogising, when in actual fact their
kind of writings are a time bomb to the society. Imam’s thinking faculty was
far ahead of his time, age and reifications. Imam was not just a writer, but
also an advocate of truth. Religious re - awakening macro- and micro
nationalism. Imam’s life was full of great complement not because he wanted the
limelight, wealth or position and power. Imam lived a life of asceticism at
that others may enjoy. He lived a life of enthusiastic hard work, so that the nation
and his people may prosper. He taught through his actions and writings how the
society should be positioned and how it should look like even after his demise.
Imam was never a mercenary or opportunistic person or writer. His pen was made
to edify not to abdicate his responsibility. That is why his books up till
today are regarded as some of the best, if not the best, not because of the
time milieu they were written or the tutelage he got from experts or support he
got from colonisers, but because his mind was sharp enough to distinguish
between right and wrong at the ripe age of 11. He never allowed his readers or sponsors
articulate what he wrote, and because he never wrote for money or prestige, he
was never beclouded by the petty Issues that today are the order of the day
among our so called fashionable writers.
That is why. 25 years after he died, he is still fondly remembered
by all right thinking people. While those that some people today are regarding as
his successors are out of the limelight, due the negative nature of their
writings or just because they behave like Andrews Liver salt in a cup of water,
they will effervesce and fizzle out, just like that.
Abubakar Imam was born at Kagara in 1911 and it was under the
tutorship of his father Malam Shehu Usmanu, who was then the chief Imam, Khadi,
treasurer and the leading malam in Kagara that the young Abubakar began to
acquire Islamic education. Just like his peers, he memorised the holy Qur’an
and went through some smaller books on Islamic education, before he was
enrolled at the European school then springing up.
The colonialists wanted him to go to Bidda Provincial School, but
his father insisted that he be enrolled at Katsina Provincial School, where his
elder brother, Malam Bello Kagara was teaching. Thus, on the 20th April,
1922, at the age of 11, Abubakar
Imam left Kagara lbr Katsina, to begin a lifelong transformation.
At the elementary school Abubakar Imam was enrolled into
Elementary 3, instead of Elementary 1. This, according to the headmaster, was
in recognition of his elder brother’s accomplishment in the teaching profession,
which he thought was running in their blood. After just a few months, the teachers
saw that Abubakar Imam could not catch up with the pace of his older
colleagues; all the same, he was made to continue with them. With the help of
his brother, the young Abubakar caught up with them and completed his
elementary six, in four years. He was at the Katsina Middle School from 1927
and completed in 1932, 2nd out of 16 students that passed out that
year.
Way back in 1927, when Abubakar Imam completed his elementary
school, he wanted to begin working life as a teacher, but his elder brother,
Bello Kagara, insisted he attended Middle school first. It was not surprising
then that immediately he finished Middle school, he got a job as a teacher,
where he taught English language. Abubakar Imam loved his career so much that
he devoted most of his time with either his pupils or their books or in the
library making new notes for their next class.
At that tender age,
Abubakar Imam was also at the Emir’s Council helping in translation of court
cases from Hausa to English and Arabic. Through that, he was able to meet many
prominent people, local and foreign. With the publication of his books like Ruwan Bagaja in 1934, Magana Jari Ce, in 1937 and Karamin Sani Kukumi Ne, in I938, Imam’s
name became well known within Hausa land and beyond. By the time the British
were looking for an editor for the GASKIYA
TA FI KWABO in 1939, Imam became the best choice.
He edited GASKIYA TAFI KWABO from 1939 until 1951.
Through that position, he helped in the enlightenment of the people of time North
against those THREE EVILS of IGNORANCE, INDOLENCE and POVERTY. He was able, through
his editorials to sensitise the people of the North about government programmes
and policies, as well as make a way that the leaders can have a feedback from
the local people.
Abubakar Imam’s sojourn
into politics was short-lived. He was elected into the House of Representatives
in Kaduna, later at the National Assembly, in Lagos, retired from active
politics in 1953, and went back to his dearest port; books and writing at the
Gaskiya Corporation, as Superintendent in charge of books. He was at various times
Chairman of Civil Service Commission of Northern Nigeria, from 1955, Public Complaints
Commission, from 1957, as well as, Interim Common Services Agency (ICSA) of
Northern Nigeria, from 1968 and Chairman Public Complaints Commission of North
Central State, from 1974.
Abubakar Imam loved
reading and writing, that was why he went into it very early in life, first at the
mat of his father at Kagara, where he learnt to read and write in Arabic. His
first book script was written in Boko in 1927, when he was 16 years old. His
first published work is Ruwan Bagaja,
written for the fiction competition of 1933, where he came first. This
publication made lmam’s name to become indelible in the annals of Northern Nigerian
literary circle. His fame secured for him, more honours and acclaimed, among
the literati and the general reading public. This prompted the colonial government
to commission him in 1936 to produce a reader for elementary pupils, which culminated
in the construction of Magana Jari Ce
(1- 3), within six months. When the books were found to be a bit high for elementary
pupils, he was again commissioned to write smaller readers, which he did in
1938, as Karamin Sani Kukumi Ne (1-2). As Editor of the famous GASK1YA TA FI KWABO, he was among the
West African journalists that visited war time England, (together with the revered
Nnamdi Azikiwe), which culminated in his book Tafiya Mabudin Ilimi. In 1944. Apart from literary and fictional
books, Abubakar Imam had published a number 0f books on Islamic history and
education, among which are, Sayyidina
Abubakar, in 1955, Tarihin Annabi
Kammalalle, in 1957, Haji Mabudin
Ilimi, 1959, Hausa Bakwai, in 1959,
Tarihin Annabi Da Halifofi, in 1980,
as well as Tarihin Musulunci and Tambaya Goma, Amsa Goma.
Together with Dr East,
he wrote Ikon Allah (l-5) in 1949. He
also co-authored other books together with Sherwood Smith, like Auren Turawa in 1949, and Auren Zobe 1974. He also translated from
Arabic other books written by the jihadists, like Diya’ul Hukkam by Abdullahi Fodiyo, which he rendered into Hausa as
Hasken Mahukunta, in 1966. It was to
his credit that the book Hali Zanen Dutse
came into being through the office of the late Sultan Abubakar. Overall, he had
penned about twenty books that are still being used in various cadre of
educational advancement in Nigeria.
In short, one can firmly
say Abubakar Imam participated in every aspect of his people’s life it at Zaria
where he established the first lslamiyya school, or at various times that he
worked for the North and the nation in general.
Scholars and present day
writers have said a lot on Imam’s creative indulgence, some arc of the opinion
that Imam was just a product of an enabling environment, which is the
colonialist that produced him. Others still feel that if given the chance and
the same atmosphere and tutelage they can excel better than Imam does. While at
the same time, others feel Imam was just like a parrot who grabbed so many
ideas from other works to become an instant hero. All this might be true, but I
feel the time has come to unveil the truth about this momentous hero.
Theoretically speaking,
the art of creativity or imagination in any literature cannot be said to be unique
or an entire product of an individual. This is because not all things that are
put down in writing or artistically produced can be intrinsically original in
outlook. This does not mean that the human mind lacked the capability to
produce fictitious environment. It can., but then the environment so imagined
can and must have a replica or mirror image within the given society. This is
so because literature by definition denotes the experiences one feels, sees or
partakes in the course of life. If this is the case, then it shows that, the
art of creating or imagining in literature is simply the ability to re-create
or re imagine such experiences.
Gauging this with the
on-set of “creativity” in African literature, we can see why it has been shrouded
in controversy. Some scholars are of the view that creativity ¡n African
literature is not very authentic and it is associated with the individual that
produces it only because of the nametag associated with the material. The case
of the African English Novel attests to this. According to scholars, the argument
about the authenticity of the African Novel rests mainly on two vital points;
one, the indebtedness of the novel to African oral narrative; two, the
influence of western traditions.
Whichever angle one
looks at it, there is some truth in each or all of these points. The African writer
since childhood has been brought up under an exciting story telling
environment. Story telling has been indelibly fixed in his mind, so much so that
when the culture of writing was introduced by the colonialist, these two things
pervaded the “creative” mind, which are the traditional oral narrative and the
newly introduced European models. This is why some scholars are of the belief
that the novelistic expression in African arts has more to do with recrudesce
or the transposition of the story telling into a finished book form.
What one is trying to establish
here is that the creative art in African societies is still rooted within these
two premises; what one has created, has been created before. What one think he
has imagined and put down on paper, has been imagined long ago, the only
difference being the sophistication and time milieu that produces such kind of
artistic formation.
This was the trend until
the idea of the so-called imaginative literature was fully introduced and subsequently
rooted in African vernaculars. In Northern Nigeria there was complete apathy towards
it, a lot of persuasion and intimidation had to be employed before the literate
people then (in Arabic) could put pen to paper in creating what was not there.
The main reason being, most of the literate Malams sneered at the idea as it
negates the seriousness with which they take religious teachings and instructions
predominant then, and as East (the father of modern Hausa Literature) attests,
this made the appearance of such kind of literature late in arrival.
Considering this, what
it means is not that there were no literary materials in Northern Nigerian prior
to the conquest of the region by the British what was not there was the Western
type of literature. We are quite aware that a lot had been committed to writing
in both Arabic and Ajami scripts way back in the 17th and 18th centuries and
even before.
What the British had
done was to introduce the idea of writing imaginative literature of the fairy tales
and fables types in Roman scripts, which became dominant from the early part of
the 20th century. This came about in two folds: first, there was the
school’s literature, that is those books meant for the emerging provincial
schools, which were more or less primers, and secondly, the imaginative literature
books that came about after an organised writing competition in 1933. The
materials that came out of the competition were mostly doctored to serve a
particular purpose; either in the choice of the winners or in the mode of the production
of the finished texts. In the choice of winners, pure entertainment was the
major point, discarding morals, the themes that m anaesthetized instead of
conscientised the Hausa mind.
That was the situation
in the early part of the 20th century. Imam’s Ruwan Bagaja made him a sort of flagship of Hausa imaginative
literature writers. He was given all the necessary encouragement, assistance
and tutoring by the British to become what he became. In fact, one can say
without fear of contradiction that it is going to be very hard to t anybody
like Imam in Hausa literary endeavour. This is so because every writer is a
product of his time, history and cultural milieu. In this instance, the time,
history and cultural milieu that produced Imam was the time Northern Nigeria was
under British control. The Emirs were most powerful. The period had very little
social services or infrastructure and very few literate people in the modern
sense, etc.
It was under this
condition that the literary personality in Imam was hatched, of course with the
notion that Imam as a person had the natural gift for creative thinking. What
can only be done to such a person that has that kind of gift is to sharpen it
or streamline it to produce what can be regarded as good literary materials.
This s what Imam did or was guided to do when the ability to re-create was
noticed in him.
Right from the Lime Imam
was born; he had the onerous opportunity to learn early, being a scion of an
imamate. At the age of 24, he had mastered three major languages, Hausa. Arabic
and English. He grew to become a writer by voraciously reading whatever came his
way in those three Languages. This helped him greatly, becau.se a writer can
never be a good writer unless he is well read and versatile. By reading
materials in Arabic. English and digesting and assimilating the ideas from
them, Imam produced his own. Because of this it become a problem trying to
sieve out what can be regarded as Imam’s and what can be attributed to other sources.
That is the reason why East, his first literature instructor said of him.
He is one of the few who
has not lost through an intensive education in English, the power to express
himself in his own language, and has already written a number of excellent
books of fiction. He is in fact a natural genius for writing.
The claim by some
scholars that Imam does not have a literature to call his own hinges on the fact
that many of his stories are now being associated with some other sources,
either in the title, the actual motif or as pure translations. In literary
circles, this is not a crime, as it is accepted worldwide. What Imam did was
like following the footsteps of the late president of America, Abraham Lincoln,
who advocated one in developing a habit in learning from the book one reads,
the people one meets in the course of life and what one sees or feels from actual
events. Lincoln said, “These will give you ideas for reflection and thus you
will be able to relate, assimilate and use ideas as your own”.
This assessment is quite
in order. Knowledge has no copyright ownership; thus sourcing of ideas from
other materials to form one’s ideas or materials cannot be faulted on the premise
that they are not one’s original thinking.
For one to sec this
point clearly, let’s take the case of William Shakespeare, born 26 April 1564. In
the English literary world, only the Bible can have an edge over the popularity
and/or acceptability of Shakespeare’s literary endeavour. However, if one takes
a closer look, one is bound to find out that Shakespeare used materials or sources
of other people, (some his predecessors, same others his contemporaries) to
achieve his monumental greatness. His Songs of Sonnet got their inspiration from
the Greek Homily Songs, so also his plays especially the history plays; Henry IV-VI,
Richard II, Ill, and Macbeth, all have their roots in the English historical
background, like the History of Machiavelli, The Medieval Nomi, The Tudor Myth
and Holinshed.
This is the case with
Shakespeare’s efforts and he is still regarded as a colossus/genius in many English
literary minds, where it is stated that “No household in the english speaking
world is properly furnished unless it contains copies of the Holy Bible and the
works of Shakespeare as a symbol of religion and culture”.
Then it means imam’s
work can be likened to such kind of works. What Shakespeare did was what Imam did,
if not more perfectly done. It is only because most of Shakespeare’s works have
been unearthed and over amplified by researchers that his literary works are
now appreciated the more.
When we come to Imam’s
works, we find that this is not the case. Agreed that Imam took some sources to
recreate his own literary pattern, where are these sources? How can we
determine the talent inherent in Imam’s works from the sources we claimed he
used? Is there any relationship as regards to how he built his humoristic style
with the source we are claiming he used? In this regard, it is imperative to
analyse Imam’s imaginative literature in detail, with particular emphasis on
the sources he used, to find out his own creative abilities within the context
of the sources, and determine how he was able to chart a stylistic course,
distinct, unique and very influencing and convincing in getting his message
across. We can only do that if we read a lot and research a lot Suffice to add
that Imam was never a lazy writer or a parrot that graciously copied from
others without tasking his brain. He went through thousand pages of materials
from Arabic, English and Hausa like Alfu
Lailah Wa Lailah, Kalilah Wa Dimna,
MuqamatuI Haririh, The Parrot, Grimm’s Fairy Tales, Andersen
Fairy Tales, Aesop’s Fables, Tales from Shakespeare, Hausa Tales and Traditions, Nurul Zaman,
Bahrul Adab, etc.
All these materials are
not for a small child or a hit-and-run writer like the ones we have today. They
are materials for the sharp mind and intelligent few. Let us take for instance Alfu Lailah Wa Lailah, Imam had to go
through both the Arabic and English versions for him to sift out materials that
helped in the production of Ruwan Bagaja and
Magana Jari Ce. The English version
by Burton is a 12- volume book, each volume with over 1,000 pages. The Arabic
version on the other hand is a 4-volume Book, each with over 400 pages. Kalilah
Wa Dimnah is Panchantatra, an old Indian books of fables meant for the princes.
Muqamah on the other hand is one of the best Arabic books for learning logic
and grammar. It is not a subject of study for any student, but the mighty,
because of its intense labyrinth in language and logic. When we look at the Roman
texts on the other hand we find that they come from the best of their times,
Aesop was the master piece of Greek literature 300 years BC, Shakespeare was
the best in Great Britain and other English speaking worlds. Andersen was the
magic storyteller from Denmark, translated in over 100 languages. The Grimms
Brothers are the best Germany can offer. Hausa tales and traditions hacked Imam
up with his African background, while Nurul Zaman gave him the jihadist’s story
angle. He ended by swimming in the currents of Bahrul Adab, the largest and a
watershed in Arabic literature, tales and fables.
Going through any of
these books requires a lot of time and energy, sifting from them the most relevant
for a community that is not in consonance with the ideals, thoughts and beliefs
of the original ideas in the book is another horrendous task. Suffice to add,
Imam at the ripe edge of 16 had comprehended most of these books, digested them
and applied some of the ideas in the construction of his works is a task that must
be applauded and copied by any right thinking person. This become more apparent
if one takes into cognizance the fact that when Imam wrote Ruwan Bagaja in 1932, the kind of library we have today was not in
vogue, so he must have gone through hell to get the materials for the book,
since it was among the pioneers. Not only that, it took Imam 6 months to
complete reading, analysing, assimilating and production of Magana Jari Ce, a job if given to a
professor today to produce its likeness may take him sixty years to accomplish,
and I am sure not up to the standard that Imam reached.
An interpretation of
Imam and his works and their likely impact on the writers of today is far beyond
the capacity of a given article of this nature. It needs fuller and detailed
research for one to get all the necessary materials, make necessary study and
come out with an extensive corpus. The few observations made here hopefully
would open up this virgin area for more scrutiny and analysis; maybe from there
we can really put Imam and his imaginative literature on their proper
pedestals.
I will end this piece by
saying that by the time Imam died on 19th June, 1981, exactly 25 years, he left
us with a work of art that withstands the tests of time and scrutiny. He also
left behind 14 children. 7 males, Alhaji Mustapha, Shamsuddeen, Kamaruddeen,
Najamuddeen, Sirajuddeen, Jalaludeen and Nizamuddeen and 7 females. Hajiya Fatima,
Ummul Sa’adat, Ummul Bishiri, Ummul Hadi, Ummul Khulsum, U,nmul Falalu and
finally, Ummul Hani.
On a final note, I will
repeat this once again, Imam and his era however hard one tries to belittle it
will continue to blossom and prosper. It will continue to influence positively
for thousand of years to come. Those that care and adore that era for its positiveness
and classicism will continue to promote it, in its textual as well as modem
ways. As for the Ado Gidan Dabinos, the Bala Anas Babinlatas, the Ibrahim
Shemes, and the Rahma A. Majids of this world that feel they have conquered the
creative Landscape and can be adjudged the inheritor of Imam, I say welcome to
the world of creative industriousness.
Dr. Malumfashi is of
Department of Nigerian Languages. Usmanu Danfodiyo University Sokoto
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