BY THE BOOK: Alexander Nderitu

Alexander Nderitu is a novelist, poet, playwright and critic. PHOTO | COURTESY

What you need to know:

  • I have fond memories of my mother helping my siblings and I understand the Lilliputian world that Gulliver found himself in.
  • As a writer, I have preference for e-books because they are much cheaper to produce and distribute.
  • I generally don’t lend out books from my home library because people don’t usually return them.

An award winning playwright and critic, novelist and poet, Alexander Nderitu is famed for being Africa’s first digital novelist—a title he earned when he published his e-book thriller When the Whirlwind Passes in November 2001.

In 2017, he was featured in Business Daily’s Top 40 Under 40 for his literary work. His works have been translated into five languages: Kiswahili, Chinese, Swedish, Arabic and Japanese.

What are the three most memorable books from your childhood? Why?

Treasure Island, Gulliver’s Travels and Jack and the Bean Stalk.

I have always had a very vivid imagination and those books sent it into overdrive. I have fond memories of my mother helping my siblings and I understand the Lilliputian world that Gulliver found himself in. We loved that story and found it very amusing. You can interpret that story metaphorically, which makes it great literature.

As for Treasure Island, written by Robert Louis Stevenson, I found everything about the story, from the characterisation of the exotic setting to the sinuous plot, quite intriguing.


How many books on average do you read in a year?

If I were to make an estimate, I’d say I read about 50 books per year. However, it’s hard to tell because there are so many books that I start but don’t finish and there are books that I have read up to three times – White Mischief by James Fox, for example.

I also read a lot of non-fiction books – most recently Reading With Oprah by Kathleen Rooney and The Anatomy of Power by Kenneth Galbraith.

Apart from being an author, I am a literary and theatre critic, so I am constantly reading. I read and write books simultaneously, which is to say I don’t wait until I have finished one to start another.

Which is your least favourite genre of books?

Least favourite? I wish you had asked ‘favourite’ because then I would have had a lot to say! My least favourite genre is Religion. It used to be interesting when I was young. ‘Comparative religion’ used to be a hot topic between me and some of the more intellectual boys in my dormitory back in high school. Now, not so much.


What's the size of your book collection as of the present?

Enormous! Elephantine! I don’t even have enough shelf room for a quarter of them. Whenever I move houses, my collection of books and old newspapers (for research) account for most of the weight.

I was moving from Kasarani to Nyeri recently and after watching me stuff dozens of novels into sacks, my real estate agent asked, ‘Have you read all those books?’ I laughed and said, ‘Most of them.’ He shook his head and said, ‘I would never find the time!’


Can you say that you have directly influenced someone to embrace a culture of reading? How?

Yes. I have been involved in reading initiatives for a very long time. I have given talks or mentored students at "StoryMoja" festivals, mentorship programmes like Daystar Creatives Academy, facilitated workshops, participated in ‘book swaps’ and book clubs.

In addition, I have influenced some people to read and write in their vernaculars. It started with "Mathabu Ma Carey Francis" (‘The Mathematics of Carey Francis’), a Kikuyu poem I wrote earlier this year. I deliberately chose a popular subject – romantic love – so that people would want to read it.

Some young people hear Prof. Ngũgi wa Thiong’o or Prof. Austin Bukenya advocating for vernacular literature, and think, ‘Those are some old guys who are out of touch with the times.’

But when they see even younger authors like me writing and preaching the gospel of vernacular literature, they might realise that it’s actually rather cool to be a cultural custodian.

Which are your two most treasured books and why? Would you lend them out?

Tom Jones by Somerset Maugham and White Mischief by James Fox. I love the ‘old world’ language in the former and the latter is like an old friend – you wouldn’t lend out your friend, would you?

I generally don’t lend out books from my home library because people don’t usually return them, and it could be an out-of-print book you spotted at an inama (roadside) bookstore.


If you were to become a character from a book, who would you be and why?

Interesting…I was at a Worldreader workshop on Human Centred Design earlier this month and one of the futuristic ideas we discussed was creating e-books where a reader types in his name at the beginning and it becomes the protagonist’s name!

As for me, I think I’d want to be Ian Fleming’s James Bond because of the high octane adventure and romantic interludes.

In practical terms, I am more contemplative - like Bernard Samson in Len Deighton’s spy novels or Quiller in Adam Hall’s books. I definitely wouldn’t want to be the main character in a Le Carré novel because they usually end up dead!


If you had the opportunity to meet three authors, dead or alive, who would they be and why?

I’d want to meet Shakespeare—probably because we share a birthday, April 23—James Baldwin and John Le Carré.

In your opinion, is writer’s block an actual challenge faced by writers or it an excuse for procrastination?
I believe some people really do get writer’s block although many writers, myself included, are notorious procrastinators! I have never suffered from writer’s block, though, and I hope I never will.

Have you ever had a bad review for your work? What did it say and how did you deal with it?

Not really. Of course certain parts of my prose or poems have been criticised but I would not call that negative review.

I take feedback seriously, and will actually change things if I feel that the critics have a point. My first professional review, for my suspense novel When the Whirlwind Passes, was published in the Saturday pullout of the Daily Nation in 2002. It was so flattering that I still have it to date.

More recently, a TV journalist described my poetry book The Moon is Made of Green Cheese as ‘too white’. I ignored him because he had read only one of the 50 poems in the collection.


What are your thoughts on society’s reading culture today in the face of popular culture?

In Kenya, it’s still not widespread but it’s growing. The number of book clubs, literary blogs and book drives has spiked over the last few years.

Just as literacy has improved, so has the reading culture, but we are still miles behind Western countries. I think a government policy that encourages reading, writing and a knowledge industry would be the best catalyst.

It’s true that other forms of media – especially electronic media – have grabbed the attention of people more than books have, but there can be cross-pollination between media, as when a TV show reviews books or when a novel is adapted into film, as happened with John Kiriamiti’s novel My Life in Crime.


E-books versus hardcopies, what is your preference?
I love both, they don’t cannibalise each other. When I travel, I use my Worldreader app to browse the 44,000-plus books in the digital library.

If at home, I love both hardbacks and paperbacks.

As a writer, I have preference for e-books because they are much cheaper to produce and distribute. They are also easier to sell and you keep a higher percentage of the revenue.

What are you currently reading?

At the moment, I am reading Shahidi Asiyekusudiwa (an Italian novel translated into Kiswahili), The Concubine by Elechi Amadi, Armageddon by Leon Uris and Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk. Armageddon is the most voluminous of those but I am really into it because it's about how the Cold War began, immediately after World War Two.