Bibi Slippers asked Yewande Omotoso a few questions about writing her Sunday Times Literary Award-nominated book Bom Boy.
In Margaret Atwood's book on writing, Negotiating with the Dead, she compiles a list of hundreds of reasons why writers write. Some of the reasons on the list are:
- To record the world as it is.
- To set down the past before it is all forgotten / To excavate the past because it has been forgotten.
- To satisfy my desire for revenge.
- Because I knew I had to keep writing or else I would die.
- To produce order out of chaos.
- To hold a mirror up to the reader.
- To show the bastards.
- To make money so my children could have shoes.
- To attract the love of a beautiful woman / To attract the love of any woman at all.
- To serve History.
If you were to name your main reasons for writing this specific book, what would they be?
- To remain sane, feel like I’m living not just waiting.
- Because the story entered my thoughts and I didn’t have it in me to ignore it.
- I wanted to be a writer badly, and apparently in order to be one you needed to write books, so I decided to stop with the excuses, get on with it and write one.
If there were to be a large-scale film adaptation of your book, who would you cast as your main character, and why?
I didn’t have a blockbuster in mind, but when I imagined someone playing Leke I thought of South Africa’s very talented David Johnson … but taller, maybe! I would hate some American star messing up the accent, but apparently without them there’s no money! *sigh*
Was there anything you found particularly difficult in writing your book?
Cutting out characters I’d created that actually didn’t belong in the book. Thinking the book, the characters, were one thing; then writing and writing down that path only to find that the book and characters were another thing entirely. Delete. Delete. Delete. That sense of uncertainty throughout the book that I as the writer am not really master in that world – the story is.
What was the first book you ever read that made you think, "I want to be a writer"?
From when I can remember I always wanted to be a writer. I lived with a writer (my father) and I was constantly being introduced to writers. Yes, I read a lot of books, but I think it was the people I fell in love with – I wanted to be like them.
Do you have a "first reader"? And relating to this question, who is your ideal reader?
My “first reader” has changed over the years. All the “first readers” I’ve had are people I inherently trust, but also people I am willing to hear bad news from, people I won’t get upset with if/when they tell me “it needs work”! Also, they are people I trust to know how to say that (“it needs work”) without killing me off. As a writer you can have a tough skin, but it’s still skin, not cement.
My ideal reader? I don’t have one. If you’re a reader you are already a favourite person of mine.
What has been your favourite South African read of 2011/2012?
2012 is still going, so can’t say – many contenders. 2011 … there is never just one – the polygamous reader: Zoo City, Snake, Lazarus Effect and more, a whole harem.
Which one of the nominated books would you place your betting money on to walk away with this year's prize?
I prefer not to gamble.