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Ondjaki

— They’re very different books. They have very different voices because they grew out of very different literary projects. The main challenge I faced in writing Transparent People was to create something similar to what I had imagined. And, in that sense, I’m the only one who may be aware that perhaps I haven’t achieved my objective. There are lots of people who like the book, I realise that. But I had that book in my head for nine years, it accumulated in my mind, my dreams, my waking hours, my moments of bitterness, it even got mixed up with my real life. I needed to write that book to get it out of me. And also because Luanda deserved to be the subject of another book. I did struggle with having so many characters and so many little worlds to keep tabs on and describe. At heart it’s a book about Luanda. About ‘one’ Luanda. I think that each Luandan has a Luanda inside and outside of themselves. Luanda now has around seven million inhabitants, so we still need lots more books in order to better understand the puzzle of the big picture.

 

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Ondjaki

— Let me begin by saying that some people, either in books or in life, don’t replace others. I understand what you mean, but I don’t like the idea of replacements. And I’d like to say this: there’s nobody who can replace the Cubans, or what some Cubans did for Angola.

 

On the other hand, I think that there are good and bad things about socialism. But what I think doesn’t matter, since what’s in the book, so far as this subject goes, are the opinions of Odonato and the Leftist. And I have a pronounced tendency to understand and respect my characters’ opinions. There is a more or less explicit debate throughout the work about a globalised Angolan present. The comparison with the era of ‘scientific socialism’ only accentuates this contrast. The problem with the end of socialism, and the transformation of the systems that came from socialism, is the lack of any transitional phase to prepare the ground for the new political phase. And I feel that the highest price is paid by those sectors of the population which have the least access to ‘capitalist schemes.’ Because capitalism is full of schemes, obviously. Or, as we say in Portuguese, the flies change.

 

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Ondjaki

— I change my literary language with each book I write. It depends on the tale I want to tell, the era it belongs to, the style and who the characters are. I don’t need to use my Portuguese language to defend something or take action against something. I was born into a Portuguese language which was, and is, Angolan. But many Portuguese languages exist in Angola. It’s not just the difference between Luanda and other places. The way of speaking varies according to social class, also, or according to place, or according to the personal interpretation that each person makes of their language. The Portuguese language in Angola, whether used by a citizen in daily life, by a child, by a woman who sells things in the street, by a sea-shell seller, a politician or a writer, is a singular instrument of self-expression and creation. It’s even each person’s private theatre.

 

I think that this book’s language helps us understand the people. Who these characters are. Who this city of Luanda is, with so many languages and ways of speaking. Who is the Angolan Portuguese language in the midst of the daily carnival of personal interests. But, on top of all that, I think that words and wordplay are, for me, as an author, a delicate tool of my work: it helps me put together the puzzle, it allows me to speak about the characters, it allows me to show who speaks how–but literary language is always also a way of describing people or places. Of course, in a book, the word choices are mine and form part of what’s going to be called the ‘literary style.’ I make my books with the language that works best to tell the tale. In this sense, my choices are aesthetic rather than political or sociological.

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Ondjaki

— I have to say that I wrote the book in 2009, even though it was published only in 2012. Crises are cyclical, and I don’t spend my life looking for things that justify my criticisms. I feel that the management practice in Angola, and in the world, that’s based on oil, is wrong. From an ecological point of view, obviously, but above all from a human point of view. The way in which oil exploration is done is wrong, the world of corruption that surrounds oil, the failure to equitably distribute the revenues, etc. It’s more and more feasible to prepare ourselves for a transition to the production of non-fossil-fuel energy. The money that comes from oil should be used for that. All that happens as a result of oil crises is that they throw into relief some countries’ dependence on oil. Angola is one of those countries, and there are even some positive aspects to the crisis. I think people will start to look for other, non-petroleum solutions. But it’s an old, vicious cycle. It’s not just a question of oil, it’s about the country and the African continent: we’re in urgent need of another type of leader. I hope to be alive to witness the appearance not of one, but of a set of leaders, who deal with the continent’s people with respect and human consideration. Who deal with their countries as a group of cities full of people. A nation cannot be seen as a private yard available to be ransacked by the president or the party. A country is a yard full of children, adults, the elderly, dreams and embraces.

 

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Ondjaki

— This depends on which families we’re talking about. I’m familiar with various cases of people whose parents were members of the MPLA and the children aren’t any more. So it’s not just a generational question. The problem is much more complex and would have to involve a historical analysis that we don’t have space for here.

 

But to give you the response that is possible, I’d have to say that there are numerous divisions between the most diverse sectors of Angolan society. There are people who are fed up with what they see, even though they belong to the MPLA. There are people who have been fed up for longer, and the fact of not belonging to the MPLA may help them see things from a different perspective. And there are people of my father’s generation who may agree with the MPLA on certain topics, but who neither like nor agree with the procedures of the Party, or the President, in relation to freedom of speech.

 

The case of the ‘fifteen plus two,’ beyond its other merits, also has this one: it brought debate to Angolan society, and in particular it touched the Angolan elite. It touched not only the hoary old dinosaurs of the Party through news and actions, but also adults and young people via the internet, Facebook, Whatsapp. And I saw ‘new’ positions among the youngest people: they didn’t agree with what the young prisoners were saying; but they didn’t agree with their detention. From my point of view, this was a big forward step. And these forward steps—the generalised debate, the internationalisation of the question of freedom of expression in Angola among those who don’t support the MPLA, how the justice system relates (or doesn’t) to the president’s office—we owe this whole debate to the courage and persistence of these young people who spent a year in jail paying an extremely high price for their convictions. They taught Angolan society a great lesson: they believe in their convictions and they’re still defending them today. Regardless of one’s own political position, we must thank these young intellectuals for this. I think that they are exercising now what will be Angola’s future. The country should be proud of these young people’s intelligence and abilities. Not to be afraid. I think this is young Angolans’ dream: that we no longer need to be afraid and that we no longer need to almost always self-censor our opinions. The day we can do that, we’ll have a prettier country.

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Ondjaki

— That could be one way of seeing things. The alternatives, in democracies, continue to receive the title of ‘opposition.’ Ask any minimally lucid person in Angola if they feel that the opposition to the MPLA works well. And they’re going to see that there’s this void, obviously.

 

On the other hand, and this is another ‘void’ that is sometimes promoted by the Party in power, civil society actions are rarely promoted. Or permitted. Politics, obviously, isn’t simply a question of parties. Unions, associations, marches, demonstrations, debates, are also ways of doing politics in a democratic context. Much of this is missing in what’s known as ‘Angolan democracy.’

 

Of course it’s going to be necessary for the younger generations to face up to this challenge: what are the goals of the new generations? What political changes do they want? How are they going to vote? To get a sense of this, it’s sufficient to go and see the extent to which information circulates, the levels of schooling, how much of the national territory is reached by the media, and you’ll see that we’re still far from the democratic standards that people from the Party say we’ve already achieved. In summary: is there a lack of an alternative to the MPLA? Yes. Without a doubt.

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Ondjaki

— I understand the question, but sometimes I just feel that everything comes from inside. Especially in the short stories. In Blue Dreams on the Corners I decided to give the name of a city to each story. It appears as if the events took place in those cities, but it’s not actually like that. It’s never really like that with writers. Those are cities that are inside me, between the labyrinth of dreams and, above all, the desire to tell stories, little tales about people or moments in time. My fiction is still going to go back to Angola a lot. You’ll be able to see this very soon. And I still haven’t gone into Angola’s past, I think that I’d like to do that one of these days. But, really, I don’t have anything against writing about other locations in the world. It just doesn’t happen to me very often. I need the echoes of Angola, of Luanda, a great deal in order to write. And to dream, too.