eel on reef Paperback by Uche Nduka

Product Details

• Publisher: Akashic Books, Ltd. (2007-09-04)
• Language: English
• Paperback: 152 pages
• ISBN-13: 9781933354378
• Item Weight: 368.55 grams
• Dimensions: 0.0 x 0.0 x 0.0 cm

A truly exciting American debut from a Nigerian writer on Chris Abani’s new poetry imprint, Black Goat, with an introduction by Kwame Dawes.

In eel on reef, award-winning writer Uche Nduka challenges every expectation of an African poet. His unique voice is a heady amalgam of Christopher Okigbo, A.R. Ammons, John Ashbery, Kamau Brathwaite, and something only Uche can bring. In reading Nduka’s poetry, the reader is encouraged to enjoy each instant, each image, while resisting the instinct to construct linear meaning in the poems.

Even though Nduka is acutely aware of his landscape and the politics of his world as an African poet, he knows that while writing out of—and sometimes against—a tradition that seems bent on didacticism, he is also unable to ignore the rituals of lament and protest that one associates with that tradition.

About the Author

UCHE NDUKA was born and raised in Nigeria. Poet, percussionist, essayist, and lecturer. His published books include eel on reef, Flower Child, Second Act, The Bremen Poems, Chiaroscuro (winner of the Association of Nigerian Authors Poetry Prize of 1997), If Only the Night, and Heart’s Field. His first prose book, Belltime Letters, was published in 2000.