How I developed my literary voice and style

“It took me a long time to learn how to play like myself” – Miles Davis.

I don’t write for a living. Like my photography endeavours, I write for leisure. I therefore do not consider myself a serious writer. I don’t even think I write that well. But many of my readers disagree. They are fans. They dote and wait on my writing. It beggars belief. These fans – and there are many of them – must have dreary lives to salivate at the slop I dish out. I underestimated the allure of pithy sentences, satire and jocosity.

Many of my readers have even urged me to write a book. It’ll be a runaway success they say. They are right about the runaway part. Everybody will run away from me when I sell only five copies. Bought by my mother-in-law and her fellowship people. Yet, the idea of a book is growing on me. I could write a travelogue. I love to travel. I have many tales to tell and yarn to spin.

Or I could write short stories. Like Nearly All The Men in Lagos Are Mad. Or a play: Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again. I don’t know why those titles popped into my mind. Maybe because I am a man in Lagos and a husband.

But I can see it. The book. My name immortalised. My face hewn on Zuma Rock.

If there is a writer who has had the most profound influence on my writing, it is Wole Soyinka. Of course, Kongi will be horrified at my farcical writing, but I don’t care. I love the man. And true love lasts a lifetime.

When I started writing, I copied Wole Soyinka a lot. Soyinka didn’t write for everyone. He wrote for a particular palate. Sophisticated grammar, erudite diction and preternatural creative expression. You have to read Ake: The Years of Childhood and A Forest of a Thousand Daemons, the English adaptation of D.O. Fagunwa’s Ògbójú Ọdẹ nínú Igbó Irúnmọlẹ̀. Spellbinding work. Many people have found Soyinka’s work challenging to read. But that’s Kongi. He is impenitent. Like Marmite, you either love him or you hate him.

I had a metaphysical connection with the man. He went to the University of Ibadan. I went to the University of Ibadan. He stayed in Mellamby Hall. I hung out a lot at Mellamby Hall. He was born on 13 July. I was born on 13 July. The only insignificant difference between him and myself was that he was a genius and I was of the genus copycathera. But I didn’t care. The man was my muse.

But there are two problems with copying someone else’s style.

First, you can’t be as good as them. Their style is baked in. It is their DNA. You’ll only be a poor copy.

The second problem with copying someone’s style is that you obliterate every ounce of yourself. If God wanted to create two Soyinkas, He would have. But He didn’t. He created you as you and Soyinka as Soyinka.

There is a third and controversial challenge. An observation pointed to me by my friend ‘Slade.’ And it is that a Soyinka-esque style won’t make you money. Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart is reputed to have sold over 20 million copies and translated into 50 languages. It is a master class in storytelling, one of the best books ever written. It is written in simple grammar and diction. A Grade 2 reader can enjoy it. But good luck selling two million copies of Chronicles From the Land of the Happiest People On Earth. And let me tell you, only broke people tell you money is not everything. Tell that to the cashier at Amala Iya Oyo.

Let me detour to my undergraduate days, to the counsel of my good friend ‘Slade.’

Chibuike ‘Slade’ Njoku and I both majored in Philosophy but had little else in common. I imbibed copious amounts of alcohol. Slade never drank. I reek of Rothmans of Pall Mall. Slade admonished he might be one of my pallbearers by 400 level. Slade was a rather inconspicuous chap. And unlike me, he attended classes and did his assignments. In my defence, I wasn’t planning on becoming a real philosopher. Otto Weininger put a gun to his head and Ludwig Boltzmann hung himself.

But pertinent to this discourse was that my friend Slade was a published writer. He had written a children’s book: Akula, The Black Bird, published by Spectrum Books.

I recollect mocking him often about the book. A children’s book. What an infantile endeavour! Such puerile literature was beneath me. If I were ever to write, I’d write only opuses. But Slade humoured me.

It was just as well that Slade was not vindictive. For often, I found myself beset by penury and only the royalty from Slade’s book kept the rain off my head. Slade would even indulge my vices. He would buy me beer, cigarettes and peppersoup. God bless him wherever he is!

Slade thought I could be a good writer if I put my mind to it. He’d seen me write a few articles. He encouraged and hounded me to take some English electives. I didn’t care much for English. English majors were lame. Unfraternal and supercilious lot. No way I was going to consort with them.

But sensing privation may not be far away from me again, I had the sudden common sense to give in to Slade’s badgering. If Slade was happy with me, he’d be happy to continue to indulge my vices. So I enrolled for Drama and Poetry, and Creative Writing.

Oddly, I took to the courses. Even stranger, I was good at them. Stellar even, if I may be a little immodest. It was a shock to many in the class. I didn’t look the ‘literary type.’ I looked and walked like a member of the Wu-Tang Clan.

Slade was proud of me. He claimed to have ‘discovered’ me.

But I was still copying Wole Soyinka.

Slade pulled me aside one day.

“Look, Jide, you are a good writer. I think you’re even better than I am. But you won’t make money. You write too intellectually. Too sophisticated, like your muse Soyinka. Be your own writer. Have your own voice. There is always room in the world for one more style.”

Tosh. Bunkum. Total codswallop. Why be me when I can be someone else?

But Slade was right, of course. He had interested me enough in writing for me to appreciate distinctiveness over pastiche.

Several years later, when I started working in brand management, I encountered the differentiation concepts of “distinctivity,” brand codes, tone of voice, brand essence, brand identity and imagery. Nike advertising looked and spoke a particular way. So did Guinness, The Economist and John Smith beer. Those concepts were useful in helping me grasp the importance of differentiation.

I started developing my style. I gravitated towards pithy sentences, satire, witticism and humour. I toned down the Obahiagbon and embraced simple sentences. Gradually I became better at it. Then it became effortless. More people now found me easier to read and more enjoyable. And now, I’m probably going to write a book. The cherry on it all? People still think I’m a great writer. Suckers!

This, I realise, is the writer I was born to be. It is my giftedness. I wasn’t supposed to be like Soyinka or Achebe or Jeffery Archer. I was born to have my voice. To be Jide Alade.