Best Russian Literature

There are only too many problems hindering the growth of Sierra Leonean literature. This includes the lack of a publishing house. As a result only those lucky and resilient enough to persist until they are noticed by a multi-national publishing firm and thus becoming published, survive as writers. There is also a lack of other alternative outlets such as literary journals or magazines. Apart from the fact that newspapers do not usually provide space for creative writing, they do very little to stimulate the production and growth of literature. When works get published by Sierra Leoneans they seldom get much attention in the press.

Another problem facing the literary art is the total lack of support from the government for literary activities. No support is given to efforts at creating literary outlets such as journals and magazines. A most glaring example of this unsupportive climate is seen in the Sierra Leone Association of Writers and Illustration having to subsist on only subscription with no government subvention whatsoever until its final demise.

The inhibiting influence of the acute shortage of electricity supply cannot be over emphasized. What I wish to underscore is that blackout and writing make uneasy bedfellows. Therefore in such a scenario writers wither, for they have to change their writing schedules and habits or perish.

The shortage, or expensiveness of stationary which are basic materials for the writer is another inhibiting factor. Stationary I think ranges from machineries such as typewriters to pens, pencils, paper, carbon and envelopes. Then with the completion of a manuscript comes the problem of dispatching it to a publisher. As most publications are based abroad, writers are left to bear the soaring postal rates. This is because with the present commercialization, the post office has ceased to be a social service. The widespread acceptance of submissions by e-mails is now minimizing this problem. As for me I find the convenience of e-mail so much easier, faster and cheaper that I have virtually forgotten about snail mails.

Books and other writing materials continue to be receiving heavy duties. Levies on books and other basic writing materials should be abolished if developments of the literature of Sierra Leone should be nurtured and this should be a consistent policy of government. Books and materials for their production should be free from all taxes and duties. There should now be a dramatic break from the past negative attitude to literacy and literature, In the past this has not been so. As a result there ihas been an ever diminishing demand for booksellers to order books except those whose demand is high as a result of being required at schools. Now the situation is much more desperate as indicated in another article I wrote ‘The Strruggle of the Book in Sierra Leone.’ which was published in FOCUS on International Library and Information Work.

A related problem is the negative effect of the recession on the once thriving bookshops. Sawyer’s bookshop is of course no longer there. The Fourah Bay College Bookshop closed several years ago leaving no bookshop to service the book demands of a whole college. The Fourah Bay College Bookshop was important not only because it stocked a wide selection of books including the most recent literary ones but it also organized literary events such as poetry readings and published from time to time cyclostyled pamphlets containing collections of poems of poets as Dominic Ofori. I am not sure whether the Njala Bookshop is still operating. But here in town it is indeed painful to see the once central and indispensable buying center for school-books as well as other readings for the general public, the C..M.S. Bookshop now Sierra Leone Diocesan Bookshop folding up rapidly. Today they are occupying only a third of the space they once held. A bookshop recently opened at Fourah Bay College raising hopes of a renaissance.

The problem of a lack of a sustaining and economic reading public does not provide enough incentives for encouraging the setting up of publishing endeavors. Official indications is that only 15% of our 3 ½ million people are literate. Of those who are officially literate it is probable that the vast majority of them are to all practical purposes semi-literate as they read nothing beyond the weekly or fortnightly newspaper. This kind of insipidness has been contributed to by a sterile and unimaginative educational system which allows little room for creativity. As a result the society sustained is one that is indifferent and insensitive and unsupportive of the literary arts.

Recession has further intensified these negative attitudes. Even those who are literarily committed change their habits as the need for survival becomes more compelling.

A major problem which faces writers and artists is that of producing their works without any certainty of the protection of their works form pirates and other threats. It is astonishing that in a country where courts are full of litigation, over physical properties-landed as well as otherwise, little or no place is still afforded litigants over trespass on their intellectual property. This is not because there have been no such infringements. Neither is it because we have no copyright laws, for there is solid evidence now of the existence of one from 1965 though which many would claim needs updating. It is still been bemoaned that Sierra Leone remains one of the few countries in the world which is still not a signatory to either of the international copyright conventions, universal or Berne.

The problem of which language to write is one which persists for many writers in Africa. If he writes in English he will not be read widely in his country. This is even more so in Sierra Leone where only 15% are literate in English. But again which of the over 10 languages will he choose. And if he does choose one of the less developed national languages there is the fear that obscurity will remain his lot as he will not be read beyond the narrow national or ethnic confines of his locale. But the famous Kenyan Writer Ngugi Wa’Thiongo has proved that this need not be so. He now writes his novels in his native Gikuyu and then translates them into English thus killing two birds with one stone.

Already, with the advantageous position taken by Krio now almost a de-facto Lingua Franca being spoken widely throughout the country and now being predominantly used in the theatre Sierra Leonean writers are more blessed with a ready choice if they should wish to reach their people first. Already an orthography has been made and a dictionary published. A few works including the Krio dictionary are already available. This position alone gives some prospects for the development of the literary scene especially so when placed besides the pioneering work of Gladys Casely- Hayford and Thomas Decker.

The pioneering role of Sierra Leone in the fields of education, writing and journalism alone should make it ideal for the flourishing of creative literary works. It was after all the seat of the first and most prestigious college which produced some of the leading elite who were to lead their continent’s development. It also had the first blossoms of schools, newspapers, journals and broadcasting media. With all this available history there must indeed be some rich potential waiting to be tapped. And indeed many young creative talents keep waiting to be tapped at all levels whenever the machinery is set in motion for the full realization of our creative literary reservoir. Already signs of breakthrough were seen in other aspects of the arts, resulting in the upsurge of musical recordings, theatrical activities, and the larger percentage of novels which have been published internationally by Sierra Leonean writers during the past two decades. This hope in our prospects for a take off can only be buttressed by the fact that Sierra Leone boasts of two of the continent’s most prominent critics of African Literature Profs. Eldred Jones and Eustace Palmer. Already the poet Syl Cheyney Coker has become a leading figure in African Literature by bagging two prestigious prizes in just a year after the publication of his first novel - The Last Harmattan of Alusine Dunbar which received rave reviews from some of the top media across the globe including the BBC Arts programmes Meridian and Arts and Africa. The two prizes in question here are the Robert Higham prize for a first novel; published in Britain. 3rd place and the African short list for the Commonwealth Prize.

Our present recession could be a plus for creativity for recession generally should serve as a stimulus for people to write and expiate their feelings. God knows, perhaps it is through such means that a breakthrough could be found. Experience and careful observation shows that most countries in the world have had the greatest spurt of creative explosion during crisis periods in their history. The great spurt of literature ‘the Nigerian civil war gave birth to is a case in point. So it is for us to see our own economic crisis as a fuel for generating our own creativity. Though we missed exploiting amply the opportunities offered by the UNESCO cultural decade we might try now to get funding from that end as well as locally to finance publications and other literary events. All the slightest hints of promise should be amply utilised. For there are certain signs that Sierra Leone will no longer be an obscure spot in the literary world. Syl Cheney Coker has brought much attention to Sierra Leone by his literary breakthrough with his first novel The Last Harmattan of Alusine Dunbar. This is reenforced by the impact of his third volume of poems. The Blood in the the Desert’s Eyes. He has now completed work on his second novel The Last Days of the Barracuda . His previous two volumes of poems are: Concerto for an Exile and The Graveyard also has Teeth . This feat was only recently boldly followed with the emergence of another strident literary voice in Aminata Forna with her Booker- prize winning The Devil that Danced on the Water and her most recent Ancestor Stone

Much promise of growth also came from the large output of works of folklore put out by an Adult Education Association., The Peoples Education Association (P.E.A.) through their Songs and Stories (SAS) project. Though aimed primarily at retrieving and recording our oral lore through songs, proverbs and folktales, it has published some real creative efforts such as two plays, The Weaverbirds and The Runaway by Frederick Borbor James and a collection of stories of Brima Rogers Love without Questions.

Happily some space is now being given by some newspapers to poems and short stories. The National for instance featured regularly poems and carried a few stories which included five of mine. Through a column in the same paper I tried to redirect attention to the literary and cultural domain. A few others. The New Shaft from time to time published poems. And I have seen some stories published in the pages of. The Vision.. Other papers have received literary publications through reviews in their pages. I have acknowledged . Sam Metzger who through his We Yone newspaper reviewed my work Folktales from Freetown which was published in 1987 as part of the bicentenary celebrations of the founding of Freetown. It is hoped that this is only the beginning of a growing trend, so that when next Sierra Leone makes a literary breakthrough the local press will not remain even though innocently or silent on it whilst it receives rave reviews in the international media. The press should not preoccupy itself exclusively in painting a completely dark picture of the society when indeed there are sparks of light here and there. These should be magnified within their pages so that readers do not get drowned in depressive complacence and despair. Readers could only be galvanized into action to redeeming the fate of our country if aware of the little though enviable efforts others are making in their little corners.

The electronic revolution is also beginning to be a boon for Sierra Leonean literature as well. Quite a number of individuals as well as institutions have created internet sites which are publishing on-line the works of Sierra Leonean writers, thus giving it a much wider exposure than was ever possible.

The first and most noteworthy of these online e-journals is the Sierra Leonean Writers Series (SLWS) which was set up and launched in 2001 in Sierra Leone in Freetown by Dr Osman Mallam Sankoh. Many of its works the latest being Lucilda Hunter’s novel Redemption Song are also available in printed book form. It focuses on academic, fictional, and scientific writing used in schools and colleges,promoting good quality books by Sierra Leoneans, writers of Sierra Leonean descent , and writers writing on or about Sierra Leone. The works published have local appeal and are related to the lives and experiences of Sierra Leoneans. The Mabayla Review another online journal is published four times a year by a prolific poet Gbanabom Hallowell offering a wide range of fiction including one of mine, poetry, social essays, translations, interviews, book reviews, criticism, theory alongside photographs focusing on Sierra Leone’s literary tradition and issues of social justice and the writing life in general from new and established Sierra Leonean and guest writers as well as social and political commentaries by Sierra Leoneans arising out of Sierra Leonean life. The journal founded in 2006 though it seems to have suffered some setbacks since its last edition in April 2007. I was assured by Mr Hallowell that it will resume after the redesigning of the website. I do hope this is accelerated as I have a few more stories to appear there and I think it holds the greatest prospect for the growth of writing in Sierra Leone.

Sierra Leone Pen is in the process of building a website sierraleonepen.org which should be expanding into publishing poetry and stories. For now the site is restricted to news items, photos and features. Perhaps the most certain promise given to not only literature but arts and culture in general is the singular commitment of government to cultural development expressed in the 1991 constitution but which is yet to be more boldly articulated in real terms with visible support for writers and other programs supportive of the growth of a luxuriant and strident literature from our shores. Now that a new government is now in place it is hoped that much interest and support wlll be coming from Government.

Arthur Edgar Smith was born, and schooled in Freetown, Sierra Leone.. He has taught English since 1977 at Prince of Wales School and, Milton Margai College of Education. He is now Senior Lecturer at Fourah Bay College where he has been lecturing English, Literature, as well as Creative Writing for the past seven years He is widely published with his writings appearing in local newspapers as well as in West Africa Magazine, Index on Censorship, Focus on Library and Information Work amongst, ChickenBones, shvoomg.com and others.

He was one of 17 international visitors who participated in a seminar on contemporary American Literature sponsored by the U.S.State Department from June to August 2006. His growing thoughts and reflections on this trip which took him to various US sights and sounds in Louisville,, San Francisco, Cincinnatti and Washington D.C. could be read at lisnews.org.

His other publications include: Folktales from Freetown, Langston Hughes: Life and Works Celebrating Black Dignity, and ‘The Struggle of the Book’

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The public needs to be educated (simple as that); in school they do not teach a view on literature as a whole, or its relation to any other part. Often the teachers consider this subject dull at best, not natural. There are literary masterworks out there, but most of them are not what we think they are. Hemingway, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, Joyce ( ‘Ulysses’ his masterpiece is nothing but a reckless Picasso), as was Gertrude Stein’s work, none have what I called masterwork interwoven in them, yes interesting, but far from admitted into the select category, much inferior to the Odyssey. Apologies for selecting these readers, I have most of their works, read all of them, and simple as they are, they are poor versions for a Nobel Price in Literature, or any prize in literature which is suppose to be top shelf stuff.

Neither Faulkner nor Hemingway went to college and one can tell that in their writings, full of redundancy. If that is what they are teaching in school then literature is bound to be pushed aside and locked up in an old chest, for something else. The near past has miscalculations, clumsiness in their hammered out selections of junk; Emersion, was right when he said Nathanial Hawthorn was unlearned, and unprofessional, and lazy in his writings, and that is when North America started selecting, second best to be best, and now we are down to fifth best is best. E.E. Cummings, with his vast verity of poetry, has a few I like, out of an uncountable number, and Ezra Pound, a great thinker of his day in literature, perhaps came close to what could have been…but never was.

So where am I going with this? In defiance of this dead-end for the contemporary scene it may be urged that authors in the future attempt a mixture, of everything, not just detail, so they are more expandable and compressible in the categories they choose to write, if they seek the Literature prize, and I do think prizes are a deterrent to good works, most great writers perhaps do not have prizes, simply because they do not have the connections.

Most people do not know the term comparative literature, even college students in literature. We can call these students low-brow readers, what he needs to do is read more books, but we are down to American taste are we not, like the hamburger, and pizza, and chicken concepts, roll them off the assemble lines, put them in a box, and bring them to a bookstore that only sells the run of the mill best sellers, the new born arrivals. Many bookstores are doing that now; I am not making this up.

It is hard for most people to write orderly paragraphs, it surely was for Faulkner, so don’t feel bad, and Sherwood Anderson who seldom had a theme, or connecting plot, but he was suited for his day. I wait for enlightenment, and never seem to find much of it in literature nowadays. The Epic of Gilgamish is great of course, and other such works.

Literature is not as complicated as folks make it out to be, too often undefined, and common sense not used, which is often not common in writing, simple procedures, a theme, plot, and insight, clearly marked; discoveries, define where you are going, make it organized, not fragmentary like Faulkner’s, or Joyce’s, or e.e. Cummings poetry. Does the sentence avoid confusion? No where you are going, state it; approach literature as if it were not a library (or categorical division); don’t divide it up like a scientist. One thing needs to be related to the other—associations. It appears we have accepted unsatisfactory liberties as in our freedoms, in our literature, make it sound like it is suppose to, it doesn’t matter if Charles likes it, and Bill doesn’t, be true to literature, to it right, misspelling is just laziness, that is my hang-up, I even have a computer nowadays, and I misspell more than I did when I had only typewriter, but that is again, laziness not wise to do, but acceptable in the long run, for it can be quickly fixed.

In oral or written literature, telling the tales of adolescents is probably as old as human history. The type of fiction called young adult fiction, on the other hand, is the joint creation of the American experience and the second half of the twentieth century.

From ancient Greek myths like Daphnis and Chloe or Persephone to later works of drama, men and women have become the protagonists of adventures in their teen years. When Shakespeare told the tale of Romeo and Juliet, he was talking of adolescent lovers. After that time, novels and stories like Oliver Twist, Great Expectations, Heidi, Little Women, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, The Secret Garden, Anne of Green Gables and Rebecca of the Sunnybrook Farm found fascinated readers for decades.

What we call young adult fiction, shortened to YA fiction, came into existence after the Second World War with the onset of the Rock’n Roll era. The stories of young adult fiction are written for teenagers and are told from the point of view of teenagers. The protagonists are adolescents and a good number of the plots involve teen problems and the way the teens face and overcome them. Since with each decade the teen problems have changed, the stories portraying those problems have also changed.

From the inception of the young adult fiction, sociologists praise its stories, because the teens find out how problems similar to theirs can be handled. These problems can be loneliness, weight or health issues, family and peer troubles, teen pregnancy, or depression.

In contrast to those who applaud young adult fiction, a very small group claim that reading too much young adult fiction has been alienating the teen readers from real literature. Yet, the study of literature challenges these critics, because good fiction cannot be classified. Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle, some Stephen King novels like Carrie, and Lord of the Flies by William Golding may fit inside the definition of young adult fiction, but time has proven them to be a lot more than popular fiction of the moment. These books are classics.

In addition, quite a few young adult fiction awards have caused young adult fiction to qualify as literature. Some of these are: Newberry Award, National Book Award for Young People’s Literature, Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Young Adult Fiction, William C. Morris YA Debut Award, Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Young Adult Novel, Michael L. Printz Award, Margaret A. Edwards Award, etc.

First young adult novels in the US came into being during the forties and fifties. Then, between the sixties and the nineties, young adult fiction flourished. Writers like Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume led the way in addressing teen dilemmas to become the icons of such literature.

Today, with the advent of e-books, religious fiction directed to teens, manga, graphic novels, and techno-thrillers, young adult fiction is branching out into subcategories and is becoming more deeply rooted in popular literature. Some of these stories, like that of J. K. Rowling’s and Gabriel Zevin’s, challenge the imaginations of teen readers by removing their plots and characters far away from reality into fantasy.

The history of young adult fiction may not be too old, but its future appears to be very bright. Since the best books are those that the readers can relate to, multitudes of teens have turned to reading voraciously, leaving unbeneficial pursuits aside. On the whole, this is no measly feat.

Joy Cagil is an author on http://www.Writing.Com/ which is a site for Writers Her portfolio can be found at http://www.Writing.Com/authors/joycag

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Olaudah Equiano was one of the most prominent Africans involved in the British debate for the abolition of the slave trade. His autobiography depicting the horrors of slavery helped influence British lawmakers to abolish the slave trade in 1807.

Equiano’s early life began about 1745 in the village of “Essaka” in an Igbo-speaking region of present-day Nigeria. where his father was a chief and an important elder who helped settle disputes.

He and his sister at the age of eleven, were kidnapped by fellow Africans and sold into slavery. After changing hands a few times he was shipped across the Atlantic to Barbados where he remained unpurchased because of his small size; for the work on a sugar plantation required much strength.

He was then sent to a plantation in Virginia where Equiano observed with horror the use of an “iron muzzle” around the mouth of fellow slaves to keep them quiet thus rendering them barely able to speak or eat. The objects inside the house so amazed and frightened him that he even thought the pictures hanging on the wall followed him wherever he went, and a clock hanging from the chimney would tell his master about anything he would do wrong.

At that plantation he was seen, liked and bought immediately by Michael Pascal, a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. As renaming, was a common practice among slave owners then, Pascal renamed him Gustavus Vassa one of his many new names he was given by his owners. (This is the Latinized form of the name of King Gustav I of Sweden, known for having liberated his country from Danish rule in the 16th Century.) Though Equiano at first detested the name, he later on used it in most of his writings and became known by it.

Being the slave of a naval captain, Equiano was afforded naval training and was able to travel extensively. He participated in the Seven Years War of England with France. He was at the siege of Fort Louisburg in Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. He also served Pascal as a seaman. He became Pascal’s personal servant but was also expected to contribute in times of battle. His duty was to haul gunpowder to the gun decks. Equiano was sent to Ms. Guerin and her sister, family friends of Pascal, to attend school and learn to read in England. At this time the other servants warned Equiano that if he wasn’t baptized he wouldn’t be able to go to Heaven. Eventually he was allowed to be baptized. This he did in St. Margaret’s church, Westminster, in February 1759. Whilst here in England his honesty and trustworthiness won him friendship and support from many English people, a base which he was going to find most useful later in his abolitionist as well as writing and speaking advocacy..

But after the war was won, Equiano didn’t receive his share of the prize money awarded to the other sailors, along with his freedom. Later, to his dismay, he was in 1763 sold on the island of Montserrat in the Caribbean Leeward Islands. Equiano’s literacy and seamanship skills as well as his knowledge of hairdressing, wine making and arithmetic made him less desirable to some. For it had made him too valuable for plantation labour. These made him less desirable to some slave traders. For he was too well educated and the fact that he knew how to navigate a ship scared many away from him..

He was eventually acquired by Robert King, a Quaker merchant from Philadelphia who carried on much of his business trading in ‘live cargos’ in the Caribbean. King however, unlike most slave owners then treated Equiano humanely. He set Equiano to work on his shipping routes and in his stores, promising him in 1765, that for forty pounds, the price King had paid for Equiano, he could buy his freedom. King taught him to read and write more fluently, educated him in the Christian faith, and allowed him to engage in his own profitable trading as well as on his master’s behalf, enabling Equiano to come by the forty pounds honestly. As a result Equiano soon succeeded in buying his freedom. Once having gained his freedom he pledged never to set foot again on American soil.

This was despite King’s then urging Equiano to stay on as a business partner. For Equiano found it dangerous and limiting to remain in the British American colonies as a freed black. For, while loading a ship in Georgia, he was almost kidnapped back into slavery. He was only released when the level of his education was made apparent. His intention to settle in London for the rest of his life was realised in 1769. He made his living there as a free servant, a hair dresser for affluent Londoners. But his skill as a seaman and his remarkable curiosity made him restless for new adventures. But before that he had learnt to play the French horn onto mastering it almost to the level of an accomplished musician.

Equiano remained at sea for several years more voyaging to the Arctic as a surgeon’s assistant and to the Mediterranean as a gentleman’s valet, and living for a time among the Makito Indians of Nicaragua. Equiano returned to England, where after Somerset’s Case of 1772 it was proclaimed that no person could be a slave again in England.

Equiano became deeply involved in the abolitionist movement which had been particularly strong amongst Quakers, but was by now non-denominational. Equiano himself was now broadly Methodist, having been influenced by George Whitefield’s evangelism in the New World.

Equiano proved to be a popular speaker and was introduced to many senior and influential people, who encouraged him to write and publish his life story. He was supported financially by philanthropic abolitionists and religious benefactors. His lectures and preparation for the book were promoted by, among others, Selina Hastings, Countess of Huntingdon. His account surprised many with the quality of its imagery and description,its literary style, as well as its narrative which was profoundly indictive of those who had not joined the abolition. Entitled The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African, it was first published in 1789 and rapidly went through several editions. It went through 36 editions between 1789 and 1857 and was translated into Dutch in 1790, into German in 1792 and into Russian in 1794. Nineteen editions were produced in the United States and Europe by the mid-nineteenth century. It is one of the earliest known examples of published writing by an African writer as well as the first influential slave autobiography, and first-hand account of slavery which caused a sensation when published in 1789, fuelling a growing anti-slavery movement in England.

It is widely regarded as the prototype of the slave narrative, a form of autobiography that in the nineteenth century gained a wide international readership due to its compelling firsthand testimony against slavery. It is indeed one of the first attempts made by an African writer to enter the literary world of western culture following the trail of the spiritual autobiographical tradition of St Augustine and John Bunyan but with a new dimension of social protest added. In its bulky two volumes, it tells a richly detailed story of personal remembrances of African societies, slave experiences, seagoing adventure, spiritual enlightenment, his life as a free man in the West with the facts and ideas derived from his wide reading of historical, geographical, religious as well as political works and economic success in England and the Americas. He is at his best when he is recreating the conflicting feelings of awe and fear that often seize him when he comes into contact with both the marvels and terrors of the Western world.. Equiano’s ability to espouse the highest ideals of his era in the language of the ordinary man and woman contributed immensely to the work’s impressive publication record. After its publication Equiano travelled extensively in England and Ireland promoting it.

Equiano’s narrative begins in the West African Igbo village Essaka formerly in northeast Nigeria, where he was adorned in the tradition of the “greatest warriors.” and where he was kidnapped into slavery in 1756. In vividly recalling his childhood, Equiiano is unique in his recollection of traditional African life before the advent of the European slave trade. He also vividly recalls the pestilence and horror of the Middle Passage: “I now wished for the last friend, Death, to relieve me.” As described in his book, the young Equiano was eventually shipped to a Virginia plantation where he witnessed slaves tortured with thumbscrews and the iron muzzle. Slavery, he explained,brutalizes everyone, slave as well as slaver.

A vital part of the work is given to how Equiano wins his freedom thus eventually becoming a new man reborn into a society where he can operate on a free plane of existence. This physical and spiritual liberation enables him to become complete as a person who can assume new and commanding roles in life like: taking charge of a vessel during a storm at sea, serving as a parson, overseeing slaves, and then graduating to the proudest role of abolitionist leader and autobiographer. He thus succeeds in projecting himself as a very intelligent, clever and complex man.

The autobiography goes on to describe how Equiano’s adventures brought him to London, where he married into English society and became a leading abolitionist.His exposé of the infamous slave-ship Zong - 133 slaves thrown overboard in mid-ocean for the insurance money - shook the nation. But it was Equiano’s book that would prove his most lasting contribution to the abolitionist movement, a book which vividly demonstrated the humanity of Africans as much as the inhumanity of slavery.

The book not only furthered the abolitionist cause while providing an exemplary work of English literature by a new, African author, but also made Equiano’s fortune. It gave him independence from his benefactors and enabled him to fully chart his own life and purpose, and develop his interest in working to improve economic, social and educational conditions in Africa, particularly in Sierra Leone.

Equiano’s life on the high seas, which included not only travels throughout the Americas, Turkey and the Mediterranean; but also participation in major naval battles during the French and Indian War (Seven Years’ War), as well as in the search for a northwest passage led by the Phipps expedition of 1772-1773 is vividly recorded. Equiano also records his central role, along with Granville Sharpe, in the British Abolitionist Movement. As a major voice in this movement, Equiano petitioned the Queen of England in 1788. He was as a result appointed to take part in the expedition to settle London’s poor Blacks in Sierra Leone, a British colony on the west coast of Africa. Sadly, he did not complete the journey back to his native land., because of intrigues against him after he had exposed corruption amongst some officials.

Olaudah Equiano settled in Britain and raised a family. For it was in Soham, Cambridgeshire, where, on the 7th of April 1792, he married Susannah Cullen, in St Andrew’s Church. The original marriage register containing the entry is today held by Cambridgeshire Archives and Local Studies at the County Record Office in Cambridge. His wedding is announced in every edition of his autobiography from 1792 onwards, and his marriage mirrored his anticipation of a commercial union between Africa and Great Britain. The couple settled in the area and had two daughters, Anna Maria , born October 16, 1793, and Joanna, born April 11, 1795.

Though Equiano was not the first African-born former slave to write about his experiences in bondage and freedom, he was the first to write the story of his life himself unaided by white ghost writers or editors. Because of the resulting independence of thought it didn’t strive to patronise the whites but to unrepentantly expose the atrocities of slavery whilst calling for its total and immediate abolition.

With Phillis Wheatley’s Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, the Life of Olaudah Equiano verified the much disputed claim during the Enlightenment, that blacks could represent themselves effectively and positively through writing. No black voice before Frederick Douglas spoke so movingly to us about man’s inhumanity to man as Equiano’s. His story stands in a class quite by itself.

Arthur Edgar E. Smith was born, grew up and was schooled in Freetown, Sierra Leone. He has taught English since 1977 at Prince of Wales School and, Milton Margai College of Education. He is now a Senior Lecturer at Fourah Bay College where he has been lecturing English, Literature, as well as Creative Writing for the past seven years.

Mr Smith is widely published with his writings appearing in local newspapers as well as in West Africa Magazine, Index on Censorship, Focus on Library and Information Work amongst others.

He was one of 17 international visitors who participated in a seminar on contemporary American Literature sponsored by the U.S.State Department in 2006. His growing thoughts and reflections on this trip which took him to various US sights and sounds could be read at http://lisnews.org

His other publications include: Folktales from Freetown, Langston Hughes: Life and Works Celebrating Black Dignity, and ‘The Struggle of the Book’

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Non-patent literature search is of great importance in the IP domain. Patentability search of any new invention is very crucial and can be achieved by both patent s and non-patent literature search. As far as, my knowledge the patents database is only domain set which is highly organized and easy to access either through free databases or commercial databases. But, the non-patent information such as journals, research publication and disclosures, thesis, etc. are scattered all over the web. There are few databases and vendors which have a good collection of this information and have tried to organize them in easy to access manner. But there are still big whit spaces for further improvements.

Thus for a patent professional, non-patent information search is not an easy task. They have to use various data sources such as PubMed, Science direct, SCIRUS, etc. Most of the well organized data sources are paid, thus not accessible to smaller firms.

As someone said that “Need is the origin of innovation”, people have developed various small tools to aid in there targeting relevant document form the scattered and huge information present on the web.

Some of the tools, which I came across are:

I have found HubMed as an ultimate tool to target relevant information. The various function such as clustering, similar words, export, etc. are very useful and might reduce at least some of the valuable time. There are many other similar tools and software which are freely available, along with some paid, which can be very useful for a patent professional in location relevant document and save their valuable time.

Vinod Kumar Singh
Content Writer - IP/Patent Intelligence
Email: vinod.patent@gmail.com
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Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Vinod_Singh

It is a honor for me to be the one who will prove that God really exists and we can see His actions daily by interpreting our dreams and the facts of our daily reality according to the scientific method of dream interpretation discovered by the psychiatrist and psychologist Carl Jung. I improved Carl Jung’s method; I am a writer who wrote a book full of dream symbols with very important meanings, after suffering a terrible accident and becoming an atheist.

The truth is that I discovered indubitable proof of God’s existence by interpreting my own literature according to the method of dream interpretation discovered by Jung. He interpreted the symbolic meaning in the literary works of several writers, indicating the influence of the unconscious in a few writers’ style.

I clearly understood that I was this type of writer, since I was a kid. I started writing poems when I was 7 and at the age of 8, my poems already revealed a very developed spirituality. I had a great talent that everyone observed by reading my works.

I couldn’t understand how I could write such wise poems and stories, and often, I understood the meaning of my words only after reading them several times. This phenomenon can be explained by the strong influence of the unconscious on my literature. The magic inspiration the unconscious sends me is what helps me write my poems and stories.

When I was 15, I suffered a terrible car accident in which my friend Marina, who was only 22, died instantly, and after her, I was the most seriously injured. I had trauma to my head and I lost my memory and coordination. I was in a coma for 3 days after which I could only recognize no one my mother, my father and my boyfriend. My other friends would come to the hospital and visit me, but I could not remember them. After a while, I started remembering a few of my best friends but I could not understand several things and I could not pay attention to what someone was telling me for too long.

Soon, my eyes would turn to another direction and I would stay paralyzed, isolated, without listening to what other people were telling me, lost in my own thoughts.

I remember many tragic incidents after this terrible accident and I only really regained my intelligence and personality a year after this terrible car accident.

I lost my faith and I started attacking the nuns at my Catholic school. I became very aggressive and I was sarcastic with everyone…

At that time, I started writing a book in which the central hero was a beggar. He was an old beggar who was frustrated with mankind. However, he wanted to bring peace and abundance to Earth, so that everyone would be able to live happily in our planet.

This book was like psychotherapy for me, as it helped me conserve my moral principles and overcome my atheism. It was a complicated book with strange and difficult words, but the dialogues were written in poetry and it had a beautiful rhythm. A few friends who read it felt it was too sad and too complicated for the Brazilian readers. It was never published because I finished writing it when I left Brazil and I would have to pay for publication. I simply kept the book in a drawer and forgot about it. I was living in Greece and had many other adventures. I stopped writing when I got married, my son was born and I had other interests in life.

I became very depressed, nervous and insecure because my young cousin who was only 18 died when I was in the sixth month of my pregnancy and three days after her, my beloved mother-in-law passed away as well. Their death in the same week, while I was pregnant, was pure hell for me … Everything was so tragic that I lost my happiness because I was waiting for my baby and I was constantly thinking: who can guarantee me that my baby is going to grow up and live?

In my despair, I started caring for my dreams and studying many books. When I followed Carl Jung’s method and I verified that he was correct, I abandoned all the other methods and followed him precisely, as a very good student. I’m the perfect student when I like the subject.

Some day, I remembered the book I wrote after the car accident and I started interpreting its symbolic meaning.

I discovered that it had three meanings: literary, psychological and universal.

The literary meaning showed to the world that only a beggar and a poor child could understand that we live in an invisible war and we have to give an end to poverty if we want to live peacefully and happily on Earth.

The psychological meaning revealed that I was a dictator. I would become schizophrenic and impose my absurd ideas to everyone, provoking many wars.

The universal meaning revealed to the word that humanity needs sensitivity, piety and goodness in order to be cured from the craziness it inherits in its psyche, because the human being is a violent monster and rationalism cannot solve the basic problems of existence.

This is why I accepted to obey to the wise unconscious, so that I would be cured from craziness before it is too late.

I wrote this book after the car accident over a span of 6 and a half years, while traveling to the USA and Greece. I was a complete atheist at this time. The significant revelations upon translating this book clearly prove that the unconscious is really wise and saintly and it is also a real doctor that cures the a priori crazy human being by using many methods.

I analyzed the most important symbols found in my literary work “The philanthropic beggar” in my ebook Craziness Prevention and in my free report Craziness and Logic.

“The philanthropic beggar” is a true revelation! This book is wholly symbolic and all heroes have a very important meaning. Due to the interpretation of two basic symbols in this literary work I could decipher the mystery existent in a very important dream that Jung mentioned but could not translate and many things more.

The information and psychotherapy I received in this book could have only been given to me by a genius. The translation of the symbolic meaning of this literary work clearly proves the existence of God, since only a superior brain could present the truth so clearly in this strange romance, even though it was given in a symbolic form. We can clearly see the existence of this symbolic meaning, behind the literary meaning, and that the meaning has a personal and a general character at the same time.

In “The philanthropic beggar” (written in Portuguese) I found all the answers I needed in order to completely understand how to translate the symbolic meaning of dream images and literary works. Further, I could also understand how serious my psychological disease was and how much I really needed the psychotherapy that the wise unconscious was providing me in my own dreams.

I also understood that I received a blessing, since I had the opportunity to be cured from the craziness inherent in my psyche before it would completely destroy my human conscience.

Prevent Depression and Craziness through the scientific method of Dream Interpretation discovered by Carl Jung and simplified by Christina Sponias, a writer who continued Jung’s research in the unknown region of the human psychic sphere. Learn more at: http://www.scientificdreaminterpretation.com and http://www.booksirecommend.com

Click here and download your copy of the Free ebook

Beating Depression and Craziness

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Christina_Sponias

William Blake first came to me in third year university English, and I was utterly amazed. It was 1969 and so much was happening that we talk about and here was this ancient philosopher who by his nature would be walking today against any war and the system as it was abusing the common man. That was Blake, and yet he spoke, created, crafted his expressions to humanity in ways that he is recognized as one of the greatest English creative minds ever. Tiger, tiger, burning bright…did He Who made the lamb make Thee?

The genius and simple mad great nature in William Blake was there in a study in fourth year tutorial about how Blake and his thoughts were carried forward from his lifetime (1757-1827) that saw him through the worst horrors of the Industrial Revolution when children were virtually chained to tables to produce mass goods, practices we now denounce through the third world, but have really been around since time immemorial.

But when Blake described the naked reality of a small boy stuck in a chimney and abandoned by his chimney sweep because he had had a growth spurt or eaten too much, greedy boy. In the time of the American revolution, while Colonists were fighting against taxation without representation, Blake was speaking of children chained to their wheels or abandoned in a sooty chimney until his cries died down, and the fires burned out his skeletal remains. His soot would filter out over the neighbors for some time, and then be forgotten, an abandoned orphan anyway.

So while mad William Blake stoke the fires of indignation, which set the way for another victim of the rough life of a father who was too much a borrower and so came to know the Poor House, Charles Dickens. And all those words of horror and indignation from the heart of Dickens pushed a change that had already begun, and a life of decency became a standard for all. It took mad William Blake, who said in his later years: the first thing is:

You work up your imagination, and allow it to become a vision, and then the thing is done.

The Wise Men from the East could not have said it better.

William Blake was a visionary in the west: far behind the Buddha in time, but close in his vision. One of the greatest creative minds, dismissed in his time as mostly mad, lived through times when young boys were abandoned in chimneys and their cries could be heard for days until someone, feeling the chill, lit a fire. Blake was driven mad by these rights of the divine and suffering of the many: while America rebelled against taxes on tea, Blake fought to right deeper human freedoms. And yet America admired his ideals and did not allow very many boys to die inside a chimney.Other matters, yes, and with the grace of God we improve our mortal souls.

rare religious books.

maps charts and globes.

American Antiques.

Derek Dashwood

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