“We need an aggressive overhaul of literary texts in our institutions” – Umar Yogiza Jr.

 

 “WE NEED AN AGGRESSIVE OVERHAUL OF LITERARY TEXTS IN OUR INSTITUTIONS” – UMAR YOGIZA JR.

Umar Yogiza Jr. is an award-winning poet and the immediate past Public Relations Officer (North) of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA). He is the guest author for the last quarter edition of the ANA Book Party. In this conversation with the ANA Interview Series, he speaks about his work, his journey, and the future of Nigerian literature.

AIS: YOU’VE BEEN CELEBRATED GLOBALLY — INCLUDING WINNING THE 2017 ATLANTA GEORGIA BLACK STREET POETRY PRIZE. HOW HAS INTERNATIONAL RECOGNITION INFLUENCED YOUR CREATIVE JOURNEY?

UMAR: It’s a paradox. Personally, international prizes don’t change my creative purpose. Yet within Nigeria’s literary space, there is a kind of pandemic — a belief that a writer must first be validated abroad before being taken seriously at home. This sickness imprisons young, vibrant writers and erodes their confidence.

Before the award, I was invisible: no national television, no newspaper features, not even invitations in my own state. Recognition abroad ended that isolation but introduced what I call the loneliness of recognition — feeling alone in a community you revere. So, yes, it has an effect. It stamps your presence in an environment where talent is constantly doubted.

It also forces difficult questions. A friend once told me, “Yogiza, don’t let this prize change you.” That made me ask myself: What am I writing for? Who will my writing serve when I’m gone? That moment triggered a deep reflection on my craft and my direction.

AIS: YOU WERE ALSO NOMINATED FOR THE PUSHCART PRIZE. WHAT DID THAT NOMINATION MEAN TO YOU?

UMAR: I’ve had several Pushcart nominations — so many I stopped counting. It’s a broad award with thousands of entries. Early in my career, each nomination felt like vital affirmation. I poured immense energy into my submissions, and my poems carry that energy — in the metaphors, the imagery, the pulse of the language.

But now, the energy I once reserved for prizes has transformed. I write for the art itself, for my own conscience. External validation has faded, making space for a more essential, internal drive.

AIS: AS BOTH A POET AND A PUBLISHER, HOW DO THESE TWO WORLDS INTERSECT IN YOUR DAILY LIFE?

UMAR: They are in constant dialogue — and sometimes in tension. One must often be set aside to honor the other. Each role has its own dilemma.

Writers are naturally poor; this is true almost everywhere. Only a rare few are born into wealth or find it through writing. As a publisher, you negotiate with writers funding their own dreams, only for printing costs to skyrocket before press. The hazards — financial, reputational, and logistical — are enormous. One small error can ruin everything. People don’t publish for money; they publish for love of the work, but the risks remain.

I now see writing and publishing as complementary services to humanity. One creates the vision; the other builds the vessel to carry it. I read manuscripts through both the writer’s heart and the publisher’s hand.

AIS: WHAT FIRST INSPIRED YOU TO WRITE, AND WHEN DID YOU REALIZE POETRY WOULD DEFINE YOU?

UMAR: My love for poetry began in secondary school. Even when I studied Building Technology, the love never faded. I write prose, but poetry holds the upper hand — it is the genre of ultimate freedom, able to stretch meaning and interrogate a single word until it yields new truth.

There’s a saying that failed poets become novelists — Faulkner said it. In my mind, I was always trying to articulate the unseen, to pay attention to the uncared-for. Poetry taught me to look at words like living things, to care for them, to give them space.

We all have one life, yet our energy to create persists. In poetry, I build — I craft a roof without knowing whose roofless house it will cover. A single, well-crafted poem can flash a light into darkness, teaching what entire education systems fail to teach: how to see each other humanely. The future isn’t only in our hands; it’s in our mouths, if we use our words properly.

AIS: WHAT THEMES DO YOU FIND YOURSELF RETURNING TO MOST OFTEN?

UMAR: I’m drawn to our relationship with the earth and with each other. I write mindless of race or faith, articulating a world I wish existed for everyone. We have advanced gadgets, yet remain primitive in how we treat one another, often using the language reserved for animals to describe human beings.

Beneath all glamour and comfort is a truth: everything ends. Anger, love, pettiness, care — all of it falls away before death. It is the poet’s duty, like death itself, to remind us to care, and to remember that nothing lasts forever.

AIS: HOW DID SERVING AS ANA’S PUBLICITY SECRETARY SHAPE YOUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE LITERARY COMMUNITY?

UMAR: It was a profound lesson — sometimes through warning, sometimes through betrayal and trust. Serving in ANA is a selfless duty; there is no money, only responsibility. Every official understands writers’ problems and has ideas to solve them, but managing expectations without resources can cripple even the strongest ego.

My tenure coincided with ANA facing intense internal issues — court cases, lawsuits, and serious divisions. I was taken to the CID headquarters twice, sued twice, and arrested by over twenty policemen, treated like a criminal simply for being Publicity Secretary. Now, when I see the Secretariat, I laugh in gratitude. Our struggle was not in vain. It was a baptism by fire that revealed both the fragility and resilience of our community.

AIS: LOOKING BACK, WHAT ACCOMPLISHMENT ARE YOU MOST PROUD OF?

UMAR: ANA’s physical stability. When we were elected, ANA operated from a two-room brick office. We inherited the Chinua Achebe Conference Centre at 60% completion and the ANA Apartments Hotel at 50%. In two years, as the project engineer and consultant, I supervised their completion — brickwork, plastering, windows, tiling, painting, landscaping, and the ANA library.

Today, seeing writers claim that well-furnished space in Abuja fills me with joy. We built a home.

AIS: AS A PUBLISHER, WHAT CHALLENGES DO YOUNG NIGERIAN WRITERS FACE TODAY?

UMAR: The major crises are the rising cost of printing and the weak reading culture for soft publications. Sponsored publications are rare, and there are no regular mechanisms for royalty collection. Many writers are pushed into self-publishing or pay-to-publish models, often at the expense of quality.

It’s easier for a social-media skit maker to find fame than a poet. And there’s the new frontier of AI, which can pirate and replicate works without consent. The core challenge remains: how do we connect genuine books with genuine readers?

The industry must innovate distribution, support fair digital models, and fiercely protect intellectual property.

AIS: WHICH WRITERS HAVE MOST INFLUENCED YOUR CRAFT?

UMAR: Many poets have radicalized my approach through their conciseness and eloquence. A few pillars include Amu Nnadi, Idris Okpanachi, Ezenwa-Ohaeto, Harry Garuba, Niyi Osundare, Remi Raji, Tanure Ojaide, Odia Ofeimun, Denja Abdullahi, and Suedi Vershima. Their work acts like an axe — shattering and interrogating the intricate soul of my thoughts.

AIS: DO YOU CONSIDER YOUR WRITING A FORM OF ACTIVISM?

UMAR: All true writing is activism. Any art devoid of this impulse has no right to quicken, regardless of its author. To write without prejudice — to drop the filters of faith and race — requires boldness. It begins when the importance of the piece outgrows your personal fear.

Before writing, I step into a version of myself that terrifies my own weaknesses. Desire burns, thought clarifies, and the need to write truth surpasses fear. In that space, I build a village with words — a shelter strong enough for storms, where a reader can live, break, rebuild, and feel liberated.

AIS: HOW DO YOU BALANCE THE ROLES OF WRITER, EDITOR, PUBLISHER, AND ADVOCATE?

UMAR: They are not separate roles but facets of one calling: the betterment of the world through story. A reader creates space for a story; a writer fills it. A piece of work is a continuous dialogue between poet, editor, publisher, and advocate. They all serve the same purpose — sustaining the vital conversation between art and society.

AIS: WHAT HAS BEEN THE MOST SURPRISING FEEDBACK YOU’VE RECEIVED ABOUT YOUR WORK?

UMAR: I’m always moved when my work speaks to people in my absence. In one day, someone may say, “Your book saved my life,” and another, “Your book made me want to write again.” Poetry works quietly.

Meanwhile, the poet with the next inimitable book might be working as a security guard, unable to afford monthly data. Every feedback reminds me that the stories that needed to be written were received.

AIS: WHERE DO YOU SEE NIGERIAN POETRY IN THE NEXT DECADE?

UMAR: The art is alive and vibrant. The challenge is finding where our individual energies fit. Poets must know poetry will likely not make you rich; at best, it may make you briefly famous. The struggle continues.

We need an aggressive overhaul of literary texts in our institutions. Our curriculum must accommodate both classics and contemporary local works. Without systemic encouragement, our literature will stagnate. If Achebe and Soyinka had not been read and studied, they would not be where they are. Our poetry’s future depends on building an ecosystem of study, analysis, and review at home.

AIS: WHAT ROLE WILL DIGITAL PUBLISHING AND TECHNOLOGY PLAY IN THE FUTURE OF AFRICAN LITERATURE?

UMAR: Technology is a double-edged sword. Some AI tools are killing genuine creativity, making the profound mental labor of writing feel ordinary and turning everyone into a “writer.” Technology did not come to make us independent; it came to make us dependent. A pilot is illiterate without a plane; an engineer is indolent without tools.

We must adapt, using these tools to amplify our voices without letting them dilute our human spark. The future belongs to those who master the tool without being mastered by it.

AIS: DESCRIBE YOUR FORTHCOMING PROJECT IN ONE SENTENCE.

UMAR: Smothered (A Dress of Barbed Wire) is a historical, heartfelt interrogation of displacement, silent genocide, and the hypocritical denial that seals the pain of my people.

AIS: WHAT ADVICE DO YOU WISH YOU HAD RECEIVED AT THE START OF YOUR CAREER?

UMAR: Read. Read. Read. Read. Reading is the fuel for your writing journey — even beyond literature. It is the one teacher no one else can give you.

Don’t blindly follow established writers or teachers; they are human. Be the writer you want to be. Don’t write every day — writing is not food. Let ideas mature. Don’t rush publication or prizes. Let rejection motivate you. Claim your identity: if you are a writer, let the world know.

And forget writer’s block — do not excuse yourself from the work.

AIS: HOW DO YOU STAY INSPIRED WHEN CREATIVITY FEELS FAR AWAY?

UMAR: The word “poet” comes from the Greek “creator.” I lean into that meaning. I read, imagine, and interrogate my thoughts against truth, without prejudice. I am learning to see failure not as doom but as another beginning. Dry periods are part of the soil from which new creation grows.

AIS: WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE FEATURED AT THE ANA BOOK PARTY, AND HOW DO EVENTS LIKE THIS STRENGTHEN THE LITERARY ECOSYSTEM?

UMAR: It is vital. ANA has the largest library in Africa — a treasure of books, journals, and manuscripts you won’t find elsewhere. We must use it. Events like this bring writers, readers, and researchers into one living dialogue, where books can “listen” to their writers and readers. I call on everyone, especially in Abuja, to claim this resource. It is how we build a lasting literary culture.

AIS: FINALLY, WHAT SHOULD THE AUDIENCE EXPECT FROM YOU AT THIS YEAR’S ANA BOOK PARTY?

UMAR: Expect poems that investigate, break, search, redefine, and rediscover. I articulate the world radically, mindless of set rules. Come — let’s read poetry. Let’s feel the language alive in the room.