Previously an award winning journalist, Aminatta Forna is now an acclaimed writer. In 2003 The Devil that Danced on the Water, a memoir about her father, was runner up for Britain’s most prestigious non-fiction award, the Samuel Johnson Prize 2003. In 2007 Aminatta was named by Vanity Fair as one of Africa’s most promising new writers and her work has been translated into nine languages. Her new novel The Memory of Love (Bloomsbury), a story about friendship, war and obsessive love, was published in April.
Aminatta talked to us about her childhood, literature and living between cultures.
What is your earliest childhood memory?
My dog choking to death on a bone and my father with his hand down the dog’s throat trying to save him. He was a doctor and he pt the dog down when all else failed.
What makes you happy?
I am happy unless something makes me unhappy.
When did you decide you wanted to be a writer?
I wanted to write stories for a living when I was at school. Adults around me were generally discouraging. I became a journalist. The imperative to write re-emerged with the realisation that journalism could not express those things I saw and wanted to describe.
What are you reading at the moment? What advice will give to a first time writer? What is your guiltiest pleasure?
I am reading Fatima Bhutto’s ‘Songs of Blood and Sword’ about the murder of her father and the Bhutto dynasty. It is full of rage, pity and courage, as well as being beautifully written. Advice to the first time writer – invest in yourself. Save up and buy time to write. Be prepared to be broke. Writing is like starting your own business. The first few years are all about investing until you begin to see returns. My guiltiest pleasure – watching Gladiator (again).
How do you relax?
Some people don’t think I do. I am most relaxed scuba diving or on horseback. Failing that, since I live in London most of the time – its a large glass of red wine and reading in the bath.
What is your favourite book?
Impossible to answer, but one great favourite is ‘White Fang’ by Jack London. I read it as an eight year old child living in 30 degree heat in West Africa. It transported me to the snowscapes of North America and the world of trappers and hunters. I read it over and over.
What is the most important thing life has taught you?
Growing up in two cultures I learned there is usually more than one way of doing something. I am constantly amazed by people who think there is only one way – and that’s their way.
Aminatta Forna was born in Glasgow and raised in Sierra Leone and the United Kingdom. Formally an award winning journalist for the BBC, she is now a full-time writer. Her most recent published works are Ancestor Stones, a novel set in West Africa, and The Devil that Danced on the Water, a memoir of her dissident father and her country.In addition she has also published essays and articles, and written for television and radio. Her latest work, The Memory of Love, is out now.
Who inspires you?
Petina Gappah is a Zimbabwean writer with law degrees from Cambridge, Graz University, and the University of Zimbabwe. Her short fiction and essays have been published in eight countries. She lives with her son Kush in Geneva, where she works as counsel in an international organisation that provides legal aid on international trade law to developing countries. Her story collection, An Elegy for Easterly is published by Faber in April 2009. She is currently completing The Book of Memory, her first novel. Both books will also be published in Finland, France, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway and Sweden.
