Nana Grey-Johnson (1951- )

Nana Grey-Johnson was born in 1951 in Banjul. He obtained his BA in Communication and his MA in Journalism in 1979 from the University of Stanford in USA. He contributed in many newspapers and reviews before establishing his own Agency of Media and Communication and having a publication of his own. He is a member of many associations one of which is the Gambian branch of Defence and Protection of Children (Geneva, Suisse).
He has publishied his last book, History of The Gambian Press in 2006. A review will soon be published.

 

A Krio Engagement and other stories, is the first Gambian collection of short stories published in 1987 in Banjul by BPMRU, under the pen name Nana Humasi. It is a book of 103 pages with illustration for each novel. This collection is composed of nine novels of which seven have already been published in the magazine West Africa. The novels deal with different subjects most of which depicting some of our Gambian social believes and culture. The viltality and daily excitement of the daily life of residents of Bathust (Banjul) in their everyday life can be discovered in many of the stories. The first story, The Man Who Came To His Own Requiem, sets the story in December 1946. The freighter and passenger steamer, HMCS Lady Denham (named after the wife of Governor of the Gambia from 1928 to 1930, Sir E. Denham), will sink after colliding with another steamer, HMCS Vic 20 three miles above Nianimaru. There were no deaths but one of the passengers, Pa Alaba Roberts, was thought drowned when he was not found after three days and therefore his family offered the customary three day charity. It’s at this moment that Pa Alaba, who was not death, arrived in Bathust when the people were at the requiem. The reaction of those who saw him was of fear and dread instead of joy, because as they were convinced Pa Alaba was death, what they believed they were seeing was his ghost. How will he arrive at being accepted by these peaople and especially his family who share the same sentiments with the others? The last story, Week-end in July recalls the attempted coup d’état of July 1981 and the fear, destruction, senseless deaths and the economic disaster it brought along.

Nana Grey-Johnson equally wrote other plays and another collection of short stories. King Pass King, is a play in Krio published in 1988. The Hare and the Tortoise, is a musical drama accompanied by choreography. It has two versions: Wolof and English.

 Children of the Spyglass, a collection of three short stories (75pages) was published in Banjul in 1995. The first story, The Snake Man, has been produced by BBC in 1988; the third one, Children of the Spyglass won a prize in USA in 1994. The second story of the collection, Kumelo, ship’s Chandler written in 1993, was inspired by a story narrated by A. Auber.

The Magic Calabash, a novel of 161 pages was published in 1998 in Banjul. This novel narrates the misfortunes of Erubani, an office boy at the Land Registry, who is sacked because of the pressure of the World Bank on the government of the country. Unemployed, living with a young woman he has not yet married, accused of theft by his aunt, Erubani is just accumulating problems. Nevertheless, one comes to realize that he can find money with the help of an object…..a magic object. But he will face one disaster after the other like in a nightmare.

 

I of Ebony, is a novel of 292 pages and it was published in 1999 in Banjul. In 1834, Simanga is captured in his village to be taken as a slave with other men and women from different regions along the river Gambia. This situation was one of forced cohabitation of populations who were satisfied to coexist. On the island where the “prisoners” were herded, a cruel slave-merchant reigned. But Simanga will be able to rebel against him and escape from the island. He was forced somehow to take refuge in Bathurst as at that time the British forbade slavery in their colonies and housed refugees, because they did not have the means to prevent and forbid the slave trade. This book can be considered a response, from within, to the odyssey of slaves taken to the USA (Alex Haley’s book Roots portrays the story).