Togo

Shadow of Things to Come by Kossi Efoui relates the experience of a young man in an unnamed African state, who has grappled and continues to grapple with its instability. It was originally published in French in 2011, translated by Chris Turner and published in English in 2013 by Seagull Books. My edition was printed in 2021.

This book is arguably French, as Kossi Efoui has lived there as a political exile for many years. I hoped that I would be able to find a larger breadth of material written by novelists who live in their countries of origin, a more global experience less characterised by people's movement, more static and I suppose more mundane but I am having to compromise. Writers, I'm finding, often work at universities in academic roles and they frequently work internationally.

So, I set aside my misgivings and read Shadow of Things to Come, unable to locate other work from Togo that is published in the English language and it was a solid book. Quite masculine in the sense that it centred on a young, male protagonist, the novel didn't dwell on emotion but read like a traditional tale, weaving a history of boy and nation and I enjoyed that. It left me with an earnest hope for the protagonist's future.