Up Station Mountain Club

(Book Review) K’cracy, Trees in the Storm by Bill F. Ndi

(Published by Langaa Research & Publishing CIG, 2008)

Reviewer: Peter Wuteh Vakunta, Ph.D [University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA]

K’cracy, Trees in the Storm, a compendium of one hundred and fourteen captivating poems, is an effusion of bitter-sweet emotions.  By titling his book of poems “K’cracy”, Bill Ndi makes a powerful political statement on the status quo in Africa. “K’cracy”, metonym for the reign of kleptocracy-cum-kakistocracy, is the poet’s harrowing hymn in denunciation of climes characterized by love-hate relationships. The poet summons his readers to a collective examination of conscience.

BOOK REVIEW: Not Yet Damascus by Emmanuel Fru Doh

Reviewer: Peter Wuteh Vakunta, Ph.D [University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA]

Emmanuel Fru Doh. Not Yet Damascus. Langaa Research & Publishing CIG, 2007.

Poetry  has the potential to be therapeutic and cathartic, allowing poets to wade  through existential meanders in their lives; to find answers to nagging questions of the moment; seek clarity in the midst of obscurantism; comfort and solace in troubled times; peace and tranquility in a world gone haywire. Versification provides a vehicle for the transportation of diverse attitudes, frames of mind, and fresh insights. Doh achieves these feats in Not Yet Damascus. He speaks in a confident tone of prophetic utterances: advising, denouncing, and chiding.

Pidgin: Cameroon's Lingua Franca or Continental Creole?

PETER W. VAKUNTA, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA

Pidgin English, also called broken English, is a lingua franca spoken in quite a few countries on the African continent, including Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Cameroon to name only a few. In Cameroon, Pidgin English, also called Cam-Tok or Majunga Tok is the chief medium of communication for the great majority of people. Cameroonian Pidgin English is an English language-based Creole. It is a blend of English, French and indigenous languages. This lingo has been in active use in Cameroon for over five hundred years. It started in the Slave Trade years, resisted a German ban during the German annexation (1884-1914) and survived post-independence neglect. Pidgin took flight when it became a makeshift language used in the plantations. Today, it has left the plantations for the homes and other domains of public life.

Book Review: Beware the Drives by Sammy Oke Akombi

 (Published by Langaa Research & Publishing CIG, 2008)

Reviewer: Peter Wuteh Vakunta, Ph.D [University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA]

Beware the Drives is a rich collection of poems intriguing in several aspects but the quality that captures the reader’s attention the most is the book’s depiction of Cameroon’s socio-political realities. The poet wields language deftly to represent human interests— the tribulations of a people taken hostage in their homeland. In his attempt to problematize the ramification of megalomania, power-mongering and moral degeneracy on developmental retrogression in Cameroon and Africa as a whole, Sammy Akombe has resource to sexual innuendos as seen in the following verses: “An entire nation is raped/ And left reeking in pain/ O, What cruelty.”(42)

Book Review: Letters to Marion (and the Coming Generations) by John N. Nkengasong

Reviewer: Peter Wuteh Vakunta, Ph.D [University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA]

(Published by Langaa Research & Publishing CIG, 2009)

Letters to Marion (and the coming Generations) is a lethal vendetta launched against a cancerous society at risk of disintegration. In fifty-six odd poems, John Nkemngong Nkengasong transforms his pen into a mighty sword. His verses trumpet the war songs of a crusader. His pen takes on the veneer of a bazooka that detonates to do damage to emasculators of social justice. In “the Mungo”, he writes: “there is greed /in that madrush of howling waves/ that auctioned me from cradle… (2) In his desire to lend credence to a just cause, the poet drums support from custodians of traditional authority: “our quifons/for they stood resolute/and wore black caps and/red feathers… (2)

Book Review: The Travail of Dieudonné

Title: The Travail of Dieudonné, Author:Francis B. Nyamnjoh, Publisher:African Educational Publishers Ltd, 2008, Reviewer:Peter Wuteh Vakunta, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA.