A Brief History of African Dreaming. Lecture by Wole Talabi

For decades, African speculative fiction has weaved together past and future, combining myths and legends with space exploration and social criticism and broadening the scope of both African and speculative literatures.

In this original lecture, invited by The House of Literature and recorded digitally, Nigerian author Wole Talabi presents a timeline of African speculative fiction from its early beginnings and until the present day. Here, he reflects on the influence and importance of the genre, citing its central works and defining its distinguishing features.

Wole Talabi is a Nigerian engineer and author of speculative fiction currently living in Perth, Australia. His published works include the short story collections Incomplete Solutions (2019) and Convergence Problems (2024), as well as the novel Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon (2023), which won the Nommo award for best novel in 2024. His short stories have been nominated for and won several awards, including the Sidewise, Nommo and Locus awards, as well as being awarded the Caine Prize for African Writing.

Talabi also compiled a database of published works of African speculative fiction, which he edited from 2015 to 2021. He is also the editor of several anthologies of African speculative fiction, including the landmark publication Africanfuturism. An Anthology (2020) and remains one of the field’s chief advocates and central thinkers.

Works mentioned:

Early Works (1930s – 1960s):

Jean-Louis Njemba Medou – Nnanga Kon (1932)

Muhammadu Bello Kagara – Gandoki (1934)

D.O. Fagunwa – Forest of a Thousand Daemons (1938)

Amos Tutuola – The Palm-Wine Drinkard (1952)

Post-Independence Flourish (1960s – early 2000s):

Sony Labou Tansi – Life and A Half (1979)

Buchi Emecheta – The Rape of Shavi (1983)

Kojo Laing – Woman of the Aeroplanes (1988)

Ben Okri – The Famished Road (1991)

Kojo Laing – Major Gentl and Achimota Wars (1992)

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o – The Wizard of the Crow (2004/2006)

The Internet Age and Genre Recognition (early 2000s – early 2010’s)

Nnedi Okorafor – Zahrah the Windseeker (2005)

Ahmed Khaled Towfik – Utopia (2008)

Lauren Beukes – Moxyland (2008)

Lauren Beukes – Zoo City (2010)

Nnedi Okorafor – Who Fears Death (2010)

Ivor Hartmann (ed.) – Afro SF (2012)

Increasing Global Recognition (2010s – present):

Deji Bryce Olukotun – Nigerians in Space (2014)

Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi – Kintu (2014)

Tade Thompson – Rosewater (2016)

Tochi Onyebuchi – Beasts Made of Night (2017)

Akwaeke Emezi – Freshwater (2018)

Namwali Serpell – The Old Drift (2019)

Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki – Ife-Iyoku, the Tale of Imadeyunuagbon (2020)

Other works mentioned:

Chinua Achebe – Things Fall Apart (1958)

Helen Oyeyemi – The Icarus Girl (2005)

Wole Talabi – Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon (2023)

Weird Tales, fantasy and horror magazine

Jungle Jim, bi-monthly African pulp fiction magazine

Omenana Speculative fiction magazine

Black Panther (dir. Ryan Coogler, 2018)

“Afro-mythology and African futurism”, essay by Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Nnedi Okorafor – “Spider the Artist”

Phoenix, publishing imprint at Ouida Books

Mother, publishing imprint by Jacana Media

Chikodili Emelumadu – Dazzling (2023)

Yvette Lisa Ndlovu – Drinking from Graveyard Wells (2023)

Pemi Aguda – Ghostroots (2024)

Tlotlo Tsamaase – Womb City (2024)

Suyi Davies Okungbowa – Warrior of The Wind (2023)

T. L. Huchu – The Library of The Dead (2021)

The Sauúti collective

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