Postcolonial Lagos : Voices from the Brink

The chapter examines some recent Nigerian narratives focusing on the representation of Lagos and proposing different views of a city that has rapidly become, in literature and the arts, an urban paradigm of vitality, development, resistance and social conflict. Blending historical reflections with a specific interest for the critical and analytic tools of literary and cultural studies this work starts on the assumption that the very concept of mimesis is to be revised when dealing with African literatures. This is all the more true for Nigeria, that in the process of becoming a nation-state, has found in imagination a very effective tool to devise a new project and to dig out the memories removed by the colonial process. Through the diversity of texts and authors, both mainstream (Wole Soyinka, Chris Abani, Teju Cole) and more tightly rooted in genre fiction (Nnedi Okorafor, Ayodele Olofintuade) the vision that is gradually shaped confirms what Chiamamanda Adichie states about Africa: no single story can be told about the heart-shaped continent.