Sunday Independent Feature on Karen King-Aribisala and The Hangman’s Game

October 23rd, 2009 by Tracey

King hung by her own subject
By Maureen Isaacson
Karen King-Aribisala is an exceptional talent. She won the Commonwealth Prize (African Region) for the Best First Book in 1990 for Our Wife and Other Stories, and the 2008 Commonwealth Prize (Africa region) for the Best Book for The Hangman’s Game.
I had interviewed her several years ago, about Clicking Tongues, which she modelled on Chaucer’s Canterbury’s Tales. As well as writing brilliant, offbeat, poetic prose, King is a performer, and declaims her work with stunning effect.
In an interview in Johannesburg last year we spoke about The Hangman’s Game (Peepal Press), an affecting novel, which observes parallels in the slavery imposed by General Sani Abacha’s military regime in the 1980s and the conditions that led to the Demarara slave revolt in 1823.
“In the book, Nigerians are as enslaved as are the blacks in Demarara. There is a connection between the hanging of the narrator’s friend (a Ken Saro-Wiwa-like figure) by Sani Abacha and the hanging of the missionary, John Smith, who went to Demarara.
“Also, Jesus was hung on the cross.” said King.