A reading culture in a nation is important as it gives the citizens vast knowledge. Kenya has a relatively good reading culture. Its literature reflects our history from the pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial era and brings forth contemporary issues.
The country also has many widely celebrated authors. However, most youth may not know them since they began their art last century, in our parents’ and grandparents’ heyday.
New authors are coming up who should be supported. Other than reading curriculum-based setbooks and textbooks, young people should also embrace leisure reading of Kenyan literature. Only a handful of Kenyan youth have interacted with their work outside the classroom.
When I was in high school, those of us who read novels during free time only had a book by a foreign author. This was partly because there weren’t as many Kenyan books, except for previous and current set texts mostly, but we also didn’t show much enthusiasm for local material.
Some of us would consider the experiences in Kenyan books boring but these are raw expressions on a page from one of our own; experiences that have shaped us. Our authentic stories are told from our mouths.
Encouraging everyone to read Kenyan literature builds a nation of intellectuals who carry our culture and have adequate knowledge for running a nation. It also supports local authors.
The readers connect well with the authors because the authors are Kenyans hence they write about shared Kenyan experiences which the readers can relate to.
Being a good author surpasses being popular and has everything to do with the talent exhibited on the pages. There are authors who aren’t known but they are hidden gems; I call upon the youth to hunt for them.
The government should also take charge and supply more books from Kenyan authors to school libraries to be read besides the setbooks.
Ms Wanjiru is a communications and media technology student at Maseno University. [email protected]
