Afrifem in Action: Edwige Renée Dro and 1949Books, the feminist library in Yopougon, Côte d’Ivoire

In 1949, more than 2000 women staged a march in Côte d’Ivoire, walking from Abidjan to Grand-Bassam in protest against French colonial rulers, and to demand the freedom of their compatriots. However, when the story of this remarkable movement is told, the role of these women is often reduced to that of wife and mother to male political leaders.

In this edition of our AfriFem in Action series, we chat with Edwige Renée Dro, African feminist writer and founder of 1949 books, the library of women's writings from Africa and the Black world. We learn about the story behind the 1949 March, how it inspired the creation and name of the library, and what it means to run this space in the heart of Yopougon in Abidjan.

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Edwige, it’s an honour to feature you for our #AfriFemInAction series, especially as someone who has been a part of our team. How do you introduce yourself?

Thank YOU! This is one of my best interviews. I am Edwige Renée Dro. I’m from Côte d’Ivoire and I now live in Abidjan. It’s one of those things I never thought I would do; I thought I would live maybe in Yamoussoukro – I’m not a great fan of big cities but here we are. I’m a writer and a literary translator. I am also a literary activist.

And that’s exactly what we will be talking about. But first, what does being an African feminist signify for you?

It is evidence that feminism is not some strange thing that fell on “evolved” African women, whatever people mean by “evolved”. It is even laughable when people decide to throw stones at you by saying that if you are a feminist as an African woman, you are westernized. I’m not mincing my words because saying that an African woman who knows she is worth being treated as a human being is westernized makes me weep and makes me angry. How can you completely decide to erase the stories and the contributions of women like Abra Pokou, Akwa Boni, Aline Sitoé Diatta, Tata Adjatché, Marie Angélique Savané, Andrée Blouin, and I could go on. These are women who didn’t see or let anyone see them as inadequate because they are women. And in their freedom, they inspired other women (and men), fought for the dignity of their people, people everywhere.

And as an African feminist, especially with the mentalities we see today, because many people do not educate themselves, it is important for me to use my privileges to say that I’m not doing anything extraordinary. I’m actually chilling. I read about Andrée Blouin, a feminist, and Patrice Lumumba’s Chief of Staff, and I’m blown away. Blown away! But some of our people imagine that these were the meek women that they want us to be today. Oh no! They were the original grandes gueules. We are our ancestresses!

I love the passion, and the very clear resistance against a single narrative of who African women and African feminists are. How would you describe your journey as a writer in relation to your identity as an African feminist?

Listen, your politics transpires in whatever you do. The more I evolve in my journey as a feminist, the more I want to be free in what I write about, in the projects I choose. Also, I started writing professionally in 2012; I identified as a feminist in 2016. But I started questioning things and people around me at the age of 5. That’s my earliest memory of when I questioned something. And that’s how I describe my relation between being a writer and being a feminist. They are both my identities. I can do nothing but write; I cannot be anything but a feminist because I refuse to be limited by the fact that I was born a woman. I mean, being a woman is the most beautiful thing ever.

You are also very passionate about translation, and you have talked about it being political. Can you tell us more about this?

Everything is political in my world. I’m very much a political and politicized woman. And I have chosen to identify as a literary translator – notice that I always precede “translator” with “literary”. I believe in the power of stories, and people have the right to tell their stories in whatever language they choose. As translators, we have the duty to render that and respect everything that went into it: cultural context, register of language, etc.

So, if someone writes “Ivorians do”, I will translate it as “les populations ivoiriennes font”, so that when we come to the pronoun, I will use “elles”. I don’t even want to use the “iels” (a contraction of ils and elles, for they in English) or “ivoirien.ne.s” (to designate Ivorian men and women) or God forfend, “travailleur.euse.s” (for workers, both men and women workers) because if you notice in those examples I have given, the masculine pronoun still leads. So, right now, my work is that the masculine pronoun doesn’t lead too much. Now in the work of fiction, it is a bit difficult, but then again, there lies the challenge: to choose work by writers with a political and feminist consciousness. This doesn’t mean that the writers whose projects I choose to work with are always feminist; sometimes, that is not the case. And that’s very fine. But it’s important that the work has consciousness.

What does that work of political translation mean for African feminist movement-building?

We need more and more translation; translators that are aware that we are not just replacing words with their equivalent meanings. Translators who want to push for translations of lesser-translated texts. Translators who want to bridge the gap. There is such a linguistic imbalance in feminist materials out there, so much imbalance, that we might be tempted to think that African feminism is English-speaking. One thing I loved with Eyala, and still do, is the way translation is done. When you are introducing Lorato Modongo, you don’t try to explain to us in the French-speaking world that Lorato Modongo is a powerhouse in Botswana. Eyala respects our intelligence, and this compassion in activism was very inspiring to me when I was in the reflection stage of 1949. Yes, standards will be high. Yes, it will be an intellectual place, but we will come with a desire to learn from others who have other qualities. We’ll be compassionate. I learn from people who get stuck in, for instance. It is not a very strong trait of mine. I live in my mind. I think a lot, I process things better through writing, etc.

You mentioned 1949, and I want us to get into that. It’s your baby, the African Feminist Library. What does the name signify?

I love that you say THE African Feminist Library. I call it THE library or LA bibliothèque and I like that. It is not an undefined library (laughs). 1949 is the year women politicians of the PDCI (parti démocratique de Côte d’Ivoire) and the wider RDA (Rassemblement démocratique africain) marched against the French colonial administration in Côte d’Ivoire. Now, this march was not an organized march that we might think about when we think “march”. To evade arrest, they went in groups of two or three women at a time, and they pretended that they were going to the farm or to visit a friend or a family member. And it is how some 2,000 women arrived in Grand Bassam.

What was the inspiration for the creation of the library, beyond the story that lends its name?

The library was set up on 5th March 2020, so we are four years old now, and therefore still at pre-school. The inspiration is the name, and I chose that name because either that story of the women’s march is all but forgotten or when people remember it, they say that more than 2,000 women marched to liberate their husbands (7 men) from prison, thereby negating the stories and the sacrifices of these women.

And going back to that first question about being an African feminist, you see why it is super important to bang on again and again about the contributions of women.

The inspiration for the creation of the library was also about NOT rounding the angles. One of our inspirations at the library is Stephanie St Clair. We don’t hide the fact that she was a gangster in Harlem in the 20s. So, in the same way we mention that she played an active role in the civil rights movement, writing and giving money to the movement, we also mention that she was a gangster. The two are not exclusive. Or we speak about the Nana Benz. I spoke earlier about inspiration. Some may say that their work as Nana Benz benefitted only their children and not the many other women in Togo, Benin, or Ghana. But what’s wrong with inspiring one’s child? And are we sure it is ONLY their children they inspired?

We who look on the actions of women who came before us, women who are more visible today… we must cultivate compassion. I tell you, when you are not in the thick of the action, there is so much you would do better.

And I think there is value in us looking back at what those things are and doing that ‘better’ in our time. What are some of the activities that you engage in at the library? I imagine it’s not just a space for reading, like most other libraries.

We are always doing something or the other at this library. I tell you, it’s the pre-school age!

We host feminist conversations every other month– we call them Le bissap féministe. We drink bissap (hibiscus juice), we choose a theme, and we talk about it. We also invite experts: lawyers, doctors and more. If we are holding a conversation around the mortality rate among women, we will invite a doctor, a gynaecologist so that when a woman leaves that conversation, she knows where to go, and she knows what shouldn’t happen to her. The library is in an area where the socio-economic background is lower, and we take that into account in our programming.

We also have conversations with young girls every fortnight – young men are allowed to join, but if they are not coming, we are not going to drag anybody from the street. We actually don’t do that, dragging either men or women off the street; we just want to be soooooo good that we give people no choice but to come to us. I mean, solely women’s writings, from Africa and the black world, organising things with names like Le bissap féministe! In Yopougon! Hahaha! So yes, we have conversations with young girls, and we read together. We play, by inviting a voice coach. If we want women, young girls to speak up, well, they need to be taught HOW to speak up. And if you speak in your throat and your voice is monotone, nobody is going to listen to you.

We also do storytelling with children aged 5 to 8 years (pushing to 10 years old because no one wants to leave); we only read stories written by African and Black women. It is hard work. We need more stories for children that are not seeking to wrap things up with a nice morale at the end.

I like that you have something for people from different generations. What key plans do you have for this year?

Pre-schoolers never have a program. Hahaha! Their teachers do but they themselves don’t. For World Book Day, we decided to showcase the five Ivorian women to read. We now have a bookstore. We are doing creative writing masterclasses. We must document, and to do that, we must learn to document. We must learn how to tell a story. Sometimes you meet people who want to tell you the story of their suffering, but what makes the story of your suffering interesting? Suffering is suffering, to various degrees, but how do we say it? We’ve hosted two residencies so far, one a writing residency for women writers in Côte d’Ivoire at the beginning of their career, and one a research residency open to Black women from anywhere in the world. We’ve had one play: a group of women griots. We’re used to seeing men griots but here we had women.

In a nutshell, we don’t have programs; we do things as we’re inspired, and thankfully, they are all sticking so far. Some of them, like the podcast, we’ve had to put on hiatus, because funds, because time, because human resources. Research takes a lot of time!

I can’t wait to listen to the podcast when it launches, and we will be happy to share it with the Eyala community. How has the library been received in your community and beyond?

Listen, no one had any idea what we were doing, and I didn’t do anything to help myself by choosing the books I did or holding the kind of conversations I do. I’m a fun person but I tend to say things as I see it. I do it with a lot of compassion and care, but I say what is what.

The library has a restaurant, and one day, we had a man who came to eat, and he was amazed that we had all these books. Then he said: “I hope it is a panafrican library hein! You Africans these days.” I replied that it is panafrican. He looked around, and I suppose because he didn’t see Cheick Anta Diop, asked what makes it panafrican. I answered that a library that has works by Mariama Ba, Marie-Vieux Chauvet, Ken Bugul, Maryse Condé, etc. is as panafrican as panafricanism goes. He conceded grudgingly but said that I knew what he meant. I replied that I didn’t. I knew exactly what he meant, but what’s the fun in life if you’re going to shake the cobwebs in people’s minds?

Another parent decided not to allow his daughter to visit the library when he saw that on the back of our T-shirts, we’d written: the library of women’s writings from Africa and the Black world. I just asked him what was wrong with highlighting the contributions of African and Black women.

It’s interesting how much people can lose out on by holding on to their limited views and perspectives.

At our first bissap féministe, there were five people: me, the two guest speakers and two other people. Haha. At the first storytelling session, there were two kids and one of them was mine. Today, we do bissap féministe where 30 people attend, ages varying between 20 and 65 with most of them living in Yopougon. We have people who are not involved in feminist conversations. We have storytelling activities on Wednesdays and Saturdays with 20 kids attending each time.

During our first year, nobody knew there was even a library in the neighbourhood; today if you are lost, they will show you where it is. Beyond the community, we have had people telling us that the library was too far, and I have always wondered: far from what? Who? Where? Now, people come.

And what would you say is the impact you’re seeing from this space. Does it align with the vision you had when you created the library?

I see that we are focusing on the literary productions that put women at the centre of conversations. That parent who didn’t want his daughter to come to the library has now allowed her and even pays her subscription fee. That’s the vision. And it aligns.

I love that now, teenage girls come in and spend the time reading, whether we have an activity or not. I love that we open the doors 6 days a week from 10am to 9pm, and sometimes, nobody comes in! This, I always tell people. That’s why I love telling the stories of starting events where 2 people come, where nobody wants to come but keeping at it, pursuing the vision and the objectives you set out for yourself. My ambition with the library is not to run around like a headless chicken.

What three tips would you give to someone who is looking to set up a similar library somewhere in Africa?

Decide why you want to set up a library that focuses on women’s contributions.
Know that you will not and cannot do everything, and that this is very fine.
Know that there are some conversations that you will not be able to hold now; write them in your notebook and either find a way to have them in a creative manner or later.

Let’s talk more about your personal connection with this library. How has running the library impacted your work as a writer, an African woman and as a feminist?

Oh, as a feminist African woman, I know the value of sleep. Siestas especially. I love nothing more than stopping everything at either 1pm or 2pm and just going for siestas – and my siestas are long! Basically, I sleep. So, I might wake up at 3:30, light some incense, drink tea, then start work again. I realised, the more I read, that the women who came before me, the women I admire today, they made time for themselves. And everyone has a way of making time. For me, it is siestas, it is choosing to not see people. It is choosing to read. Or going for a swim. It is definitely not a massage, for instance.

You don’t make the kind of music they did/do, wrote/write the things they did, paint(ed) without taking time for yourself. That’s why for the residencies here, we do not insist on creating. It is okay to go away to sleep, to read, to eat, to go for short walks, to drink great wine, to sleep some more, to be with yourself. In fact, one of our mottos at the library is: I have so much to do that I’m going to read.

We have so much to do. Our continent has so much to do. Let’s rest and read instead of running around with an obligation to produce.

As a writer, I want to learn how to write plays and show them. In the case of Côte d’Ivoire, some 51% of people cannot read or write French (and perhaps the 70 other languages of Côte d’Ivoire). But also, we have an oral culture and personally, I’m interested in the orality of literature. But I make time to write. I close my office door every Monday and Tuesday to write. I read every morning.

What is your biggest dream for the library?

The dream is too big that I cannot mention it.

Cheers to big dreams and hoping that we witness it all come to life. What writing can we expect from Edwige the writer soon?

I’m busy editing a novel – mine – and writing a collection of essays.

How can the Eyala community support you and the library?

We always need great books. We need volunteers. And funding! Which means fiscal sponsoring. It’s a long story but I’m prepared to talk about it if anyone is interested.

Let’s finish with our favourite final question: what is your feminist life motto?

Question always. Be free. Be compassionate.

Thank you so much Edwige. We look forward to joining you for a bissap féministe someday soon.

Voice