Angola’s vibrant literary culture stems from a strong tradition of oral
story telling
that has made the country’s tales accessible to the most remote communities.
The
tradition comes from people who worked in the fields and who at the end of
the day
would sit around the fire or a table to hear stories, proverbs and riddles.
Some of the greatest works that were produced both pre-independence and
postindependence
were and are based on day-to-day events that always provide writers
with plenty of material to explore.
The Birth of Angolan Literature
Angolan literature began during the colonial times, when our literature
emerged and
developed as an extension of the Portuguese. Until the mid twentieth century
there
are no clear demarcations of a so called Angolan literature.
The first native medium totally dedicated to literature, the Almanach -
Essays in Literature
was published in 1901. The almanach was printed in Luanda at the People’s
Typography. The 1st edition featured the volume Angolan Voices Clamouring on
the
Desert — From the Natives to Friends of the Truth, a collaboration work of
several
native and African journalists who influenced Luanda’s press in the
nineteenth
century. This was the first collective protest manifest of the local society
against the
Portuguese rulers.
The novel, The Deadwoman’s Secret by António de Assis Júnior, was published
in 1934. It was a book that would later be established as the pioneering
work in
Angolan prose fiction.
1945 unveiled the rising of a cultural conscience focused on nationalization and willingness to add new meaning to the local art of story telling. A group called "Let's Discover Angola" emerged in Luanda in 1948. Its mission was to motivate the young generation of writers to get to know all aspects of Angola.
The romance, Dying Land by Castro Soromenho, was published in Brazil in 1949. It was a literary work that disclosed the effects of the Portuguese colonization in Angola.
The 1950s marks the clear existence of a literary elite made of poets and novelists. By dodging government censorship of the press they managed to establish the foundations for Angolan literature. With a few exceptions the 1950s favored in-country writing and publishing of poetry rather than of novels or prose.
By early 1951 magazines and college newspapers featured essays by Angolan novelists and poets whose influences were the neo-realist trends in literature, cinema and in the arts made popular after the end of World War II.
