Wikipedia Ate Half My Weekend

[queerbychoice]

When I sat down this morning, almost immediately after I woke up, and started editing Wikipedia's List of Novelists by Nationality to make it include nations other than the usual rich first-world ones, I was definitely not intending to make this an all-day project. It did manage to become an all-day project, so I'm relieved to say that at least I got some new additions to my reading list out of it. Most of the writers I added to the Wikipedia page were African, and all of the new writers I discovered while researching it and added to my personal reading list were African. This is what my African reading list (novelists and otherwise) looks like now:

Algeria: Tahar Djaout, Alifa Rifaat
Cameroon: Calixthe Beyala
Egypt: Naguib Mahfouz, Ahlam Mosteghanemi, Ahdaf Soueif
Ethiopia: Nega Mezlekia
Ghana: Ama Ata Aidoo, Ayi Kwei Armah, Akosua Busia
Kenya: M. G. Vassanji
Morocco: Fatima Mernissi
Nigeria: Ken Saro-Wiwa, Wole Soyinka, Amos Tutuola
Senegal: Mariama Ba
Sierra Leone: Aminatta Forna
Somalia: Nuruddin Farah
South Africa: Athol Fugard, Nadine Gordimer, Sindiwe Magona, Zakes Mda, Bloke Modisane, Njabulo Ndebele, Zoe Wicomb
Sudan: Al-Tayyib Salih
Tanzania: Mark Behr
Uganda: Moses Isegawa
Zimbabwe: Yvonne Vera

Now, in order to find time to read them all, I need to not spend any more entire days on Wikipedia.

Actually, last night I was reading the autobiography of Le Ly Hayslip, a former member of the Viet Cong who later moved to the U.S. and married a U.S. soldier. And related to that, I'd like to say: R.I.P. Hugh Thompson, Jr. - one rare American soldier who did the right thing.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Lebanon isn't in Africa.

[chisparoja.livejournal.com]

And like any other American who does the right thing, was showered with death threats.