Profile: John Nkemngong NKENGASONG

John Nkemngong NKENGASONG (Novelist, Fiction Writer, Poet, Playwright) is a prolific writer and literary critic whose work ranges across genres and disciplines. He has published two novels (most recently The Widow's Might (2006), and Across the Mongolo, 2004), one play (Black Caps and Red Feathers, 2001), and his poetry has appeared in journals and anthologies throughout Africa and the United States.

He has staged four of his unpublished plays (most recently A Madding Generation, 2005) in the cities of Kumba and Yaoundé. Nkengasong has held weekly columns in the Cameroon Post and The Post newspapers and has penned dozens of scholarly articles on topics in African, American, and British literature. His critical volume, W.B. Yeats and T.S. Eliot: Myths and the Poetics of Modernism, was published by Presses Universitaires Yaounde in 2005. He is currently Associate Professor at the University of Yaounde 1, Cameroon.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

“Letters to Marion” and other poems. In Journal of New Poetry 4. Morrisville: Lulu Inc., 2007.

Novel

The Widow’s Might. Yaounde: Editions CLE, 2006.

Across the Mongolo. Ibadan: Spectrum Books Limited, 2004.

Published Play

Black Caps and Red Feathers. Bamenda: Patron Publishing House, 2001.

Staged Plays

A Madding Generation. Yupoc, prod. University of Yaounde: Amphitheatre 700, 2005. Ancestral Earth. The Royal Spear Theatre, prod. GTHS Amphitheatre, Kumba, 1999.

Bakassi Soldier. The Royal Spear Theatre, prod. Catholic Mission Hall, Kumba, 1998.

The Call of Blood. The Royal Spear Theatre, prod. Catholic Mission Hall, Kumba, 1996.

Black Caps and Red Feathers. The Royal Spear Theatre, prod. Catholic Mission Hall, Kumba, 1995.

"Titabet and the Takumbeng" by Kehbuma Langmia

Kehbuma Langmia. Titabet and the Takumbeng. Langaa Publishers, 2008. Available on amazon.com and African Books Collective. $16.95.

The unprecedented political upheaval of the 1992 first ever-multiparty presidential elections in Cameroon is relieved in this play. Following the controversial elections, Bamenda - the stronghold of the main opposition party, the Social Democratic Front (SDF) - was plunged into a tense and intense civil disobedience campaign. The violence which ensued pitted SDF militants who claimed their victory was stolen against regime loyalists. The government reacted by imposing a curfew on Bamenda. The army that was dispatched to keep the peace committed ferocious kidnapping, rape, theft and torture, driving women, children and men into the arms of terror. Titabet the protagonist emerges as the leader of the oppressed. He and the sacred women's cult of Takumbeng were the only hope for the people. The sacred cleansing cult and Titabet's courageous resistance apparently brought an end to what would have been too devastating a tale to narrate.

About the author

Kehbuma Langmia teaches courses in Mass Communications, Broadcast Journalism and Media Studies at Bowie State University. With previous degrees in fine arts, television and film, he earned his PhD in Mass Communication and Media Studies from Howard University. He also has an MA degree in theatre arts from the University of Yaoundé, Cameroon; and is a graduate from the Television Academy in Munich, Germany. Dr. Langmia writes, produces and directs independent productions, and serves as executive producer for students' television projects at Bowie State University.