Two-time Giller prize winner M. G. Vassanji, explores concepts of identity and belonging in his memoir and essay collection, Nowhere, Exactly.
On the final day of the annual Kingston WritersFest, M. G. Vassanji spoke about his new memoir Nowhere, Exactly, which was published on March 26, at the Screening Room. He was interviewed by Juliane Okot Bitek, Queen’s professor and author on Sept. 29. With wit and charm, the two writers discussed what it means to belong within this enormous world.
Vassanji is a Gujarati Indian and was born in Kenya before his family moved to Tanzania. He pursued post-secondary education in the U.S. and eventually settled in Toronto, Ont. to raise a family. Vassanji’s transnational life and upbringing has left him with many questions about where he belongs and what belonging truly means.
Winning the Giller Prize twice for best fiction—first for The Book of Secrets in 1994 and again for The In-Between World of Vikram Lall in 2003—much of his storytelling centres on East Africa. His deep connections to both East Africa and India play a pivotal role in his work, and he frequently visits these regions for inspiration.
In Nowhere, Exactly, Vassanji reflects upon identity, literature, religion, heritage, and more. Nowhere, Exactly is increasingly relevant to Canadians, as Vassanji often asks what it means to be Canadian, and whether or not Canada has a true identity outside of comparisons to the United States, or being the “nice guy.” The book investigates Canadian multiculturalism and how Canada’s diverse communities aren’t accurately reflected within Canada’s literary canon or mainstream Canadian arts culture.
Vassanji frequently explores the nuanced experience of being a member of a “minority” group within Canada. “Being a Canadian is to bear the burden of its history of colonization and racism; a modern nation was built on a foundation of broken treaties and cultural genocide,” writes Vassanji while pondering what it truly means to be a Canadian.
He argues Canadian literature should be representative of not solely hockey and the Mounties or British Canadians. Instead, stories of Canadians from so many rich and diverse backgrounds deserve to be included in the Canadian literary canon. ”
If 80 per cent of a nation resides in its cities, then cities deserve to be recognized as emblematic of the nation, as defining as the Rockies, the Prairies, and the Atlantic,” Vassanji writes.
During his talk in Kingston, Vassanji explained what inspired him to write the novel was reflecting on where his mother belonged. She was born in Zanzibar to Indian immigrant parents, moved to Kenya where her children were born, and raised them in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. Fifteen years later, she moved back to Nairobi, then New York, then Calgary, and finally ed away in Toronto. Did she belong in Calgary, Nairobi, or Dar Es Salaam? Or did she belong nowhere, exactly?
Vassanji tells the Kingston audience true belonging is a myth, an unachievable concept.
Nowhere, Exactly ends with the words “the world is large,” emphasizing how global writing and arts will always thrive and survive, mainly due to self-publishing and online communities. The local mainstream becomes rendered irrelevant and loses its power through these services and resources. In a multicultural society such as Toronto, the literary arts scene shouldn’t be dominated by solely white voices.
“All writers never abandon the past- that’s where our inspiration comes from,” Vassanji tells Kingston audience . The weight Vassanji puts into history is etched throughout his book, while he reflects on Gandhi, Hinduism, Canada’s literary history, and more.
Ultimately, as Vassanji illuminates, belonging and identity are rooted in the past, inseparable from writing. Maybe the only rooted home exists within the writing.
When asked why Toronto is home by an audience member, Vassanji replied that “home, to me, is not necessarily Toronto, however, a place begins to feel like home, when you leave, and your neighbor tells you that they’ll miss you.”
Belonging may be something one must search for forever, and belonging may not indeed exist. However, Vassanji suggests there’s a small, quiet form of belonging that can be found eventually through writing or a neighbour’s care.
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