Fifty Shades, Sahel-style
Northern Nigeria’s subversive love literature
A FEW minutes into Kantin Kwari market, sandwiched between the stalls selling grain and those hawking second-hand shirts, is a little alleyway where girls flock for advice. It is in short supply in Nigeria’s mostly Muslim north, where women are poorly schooled and married off at their fathers’ behest, often as children. Those with wedding woes or family dramas could do worse than consult the littattafan soyayya, or “love literature”, flogged by booksellers there.
This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “Fifty Shades, Sahel-style”
From the October 8th 2016 edition
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