Simi Bedford
Simi Bedford is a Nigerian novelist based in Britain. Her best-known work is Yoruba Girl Dancing (1991), an autobiographical novel about a young Nigerian girl who is sent to England to receive a private school education.[1]
Biography
Bedford was born in Lagos, Nigeria,[2] to parents who had come there from Sierra Leone.[3] Her great-grandparents were from Nigeria and were rescued from a slave ship.[4] Bedford spent her early years in Lagos, before being sent to Britain for her education,[5] attending boarding-school there from the age of six.[6]
She read Law at Durham University, and subsequently worked in the media, including as a radio presenter and a television researcher.[6] Living in London, she married and raised three children.[5] She is now divorced from her artist husband, Martin Bedford, but they still maintain a friendly relationship, even sharing space together in a house in Devon.[7]
Bedford's debut novel Yoruba Girl Dancing is semi-autobiographical, recounting the experience of a Nigerian girl's education in Britain.[8] A five-part abridgement of Yoruba Girl Dancing (by Margaret Busby, read by Adjoa Andoh and produced by David Hunter) was broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Book at Bedtime in October 1991.[9]
Bedford's second novel, Not With Silver (2007), is historical fiction, focusing on mid-18th-century West Africa, slavery and court intrigue.[10] Drawing on its author's own ancestral history, Not With Silver is unique among books about slavery in depicting the lives of people in Africa before they were enslaved.[4] The Spectator′s reviewer concluded: "This relentlessly honest book has no false or sentimental notes, absolutely no prettifying. A black warrior facing unexpected danger is taught to imagine the worst, ‘look the leopard in the eye.’ Simi Bedford does just that. A brave and uncomfortable labour of love."[11]
Bibliography
- Yoruba Girl Dancing, London: William Heinemann Ltd, 1991, ISBN 978-0434055579; Mandarin, 1991, ISBN 978-0749310103.
- Not with Silver, London: Chatto & Windus, 2007, ISBN 978-1856192354; Vintage (paperback), 2008, ISBN 978-0099445173.
References
- ↑ "Simi Bedford: 'Yoruba Girl Dancing' and 'Not With Silver'". Afro Republic. 2 August 2015. Retrieved 3 February 2016.
- ↑ Peter Leese, Britain Since 1945: Aspects of Identity, Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 50.
- ↑ Simi Bedford interview on Woman's Hour, BBC Radio 4, 25 July 2007. YouTube.
- 1 2 "Bedford's 'Complete' Slave Picture". BBC News. 3 September 2007. Retrieved 4 February 2016.
- 1 2 Cooper, Brenda (2011). Stories Fly: A Collection of African Fiction Written in Europe and the USA. New Africa Books. p. 60. ISBN 9780864866080.
- 1 2 "Simi Bedford", Black British Women Writers.
- ↑ Hodgkinson, Liz (20 July 2015). "Divorced? You Can Be Friends With Your Ex. I Should Know.". The Telegraph. Retrieved 3 February 2016.
- ↑ Griswold, Wendy (2000). Bearing Witness: Readers, Writers, and the Novel in Nigeria. Princeton Studies in Cultural Sociology. pp. 26–27. ISBN 978-0691058290.
- ↑ "Listings", Radio Times, Issue 3539, 23 October 1991, p. 93.
- ↑ Dabydeen, David (30 August 2007). "Not With Silver, by Simi Bedford". The Independent. Retrieved 3 February 2016.
- ↑ Digby Durrant, "Pity the oppressed; fear the oppressed", The Spectator, 7 November 2007.