So today, I want to talk about why, despite its many ups and down, I am a publisher. I am a publisher because I love stories. I am a publisher becaus… - Bibi Bakare-Yusuf

We need to understand that every action we take in the present moment, every cultural production, every scientific discovery, every dance movement, every new melody, every Yoruba panegyric that is slowly receding from our tongue, every Facebook update, every twitter spat, every email exchange, every graffiti on a mutatu is an opportunity to create and contribute to the archive. Whether we conceive of our actions as a potential contribution to the archive or not, someone else is already doing it for us, watching our updates, mapping our habits of being and archiving them to better understand how to induce new desire(s) in us for profit and capitalist accumulation.

Perhaps the biggest challenge of publishing in Nigeria is that it’s close to impossible to find a consistently reliable local printer. After several disastrous experiences, we made the decision to print overseas.

However, if we take the project of archive seriously now, what they will find will be determined by people like me, what we produce now, the decisions we take now – whether we are satisfied to continue to do wonders with the English language as Achebe implored us to or follow in Ngugi’s step and develop a robust African language literary culture – will be entirely up to us.