Reviewed by Amirah Muhammad
Founded by Dr Kadija George Sesay, the International Black Speculative Writing Symposium and Festival was a three-day in-person event at Goldsmiths, University of London, held in February 2024, alongside a single-day online event for global audiences. The festival offered workshops for writers, readings and performances, speakers’ panels, interviews, and group discussions. The festival’s many partners included Comma Press, Spread The Word, New Writing South, Writing East Midlands, TLC, Writing Our Legacy, Peepal Tree Press and Yaram Arts. The event was supported by Arts Council England, Professor Deidre Osborne and the Department of English and Creative Writing at Goldsmiths. The festival’s authorised bookseller was This is Book Love. The BSFA had a stall featuring its publications, showcasing African writers from the Luna Press and launching Kampala Yénkya – an applied African speculative culture project on imagining climate futures by Dilman Dila and Vector editors.
As the first of its kind, the festival promised all the thrills of a new experience, alongside the anticipation of a skilfully curated event. Across its online and in-person events, titans of Black Speculative Fiction abounded, including Sheree Renée Thomas, Professor Reynaldo Anderson, Dr. Karen Lord, Dr. Courttia Newland, and Leone Ross. I spent three days at Goldsmiths absorbing new fiction in all its forms, building new personal and intellectual connections, and exploring new ways of thinking about Black Speculative Fiction.
Friday; or, Previous Conceptions of the World Need Not Apply
I entered the festival with a giddiness in my bones. There was a distinct sense that I was on the precipice of something new, where previous conceptions of the world need not apply.
The first day of the festival consisted of workshops, panels, and readings, which encouraged me to think about the many ‘ways’ and ‘whys’ of writing Speculative Fiction. Workshops by Ama Josephine Budge and Leone Ross on activism and sexuality respectively explored the consequences of writing when nothing else is impossible. In a session chaired by Reynaldo Anderson, Budge and Heather Goodman shared research on their interventions into scholarship on Black Speculative Fiction.
The emerging theme of combining the theoretical with the practical continued in the next sessions, while distinctly international approaches made sure that the festival quickly lived up to its name. Yvonne Apiyo Brändle-Amolo spoke about Afrofuturism and her Femme-activism as a politician and visual artist in Switzerland, while Speculative Fiction by Akila Richards and Claudia Monteith creatively explored experiences of mixed heritage people in Germany.
Readings filled the afternoon. Immersing myself in the power of performance reminded me of the diversity of forms Speculative Fiction takes. I heard Courttia Newland, Luan Goldie, and Peter Kalu read from their short stories in Collision: Stories From The Science Of Cern (2023), accompanied by singer Naomi Kalu. Peter Kalu also showcased Simulacrum Funk: The Game (2024), created by himself, Tariq Mehmood and Melvin Burgess, based on the setting of a dystopic future England that their trilogy of novels share.
Before the launch of Akila Richards’ debut poetry chapbook closed the evening, Courttia Newland’s keynote shared some personal reflections on the evolution of Black British Speculative Fiction. For a day that began on the precipice of possibility, it ended with a sense that Black Speculative Fiction in particular was paradoxically bound and unbound by its context.
This feeling was a premonition for Saturday.
Saturday; or, The Real World Bites Back
If I spent the first day of the festival wide-eyed and dreamy about the endless possibilities that Black Speculative Fiction promised, the second day of the festival brought reality back with bite.
The morning’s workshops by Ronnie McGrath, Florence Okoye, Ellah Wakatama and Temi Oh took me through the real-world inputs that often inspire fantastical pieces of fiction. From new technologies to legacies of trauma, Speculative Fiction imagines futures with a foot firmly in the imperfect present. The imperfect present reappeared in the panel discussion on decolonising Speculative Writing in Literature and Publishing. Chaired by Dr Toyin Agbetu, Gerald and Steven Vreden, Ronnie McGrath and Yvonne Apiyo Brändle-Amolo spoke about what decolonisation means for their work from their respective contexts of Suriname/Netherlands and Kenya/Switzerland, as well as the ways that their work inspires hope for change.
But the imperfect present did not linger long. The year 2300 beckoned. In the keynote conversation, Patrick Vernon interviewed Reynaldo Anderson from the future for the Museum of Grooves, which curates Black history and the existence of Black people who lived on Earth prior to a fictional World War IV. Partly tongue-in-cheek fun and partly prescient insight, the conversation reminded me that invention is not apolitical, that hope is a prerequisite to survival, and that the future needs protecting as much as imagining.
The festival refused to leave its audience in the grip of such creative tension. Readings and performances proved to be the best release. Temi Oh, Karen Lord, and Gerald Verden read from their current novels, while Anni Domingo and Tonderai Munyevu discussed how they reclaimed Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park (1814) through a Black gaze in their play Mansfield Park at the Watermill (2023). The evening ended with Storyteller Usifu Jalloh delivering coded and symbolic narratives and literature of traditional Africa, Senegalese masquerade performer, Moulaye Diallo, sharing his art, and a screening of In Praise of Still Boys (2021) by JULIANKNXX.
Hope, politics, imagination, and play were all present by the end of the festival’s second day. Now, the appearance of the imperfect present in a space of limitless possibility seemed less an intrusion and more of an opportunity. I left the festival with a sense that the synergy between the ways we think and the way we live depends on expanding both categories infinitely.
Sunday; or, No Such Thing As Endings
The festival’s final day was a bittersweet occasion. A jam-packed agenda was still on the cards, but the end of the programmed events loomed large on the horizon. Every captivating conversation and every enthralling new idea felt ever more ephemeral, like sparks flying off a match. Suddenly, the concreteness of possibility was receding. Even so, it was difficult to see how the festival would (or could) end. After all, a spark will catch, eventually.
The morning began with form at the forefront. Peter Kalu gave a workshop on building choice-driven games, while Alby James explored what it meant to portray Blackness in film, alongside a Q&A with writer and filmmaker Nosa Igbinedion. Ellah Wakatama’s conversation with Tade Thompson dived into Thompson’s creative process and the politics of worldbuilding, particularly for imagining new future versions of Africa. In a tandem conversation, Troy Onyango, Calah Singleton, and Emmanuel Omodeinde discussed current trends in publishing Speculative Fiction.
Once again, readings proved energising, reigniting the excitement of the festival. Patience Agabi inspired young readers and families with her Leap Cycle series (2020 – 2024), while Dr. Aisha Phoenix, Ioney Smallhorne, and Ronnie McGrath read from their short stories in Glimpse: An Anthology of Black British Speculative Fiction (2022). As with the festival, Glimpse is the first of its kind, and, as with the festival, I suspect it will not be the last.
By the time the keynote conversation came around, the festival was coming to a close. Chaired by Joy Francis, Karen Lord and Leone Ross discussed their works and creative processes with a warmth and generosity of spirit that epitomized the festival. The energy was infectious, spilling out into the open mic session hosted by Michael Chilokoa. Anyone could take part and share their art. The openness and compassion of the exchange was a fitting end to proceedings. It signified that all the connections that had been made, all the ideas that had been shared, and all the worlds that had been invented, could not now recede into obscurity.
The inaugural International Black Speculative Writing Symposium and Festival drew together diverse perspectives on Black Speculative Fiction from academia, publishers, authors, and artists. The festival at once looked backwards and forwards, providing a roadmap for accessing a wealth of Black Speculative Fiction while inspiring new ways of thinking for and about the future.
I came away from the festival feeling challenged and stimulated. The match had been lit, and the fire that would inevitably follow suggested that there was no such thing as an ending – neither for Black Speculative Fiction, nor for the festival. There will be more to come.
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