TIC interviewed Cossy Emmanuels about African literature, ghostwriting, and the role of feminism within the literary space. The conversation highlighted the unacknowledged nature of invisible labor in African literature, such as ghost writing and editing, with Cossy Emmanuels stressing that Nigerian culture is not ready to admit the prevalence of ghostwriting due to a desire for individual recognition. She asserted that feminism is crucial for reshaping African literature by addressing patriarchy as a problem, advocating for a shift from prioritizing mainstream content to producing stories focused on female projection and empowerment, as exemplified by works like Dream Count and Tomorrow Died Yesterday by Chimeka Garricks.
Interviewer: Hello, Cossy. My name is Chinedum from the Iroko Book Community, and I am honored to be interviewing you. May we get to know you?
Cossy Emmanuels: Good evening. My name is Cossy and well, I’m happy to be here. And I’m happy to talk about anything else you want to get into. I’m good to go.
Interviewer: Okay, Cossy. It is nice to meet you again. How about we start at the very beginning? What would you say drew you to African literature? I know you’re a fan of African literature. What drew you to it and how has it shaped your understanding of storytelling and the African voice?
Cossy Emmanuels: So this is very funny because in my, should say formative years, when I was like 12 or 13, after the usual books you read in primary school, I got into secondary school. I had a much older sister, and I noticed she was always reading romance novels. She had some African books, like Chinua Achebe and Chimamanda, but I wasn’t interested in those. I was interested in the ones she was reading at that time. So, I started sneaking her romance novels, Mills and Boon, uh, Harlequin, and all that. As I got older, I think when I was in SS2, there was this book, the um, what do they call it? Was it Faceless? I think Faceless, the Ghanaian book we read in secondary school.
Interviewer: Yes, it’s Faceless by Amma Darko.
Cossy Emmanuels: Yes, thank you. I read Faceless, and I was like, “Oh, wow. African novels are great.” But did I immediately start reading them? Not really. Then we had the JAMB book too. I think I read Last Days at Forcados High School and Independence. So I found that interest in African novels. You know how, when you’re reading foreign novels, it feels like Nigerian writers or African writers are just dumb, and I must say that was very stupid thinking. Anyways, when I started reading more I found out that we are actually good. So when I started getting into the career of writing during my undergrad, I started reading more African novels. I started from recommendations, and I remember my friend recommended ‘Stay With Me’, but I really can’t remember the writer. But I know the book I’m talking about is the one where the man had to get his brother to sleep with his wife. Do you remember the book I’m talking about?
Interviewer: Yeah, I think I remember ‘Stay With Me’ by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀.
Cossy Emmanuels: Thank you so much. Yeah. So that book practically reintroduced me to African literature, and it has been so beautiful that I can’t even remember the last time I read a foreign novel or anything like that and then I joined The Iroko Circle’s Book Club. It was really a tough decision for me because even when I was writing, I still had this um, idea of making it foreign. Reading more African novels I saw writers use their native languages, people were actually writing them, and they were so relatable. The names were pronounceable and these people are real people who exist in our societies. So African became something I did not hate anymore. I started loving it, and to be honest, it has really impacted my writing. Now, I nigerianize my writing. If that’s a word. (laughs)
Interviewer: You still freelance as a ghostwriter?
Cossy Emmanuels: Yes.
Interviewer: How did you first get into ghostwriting, and what has ghostwriting taught you about authorship in Africa?
Cossy Emmanuels: When I got into ghostwriting. I didn’t even know it was called ghostwriting. I was writing fictional stories on Facebook and then before I lost my account and for a guy who published on his blog in 2020. My stories were being published under the blog name. I was being paid and there was no ‘Written by Kossy’. Later, while I was having a conversation with my sister, she told me that it was ghostwriting, that I do not get the credit or recognition.
I’ve not really been into the writing community because I won’t lie, my strongest suit is actually editing and proofreading. I do a better job at proof reading, betareading, editing works, because of that I’m not really in the writing community, but a few times I still get just writing gigs for articles and fictional books.
The thing about ghostwriting is that I think it is great. It is beautiful if you don’t want the baggage of publishing, marketing, and promoting your work. You just want to take the money out of it. But I believe that ghost writing is now seeming like surrogacy. It’s great that you are doing this for someone, but also you are giving up so much. You can literally see your words being praised as someone else’s work, and you can’t even say anything. I think in a way it has affected, I don’t know if it has positively impacted authorship because some people have the money, or don’t have the idea, or don’t have the time to bring their idea to life. So instead of using AI, they come to other humans to do that for them. And in some way, these other humans that are being used do not get the credit they deserve. They don’t get to be known. And I really believe that no matter how much money you earn through this, I think to some extent you will still feel like you are losing something. That’s just it. This is why I’m sticking to editing so that at least I can get the little, you know, that little credit I deserve.
Interviewer: Ghostwriting often challenges the idea of the author as a genius, right? So, what do you think, or do you think African literature is ready to acknowledge the invisible labor behind many celebrated texts? I am asking this because I know that there are texts in African literature that are not written by the person whose name appears as the author of the book. So, do you think the African literary sector is ready to acknowledge the invisible labor behind many celebrated texts?
Cossy Emmanuels: I actually do not think so because even currently, people don’t even acknowledge editors, and I’m being honest. People just pretend that part of the book does not matter. If you are so cool with the author, your name might pop up in their acknowledgement. And sometimes if you’re not the one who does their editing all the time, say maybe, they have like three or four works, and you edited one, you won’t even be mentioned, how much more those who do the writing. I don’t think the African or Nigerian literary sector is ready to talk about it. I am someone who does not do this fan base or fan-girling sort of thing, like reading your book and going to look you up online to follow you. There was an author we had read in the book club once, then I saw this person’s writing on Twitter, and I was like, ‘the narrative, the way you write, the way you wrote this thread, and your book I read is so vastly different’, like there’s such a gap it doesn’t sound like the same person. I was so confused. So, I don’t think Nigeria has gotten to that point where they can proudly say this was ghostwritten by this person. Some writers online, people are ghostwriting in the back, and a few months later, I see them talking about the book they are working on, and I’m like, you are working on? Most times or sometimes,, you’re most likely to see foreign authors say a book was co-written with someone else. I believe that those are instances of ghostwriting coming into play. You see probably a more popular name and you see another name that you’re not really that familiar with. So I believe those are instances of ghostwriting. But you never see it happening in the Nigerian literary scene. Everybody wants fame for themselves. People don’t even want to hear that you presume that their work was being done by AI tools. But I know that through editing, you use AI tools to edit. So why are you so scared to say you had help doing this? I think it’s going to be a long time before anyone admits that. We just like the clout. So nobody’s willing to give that up or share that with anyone. In my own opinion, I don’t think we are there yet.
Interviewer: Kossy, from your perspective, how does ghost writing intersect with gender? Do female ghostwriters face unique challenges in the African literary space?
Cossy Emmanuels: Female ghost writers face a lot of, should I say, um, I’m trying to find the perfect word for it kind of a way where they sidelined and I’m saying this in the sense that usually unless you are saying you do academic work when it comes to fiction you are more likely to see someone trying to push that romance on a female writer and I’m like not all of us want to do romance. I read romance books, but I can’t even write them. I find it very cringeworthy to write. I can’t even watch romance movies. Anytime I watch it, my face will just be like…, so when those things come to me, I feel like you do not rate me at all. And these romance works do not even pay as much. You can say, “Oh, this is my fee,” but there is somebody who is going to charge way less and still do what needs to be done. And there are very few romance works that come up for publication. Sometimes they are put on blogs. So I prefer to write more on realism, on books like Tomorrow I Become a Woman by Aiwanose Odafen, and more on practical things that affect society and not head in the cloud. However, in the writing community, you see that more women are petitioned to write romance. You see that even women are now moved, female ghostwriters are now moved, so that when they’re trying to make submissions for any kind of competition, they will lean towards writing romance. It has become gendered so much that when it comes to real work, to real research, to books that challenge the norm, books that will make you pause, you will most likely get it from the male writers because the female writers are not even given the opportunity unless they keep putting themselves out there or they insist that any other job can come in apart from romance jobs. So basically, it’s very gendered, from the proposal to the expectation, and most times, we’re not even considered once it comes into play that the intended work is very neutral and not so romantic, and I don’t appreciate it. I’ve had a client address me as a guy until I cleared him up. So, yes, I believe it is gendered.
Interviewer: Patriarchy is deeply embedded in many African literary traditions, how has your experience as a woman shaped the way you read, write, and edit African stories?
Cossy Emmanuels: Patriarchy is in our bloodstream that it will take even the best feminist writers years to finally expunge it. It would even get to a point while expunging it, everybody would look at you like you’re doing too much. So when I’m reading, and I see things like that, I remind myself that it’s normal. But when I’m writing, I am more conscious to point out those tiny acts of misogyny or patriarchy. I call it out when I’m writing at my discretion. When I’m proofreading or editing for someone, I usually ask why. Because sometimes somebody may write, and what they are looking for is that gig. They keep saying, “I don’t think this sounds right. I just want you to make it sound better.” And some people, when they bring it for proofreading, they say, “Oh, all I need is for you to take out all the grammatical errors, make it fluent, make it flow, and that’s all I want. Don’t touch what I’ve written.” Some people are very guarded with their work. Then other people just practically want you to do an overhaul. Whatever you can do to make this sound better, so they practically give you the bare bones. So when I get jobs like that and find out that you’re leaning towards patriarchy in your tone or in the way you’ve presented something, I immediately tweet it because I can’t stand it. I think when people read books that actually speak on these things or call them out, it will deeply impact them. So it affects the way I write because I am very conscious about it. So anytime I have the opportunity let’s say so the the client says oh go ahead do whatever just make it better I do whatever I make it better and I make sure that all forms of misogyny, patriarchy or otherwise is addressed even if there’s any kind of trauma we want to take from that it will be addressed later in the book so that it will make sense to you so I very conscious about it and I don’t let it slide.
Interviewer: Coming back to your response, you said something about you tweaking stories that lean towards the patriarchy or having strings of misogyny in them. I just wanted to clarify, are you saying that when somebody reaches out to you to proofread or edit their work, and you realize while doing so that it leans towards misogyny or having strings of the patriarchy in them, you tweak it straight up? Or do you seek the opinion of the writer before you get to do this?
Cossy Emmanuels: In editing, it is not your work, it is not your thoughts, and it is not your story. I will always ask why because editing is very complicated, and sometimes you get a manuscript that is about 200 to 300 pages and, you first have to comb through grammatical errors. So I basically have to read the manuscript like three times. First, read through it and make my notes. Find out what has to go, and what can stay. The second time I read, it is to correct grammatical errors, and the third time is when I make my input to the story. I do not enjoy having to go through the story more than three times because, let’s be honest, sometimes some people’s books are not interesting. Having to suffer through it one or three times is not something I like, so I always ask for the author’s input. Tell me what do you want? So that I can hold on to that. Recently, I started preparing contracts, and I’ve started making sure that every conversation is had on text. I don’t send voice messages, and I do not want my clients to send me voice messages either. I also make sure conversations are exported, so I could always go back to it whenever the client decides to sway from actual agreements. This way, I do not waste my time having to go over it again. Sometimes, when you even tweak those things, it changes the arc of the story entirely. Let’s say for instance, a book is talking about physical abuse or domestic violence, a sort of act of patriarchy and you want the character to push back and fight, but you get to the end of the book and you see that the character dies or the character does something different and you wonder what could have happened when you started doing the tweaks. So sometimes, when you do not ask these things, you practically change the fate of the character. There are times when a writer would say, ‘If you go ahead and tweak, I do not know what I am going to do here,’ and instead of them going back to writing, they leave it for you to fix. The book I’m currently working on, I have permission to talk about it, it is in two parts, yea. The main character is suffering abuse and enduring it. It was confusing, but when I got to the second part, I understood why they had to endure. If I leaned on my own ideologies, it would mar the story. Another reason I always ask to know what the writer has in mind, is because, sometimes people’s stories are their personal stories and experiences, most times of something they have seen happen, no matter how fictional it is said to be.
Interviewer: You said something about some of them not being able to go back to work, and you have to take over and fix up. Considering the heavy lifting that goes into editing, do you feel African writers or most African writers, do you feel most African writers are lazy?
Cossy Emmanuels: I don’t know about the older writers, but I speak to current, mainstream writers, they make it seem like writing is content creation. You will see a writer promoting their book on TikTok and things like that. Most times, they write books that are mainstream instead of books that make an impact. So when I get hold of such books as a proofreader or editor, I’m like, ‘This is so lazy and you could have done better.’ I think that books are starting to lack depth and because writers and editors are not paid enough, sometimes the editor will just do shabby work.
I don’t know if it is laziness, because I can’t tell the motivation behind a book, or what is motivating someone to write. I know people who say it took them three years to write a book, some even longer periods. And their books are masterpieces, take for example Tomorrow Died Yesterday by Chiemka Garricks and Dream Count by Chimamanda Adichie. For current writers, I do not think they have the patience to go through that phase where they give a lot of thought to their books, so long as they have written more than four books, they are okay. I think maybe it is um, a shortage of creativity, they don’t know what else to do there, so they rush to publish it and get it out there. People who care will force their editors to become co-writers without the title of ‘co-writer’. People who don’t care just put it out there. You’re reading a book, and you’re almost taking a pen and correcting errors and drawing a different arc. That would have been great for the book. It is tiresome.
Interviewer: Many African texts celebrate national or cultural identity, but however, they remain patriarchal in writing. Do you think feminism has a place in reshaping how African literature tells these stories?
Cossy Emmanuels: I don’t recall how the saying goes but, ‘In a group of lies, the one one who tells the truth is a rebel’
If we’re being honest, our entire culture is rooted in patriarchy. Now, when people want to discuss or talk about books with the historical mindset, they always have to reference the patriarchy. They always have to talk about the patriarchy even if they don’t support the patriarchy. Do you understand? They don’t necessarily support the patriarchy, but they are talking about it because it is a thing, and it is not something you can erase. I stand to be corrected, but the Igbo land has male leaders, but we do not have kings, but then you’re seeing somebody writing a story, or even in movies, and they keep talking about male kings. One thing that stood out in Nigerian history was that the Igbo people were acephalous, so where is the kingship coming from? An annoying thing is that people talk about patriarchy in their stories and add things that are not part of cultural heritage into it. Sometimes, I question the writer’s stance because, is this what you believe, or is this how you want the world to be?
Referencing matters too. You know there’s a way a writer will write about patriarchy, and you will know that it was something that impresses them, or it was a dent they wanted to point out or address. However, just like we cannot erase patriarchy from our cultures, we cannot erase it from our stories, but how it is referenced matters.
Interviewer: As a ghostwriter, you give voice to the stories of others, behind the scenes how do you protect your feminist perspective and opinions?
Cossy Emmanuels: Honestly, it is incredibly hard. And why it is incredibly hard is that, Oh, I forgot to mention that I don’t just edit stories. Sometimes I edit scripts too. Everything is so mainstream that people know that a story where someone gets abused will sell. It will annoy the viewers or the reader. It will sell because it is a rage bait. When I am working on such stories, I remind myself that this is just a story that is to gather views or criticism. This person is trying to gather all the attention, good because they say no press is bad press. This makes writers go to the extreme, they do the most bizarre things. And when he gets to your table, your first thought will be, “Why are you even putting this out? It is going to create a backlash.” but they are like, “Yes, it does not matter.” So when you bring up feminist ideas, it seems as if you don’t want money because if you want money, you do the mainstream thing. Sometimes, I’m actually happy that some things I work on don’t carry my name, so that when the shame starts to come out, you won’t even see me there. Other times I’m like, “Oh, I’m so proud of this, and I wish I was more known for my contribution to this.”
So I’ve just worked on a few films, and they have given me an introspection into the fact that even in film, there is that gap. It keeps popping up, it keeps happening, and it seems like everybody’s trying so hard to just make their cash.
Interviewer: Do you feel African literature still penalizes women who are outspoken, angry, or political in their writing? How does this idea influence the kind of stories that you choose to tell or to support as an editor or ghostwriter?
Cossy Emmanuels: They definitely penalize them somehow. Unlike publishers that pay you to publish, there are publishers that publish your book without paying. They take their cut from whatever the book makes as profit. So a writer comes with their work to the editor, and when the editor does their part, the publishers would refuse. Most times, due to contracts, whatever work you and your editor has done will be overhauled by them. Publishers get to decide how they want the book to sound so they get it to sell. The same thing happens with scripts, it might get to the producer, and the producer will say no, I’m not investing money in this because it’s not going to sell, or it is not controversial. And this doesn’t just affect feminist ideas, it affects when you try to represent the minority. Take for instance, your main character is a person with a disability or your main character is in the minority, it takes out a lot. The editor or publishers might be someone who doesn’t like that. And what plays out is that the character is rooted out of your work, stripping what makes your work unique, just so it can look more mainstream.
Interviewer: Looking at African literature today, what feminist gaps do you see? Whose voices are missing? And what stories, what kind of feminist stories needs to be prioritized?
Cossy Emmanuels: So yeah, feminine stories don’t need to be about abuse. You can be talking about female empowerment, like from childbirth. They can be talking about society, and how we want it to be. I want to see characters where women cooperate, where women come together and help each other, where women are intelligent, where women speak their minds, and where society actually approves freedom of speech. When I think of feminist ideas in books, I think it should be in the sense of how feminism is respected. Equal opportunity, equal rights across the board. It should be a projection of what the future could look like if everybody behaved themselves.
Interviewer: To conclude, um, how do you envision the future of African literature in relation to feminism? And what role do you hope women who are ghostwriters or editors play in shaping this future of African literature?
Cossy Emmanuels: The role we can play is stopping the mainstream. We mainstream a lot. And I know that there is a margin when it comes to people watching YouTube movies to pass time, or people reading random books online to pass time. People even read more soft copies than hard copies. People prefer to read books that are easy, predictable, exciting, while maybe working a night shift or doing something that doesn’t require a lot of mental disturbance. So when they are at that point in their lives, they actually don’t want the mainstream. Ghostwriters should also take their profession seriously and try as much as possible to put a bit of change in the work they put out. We need to do better by speaking up and not just taking money and creating mainstream content just because.
Interviewer: Kossy, thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate the fact that you were able to make out time for us to have this interview. It’s really an honor and we are actually very honored to have you here with us.
Cossy Emmanuels: Thank you for having me and for making the time really.