Books On Rwanda Directory
Through the ages, man has sought to encode and communicate knowledge as a tool for socio-econo-political development. Hence the advent of writing, first in the form of tokens over 10,000 years. It wasn’t until 3500 years ago that the alphabet was born in what is today, Lebanon. The birth of the printing press in 1450 broadened the capacity of writing to communicate knowledge and information more broadly across societies, and globally as we see it today. The Chinese, Indians, Europeans and Americans were the primary leaders in the exploitation of the printing press to encode knowledge in the form of written books, magazines and newspapers.
This modern technology took too long coming to Africa. Of note, printing was introduced in Rwanda by the Kabwayi missionaries only in the 1920’s. While there is evidence that reports on Rwanda appeared in colonial information publications around 1900, it is not clear when the first book about Rwanda was first published. Some informed sources posit that the first book published in Kinyarwanda was: Igitabu chy’Abany’enkoli bo mu Rwanda by Father Leo Paulus Classe, on 5th July 1929. Suggestions to an earlier possibility has not been backed by proven facts. And it is not surprising that the first words in Classe’s book seek to teach people how to read, in a section entitled: Ubulyo bwo gusoma neza (or The best way to read).
Because of the late entry of the modern alphabet and book publishing in Africa, as well as the control by colonial and post-colonial western firms on the publishing industry in Africa, the continent continues to lag behind in both encoding knowledge and publishing it, through books, for broader circulation. This deficit has been compounded by the perennial disinterest of African governments in supporting the growth of book publishing industries, electing to go with the status quo inherited at Independence – western publishers who control both the education and non-education book publishing markets across the continent, to-date.
Research has shown that Africa consumes 12% of books produced globally while contributing only 3% of all books produced annually. Africa’s oral tradition still persists today. In Rwanda, social gatherings reflect the creative genius of Africans who recite oral poetry that would rival the Shakespeare, Rumi and Tagore’s of the last century. Much of this is not written. Like in much of Africa, Rwanda suffers from a paucity of writers, let alone, authors. An effort to determine how many books have been written on Rwanda by local and foreign authors reveal there might be just over 5,000 titles since publishing started in the 1920s. Over 850 of these titles are contained in the Genesis Africa Books archive hereunder entitled: Books on Rwanda. When you hear that in 2015 alone, China produced 470.000 new titles followed by USA at 386.986 new titles in one year, then you understand how much more ground we still have to cover to give our culture as well as our economic, political and intellectual aspirations a voice or as President Paul Kagame persistently reminds us, just how much we must do to own our narrative.
GAB invites you to check our list of books on Rwanda and see where you might find the one you wish to read or the gap you might want to fill by penning your first manuscript. We will be delighted to receive and review it for publishing. We are keen on fiction or non-fiction manuscripts with a special focus on African writers and story-tellers covering three areas: Leadership, Development and Africa’s place in the world.
We will keep updating the GAB archive list and welcome any information you may have on books on Rwanda for us to include on our list. The National Library has a much large list of books on Rwanda and you may visit their website for a broader search on: