Before we (the Ethiopian GenX) “got” Matlock, Father Dowling, and Jake and the Fatman, we “had” Inspector Derrick. A German crime series aired after the English news on weekdays in the late 80s and early 90s. I had this memory of his raincoat, his baggy eyes, and the sound of his shoes against cobblestones as he walked into the darkness of an alley.
Earlier this year, I read an article that referenced Derrick, and I wondered why I never tried to find out if the series was available for free online. And they were. I was on a major crime series binge watch phase at the time, and there I was watching Derrick and waiting for that scene of shoes walking on cobbled streets and which only came at the last shot of the last episode. I discovered that Derrick takes place in Munich and many other surprising facts besides, including realizing it was not age-appropriate for us to watch at that age. The series is just better understood as an adult. (But much of what I love about Derrick I would like to reserve for a separate article one day)
Crime drama has always been my first and go to entertainment choice. Give me even the end tail of a thriller, an action movie or anything where the bad guy is about to get caught or die, I would revive with enough adrenaline to get me through another tough 24 hours. Yes, there are always exceptions like The Usual Suspects or the Ocean gang whose bad guys you never want caught. But as a rule, there is something satisfying about the good guys getting justice in the end. Thanks to Hollywood and the Brits we certainly have enough realistic characters and action to get us through a whole lifetime of toughness. Gone are the days when the James Bond of Pierce Brosnan defied the rules of physics to spring off the parachute of a flying snow car with his skis.
GenX will also remember as the whole of Addis followed Prison Break and 24 Hours along with the rest of the world, with pirated CDs. Once a new episode of either was out it was impossible to talk about anything else with anyone. Not exactly classic crime movies but it goes to show that a good action plot where the “good guy” wins has a universal appeal.
It is the reason people clap to cinema screens and scream at a TV screen. That sense that what is fair and just has overcome and to imagine, for a brief moment, that life is fair and everything that is going wrong in your life will be made right is an inimitable feeling.
So whether they are as far-fetched as Mission Impossible, as fast and furious as NCIS or as naïve sounding as Diagnosis: Murder or as inspiring as Columbo, we love great good cops and detectives- of course, does not hurt when detectives are as foxy and sexy as Mark Harmon. If each country and continent had to fulfil a quota of detectives who can make the entire world dream the Americans and the Brits have done more than their share. The Brit Agatha Christie and David Suchet’s Hercule Poirot alone could have sufficed for two millennia, even if we did not have Sir Conan Doyle and Jeremy Brett’s Sherlock Holmes. (But British TV has always been a league of its own).
Then in the late 90s, the world discovered that other countries on the planet actually had their own detective series too- the Nordic Noir, some interesting European and South Korean thrillers etc…which we can enjoy from a remote town in Tigray, Ethiopia thanks to streaming. The point is, if you get your fix from bad guys losing even if it is only fiction, the world will never run out of thrillers and interesting detectives.
But it took me to be in a place where I read anything I could get my hands on to rediscover the pleasure of reading crime fiction instead of watching it. (Or read in addition to watching it) I was at my fifth crime fiction in ten days when I asked myself when the last time I read a crime fiction was – after having been given a special edition of the Sherlock Holmes collection in 2010 and then about six years ago in Addis Ababa when I stumbled upon a collected works of Yilma Habteyes (unfortunately only a first volume- Not sure a second one was ever made).
There were times when Agatha Christie, Sydney Sheldon, Robert Ludlum, Jeffrey Archer and a bit later John Grisham seemed to me like an unending series of books that will accompany me for the rest of my life. It seemed like everyone I knew had read at least two Sydney Sheldon- in either English or Amharic.
It was not even consciously that I bought the Yilma Habteyes collection. I bought the book because the striking title የአበቅየለሽ ኑዛዜ was something I never forgot having laughed at in an Amharic class one day. I did not know that the story was actually part of a crime short story series. I am not sure how many people are aware that Yilma gave us a Sherlock of our own called Lieutenant Tesfaye (ሻምበል ተስፋዬ). Like any self respecting detective, Lt Tesfaye does not get along with his superiors and spends most of his time roaming the streets of Addis in the 70s. Africa literature observers will also remember about all the hype around the unforgettable The No 1 Ladies Detective Agency. Perhaps more than the book the lovely Jill Scott playing private detective Precious Ramotoswe is easier to remember. (I will never understand how they would cancel a show like that). Well, who then would believe those crime fiction book series were written by a Scot !It is another thing I discovered- that Scots have extremely interesting crime fiction with a whole name of its own- the Tartan Noir. If you like the messy but generous and expert of human nature detective, you have Ian Rankin’s Inspector Rebus. If you do not mind what can be sometimes a disappointing end, what with a mind spoiled by movies and all, you have to read Peter May. But if you want a slow, jazzy entry into plots set in a cross between historical novel and urban documentary, and with a detective you know you will want to hug and protect, then it is the Argentinian Ernesto Mallo’s “Perro” that you need.
It was natural then that this somewhat of world tour in crime fiction, as unexpected and refreshing as it was, led me to wonder about our own continent’s contribution to the quota of globally loved detectives. It was precisely at this point that the son of Ngugi wa Thiong’O – Mukoma Wa Ngugi’s book Nairobi Heat “came into my life”. A quote from a review by New York Times describes the book as “something to read if you are tired of Nordic Noir”. For a less than 300 pages book, Nairobi Heat does covers many thematics such as the relationship of US black cops with their African American communities, aid profiteering and the rarely mentioned issue of non-Rwandan victims of the genocide. A Kenyan origin African American detective in a wealthy neighbourhood in the US is sent to Kenya for an unconvincing investigation and falls in love with the country so much that he decides to settle as a private detective in Nairobi. In action scenes that remind you of Django Unchained the Nairobi painted in the book is so lawless that the American and a counterpart of sorts, who sets foot in his police station only once, basically shot, killed and burned houses. Yes, criminality and corruption are major concerns in Kenya but I don’t remember such anarchy either.
Regardless of your views on the book, and despite his African heritage, Mukoma is an African American. So, it does not solve our problem of finding African equivalents of the middle-aged, rugged, haunted but acutely observant and sexy male (or female) detective. Forget the Jack Bauers and Gibbs of the American fictional criminal world, would you visualize a private detective like Precious Ramotoswe or a middle ranking police officer like Shambel Tesfaye in your country, today, solving the petty level crimes the two characters deal with? Even in countries like Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa with relatively more advanced film industries than the rest of the continent, police are often the bad guys. Outside a few exceptions such as South Africa’s Deon Meyer and two other books, to my knowledge, one book by Nigerian Oyinkan Braithwaite, as well as a few examples from North Africa, the crime fiction genre is basically non-existent on the continent. In fact, it is perhaps best to avoid any mention of any government agent or agency at all, even in your fictional work. After all, this is a continent where there is a country that deployed police officers to raid a writer’s house at night, not that long ago, to arrest a fictional character he had created. (Best to avoid mentioning names- just too embarrassing)
It made me ask myself…………are Africans then not worthy of even fictional justice?
