Five important lessons I learnt from the literary evening with Chuma Nwokolo

Chuma Nwokolo is an author and advocate. He is
publisher of African Writing magazine. Called to
the Bar in 1984, he published his first novel, The
Extortionist (Macmillan Pacesetters) in 1983.
Dangerous Inheritance (Macmillan Pacesetters)
followed in 1988. He has a passion for the short
story and his African Tales at Jailpoint
(Villagerhouse) appeared in 1999. His other books
include the novelised anthology, One More Tale
for the Road (2003) as well as the poetry
anthology, Memories of Stone (2006). His
anthology of stories, The Ghost of Sani Abacha
was published in 2012 while the novel Extinction
of Menai is due in 2013.

Well, I believe it is not exaggerative to opine that the literary evening was the best meeting I have ever attended in recent times. I was so thrilled and stupendously marveled at his pen acumen. And as he read those lines from his books of short stories, I watched very closely without a distractive blink.
He was so good that a seed of jealousy was already germinating in me. However, I never stopped listening to his literary advice.
Here are five of the new and important lessons I caught from the meeting :

1. About writers block : Writers block can be a symptom that emanates from having too much writing ideas but not utilized as they come. Soon, the head is accumulated with more than it can process at a time. At this point, the writer might experience inability to orchestrate his words into a nice write up.

2. About being a good writer : You cannot become a good writer if you don't enjoy reading other people's writeups.

3. About story writing : Don't write the title of your story before writing the story itself. Perhaps, it works for few people but it doesn't for many writers especially him ( Chuma Nwokolo).

4. About inspiration : Inspiration for writing can come from different sources depending on the writer. His inspiration comes from absurd changes in the environment.

5. About writing : Write as much as possible and one day, you'll notice your creativity has improved beyond comprehension. It sure worked for him.