With his collection of poems Breaking fate, the Cameroonian poet Herman Kamwa won the Martial Sinda Grand Prize for Francograph Poetry last March during the 20th Printemps des Poètes des Afriques et d’Ailleurs. A secondary school teacher in Banekouane in western Cameroon and at the University of Yaoundé I, author for cinema and theatre, Herman Kamwa discovered poetry when he was a high school student.
Herman Kamwa is in first class when he reads the work for the first time balafon of Father Engelbert Mveng, Cameroonian Jesuit priest, author of numerous works. “ And I literally fell in love with poetry, so that the days that followed, I had fun scribbling some texts, having fun writing too, so that’s how the crush came with the poetry. »
At university, Herman Kamwa joined the association La Ronde des Poètes of Jean-Claude Awono, who wrote in February 1999 being convinced that poetry ” makes it possible to take into account the dimension of the dream in the social life of man. At the Ecole Normale, he was supported by professor and poet Guy Merlin Nana Tadoun, who prefaced his first collection Marriage (talgic) of the (good) evening. The cry of Lent (Paris, 2017).
And when he discovered by chance the announcement of the 2023 edition of the Martial Sinda Prize, Herman Kamwa said he was immediately struck by the theme “History, memory, resistance. which echoes his work, he therefore decides to submit about twenty texts under the title Break the spell.
” I think that poetry can be a tool of resistance insofar as it speaks to men where it addresses the soul of individuals, a genre that can become a real instrument in the fight against the various social problems that we encounter in daily. »
Herman Kamwa hopes that thus rewarded, his collection Break the spell will be published soon. Even if the means of dissemination are lacking, he wants to continue to create spaces, reading meetings in the neighborhoods, in the classes, to share poetry. Herman Kamwa will be invited to the Trois-Rivières International Poetry Festival in Quebec, from September 29 to October 8, 2023.