Two decades after its quiet release, Jude Dibia’s Walking With Shadows still resonates as a landmark in queer African literature. In a society that rendered queerness invisible, Dibia dared to name what was forbidden, placing a gay Nigerian man at the centre of his narrative with radical empathy and moral clarity. The cost was steep, but the impact enduring: a singular voice that cracked open a space for many others to follow.
Jude DibiaYou can simply scroll past—but please don't overlook the importance of an independent queer press.
Time is now or never.
Queer voices disappear without independent journalism to amplify them.
We document what others won't touch.
We hold power to account when it threatens our communities.
This work exists only because you choose to fund it directly.
Donate over €25/month and receive our limited-edition tote bag — a badge of resistance, a statement that you stand for fearless journalism.
We are grateful!
Can't donate? Sharing our work helps more than you think
You can simply scroll past — but please don’t overlook the importance of an independent queer press.
You can simply scroll past—but please don't overlook the importance of an independent queer press.
Time is now or never.
Queer voices disappear without independent journalism to amplify them.
We document what others won't touch.
We hold power to account when it threatens our communities.
This work exists only because you choose to fund it directly.
Donate over €25/month and receive our limited-edition tote bag — a badge of resistance, a statement that you stand for fearless journalism.
We are grateful!
Can't donate? Sharing our work helps more than you think
It began with a story no one wanted to hear.
In 2005, when Nigerian novelist Jude Dibia published Walking With Shadows, he wanted to achieve one thing: “to acknowledge the most basic and simple reality [that] gay people exist in African society.” His novel follows Ebele “Adrian” Njoku, a husband and father who is outed to his wife by a colleague, forcing a profound self-reckoning.
At a time when queerness in West African literature remained largely invisible or cruelly caricatured, Dibia placed a gay Nigerian man at the heart of his debut novel. Without geographic precedent, he turned to the African-American queer canon for inspiration – the novels of James Baldwin or the forgotten trailblazer E. Lynn Harris.
“The absence wasn’t just literary; it was societal,” Dibia says. He now lives in Malmö, Sweden, in exile from a home country that still persecutes queer life. “Queer people were living, loving, suffering, surviving—but largely rendered invisible or spoken of in hushed tones, if at all. That silence felt violent. It felt like erasure.”
“I wanted to name what society refused to see,” Dibia says. “It was my small attempt to do that.”
That attempt nearly didn’t make it to print. Several publishers rejected the manuscript outright, labelling it “too controversial.” Others offered to publish the novel only if Dibia rewrote the ending—if Adrian denounced his sexuality, or died. When the book was finally released by Blacksands Books, the consequences were swift and brutal. Friends distanced themselves. Invitations to literary events were rescinded. Dibia was shunned in the spaces that once nurtured him.
But the story found its readers.
For Ainehi Edoro, a scholar of African literature and founder of the literary blog Brittle Paper, the novel marked a crucial turning point. “For a long time, queer characters in African literature were either invisible or treated as symbols of crisis,” she explains, “like their presence was a sign something had gone wrong. “So when Dibia wrote a novel that centred a gay Nigerian man as a full human being, that mattered. He pushed back against an entire archive of erasure.”
Breaking New Ground
Dibia cracked the door open, but others have since kicked it wide.
In the years following Walking With Shadows, a new wave of queer Nigerian literature has emerged. Chinelo Okparanta’s Under the Udala Trees (2015) offered the first Nigerian novel focused on lesbian love. Romeo Oriogun’s Burnt Men (2016) gave voice to queer poetry. Chike Frankie Edozien’s Lives of Great Men (2017) marked the first gay memoir, whilst Unoma Azuah’s Embracing My Shadows (2020) did the same for lesbian experience.
Yet for many, it all circles back to Dibia. His book, they say, was the catalyst.
“Each time I do something that examines the fullness and varying natures of our lives,” says Edozien, “I know that I’m continuing the work Jude began by adding to a canon that boldly debunks the prevailing narrative that queerness in West Africa is foreign or imported.”
For British-Nigerian activist Bisi Alimi, the impact was immediate and visceral. “Prior to that day, I had never really read any book as personal and relatable as that. Jude and the book did something to me,” he says.
The same was true for Nigerian writer and researcher Ayodele Olofintuade. “Encountering the novel about two years post-publication was a shift in reality for me. Walking with Shadows is a roadmap of what is possible,” she says. “The book came as it is, creating a new genre, queer literature.”
The Cost of Truth-Telling
Despite this legacy, Walking With Shadows has never entirely shaken its status as a provocation. “There are still people who consider the book too political, too queer,” Dibia acknowledges. “But I’ve made peace with that. If a story makes people uncomfortable because it tells the truth, then perhaps discomfort is the first step towards awareness.”
That discomfort became existential when, in 2014, Nigeria passed the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act, criminalising not just gay unions but even association with queer organisations. Dibia left soon after, fearing his writing had made him a marked man.
The legislation was a codification of attitudes that had long made life precarious for LGBTQ+ Nigerians. For writers like Dibia, whose work explicitly challenged these attitudes, the new law created an atmosphere of genuine danger. The decision to leave Nigeria was deeply personal, a recognition that his very presence in the country had become untenable.
Today, he lives in Malmö. He still writes. He still believes in the transformative power of storytelling. And he still receives letters from readers across the globe who say Adrian’s story helped them to feel seen. “That’s the legacy I’m proudest of,” he says. “Not the controversy, but the quiet courage it gave others to tell their own stories.”
A Lasting Legacy
The novel’s influence extends beyond literature into broader conversations about identity, belonging, and resistance in postcolonial Africa. By centring a gay Nigerian man’s experience without sensationalism or tragedy, Dibia challenged not only homophobic attitudes but also Western narratives that often portrayed African queerness as either non-existent or inevitably doomed.
The book’s radicalism lay precisely in this refusal to conform to expected narratives. Adrian is neither villain nor victim but a complex individual navigating impossible choices. This nuanced portrayal opened space for subsequent works to explore queer African experiences with similar depth and humanity.
As Walking With Shadows turns twenty, Dibia hopes it will be seen not just as an artefact of its time, but as a measure of how far Nigerian literature has come—and how far it has yet to go. “I hope the novel becomes a reminder of what silence cost us,” he says. “And to how far we’ve come.”
Subscribe to our newsletter here.
– – –
If you want to hear the most essential news commented on in-depth, listen to our weekly podcast, Queer News & Journalism or go to our YouTube Channel @GAY45mag.
– – –
Submit a letter to the editor at [email protected].
– – –
When we learn of a mistake, we acknowledge it with a correction. If you spot an error, please let us know.
