Homelands

“Eric Ngalle Charles traverses landscapes, generations, relationships, languages and traditions with poignancy and wisdom in his debut collection Homelands which begins in his birthplace, Cameroon, and ends in his current place of home, Cymru.”

“Movement through space and culture is paramount to his writing, and like his Cameroonian phrases, Russian and French also emerge, detailing his international existence. Yet, with the focus on his life being taken away from home, family is central… pain is laid bare, but growth and change borne of his circumstances are also evident… That the real and the spiritual blend together is reinforced by Charles’ variance of tone and structure… The vivid, violent displacement that Charles describes in ‘Homelands’ is given a new twist as he quotes Ifor ap Glyn… which draws us back to his present life and new home there, but reflects also on his situation, and all the diaspora he writes about.”

“The debut collection Homelands by Eric Ngalle Charles is a joy to read.”

“A simmering anxiety underpins Homelands, the quietly arresting debut collection… Throughout Charles wrestles with the complexities of language, geography, and identity, but the central question of this book may be the one raised by the speaker in one poem, who, when asked “where are you from?” can only wonder: “How long must one stay in a place to become it?””