Today's Feature: Margaret Busby

August 12th

Margaret Yvonne Busby, CBE, Hon. FRSL (born 1944), also known as Nana Akua Ackon, is a Ghanaian-born publisher, editor, writer and broadcaster, resident in the UK. She was Britain's youngest and first black female book publisher when she and Clive Allison (1944–2011) co-founded the London-based publishing house Allison and Busby (A & B) in the 1960s. She edited the anthology Daughters of Africa (1992), and its 2019 follow-up New Daughters of Africa. She is a recipient of the Benson Medal from the Royal Society of Literature. In 2020 she was voted one of the "100 Great Black Britons". In 2021, she was honoured with the London Book Fair Lifetime Achievement Award.

Education and early years

Margaret Yvonne Busby was born in 1944, in Accra, Gold Coast (present-day Ghana), to Dr George Busby and Mrs Sarah Busby (née Christian), who both had family links to the Caribbean, particularly to Trinidad, Barbados and Dominica. Dr Busby (1899–1980) was a lifelong friend of Kwame Nkrumah's mentor George Padmore and attended school with C. L. R. James at Queen's Royal College, winning the Island Scholarship, which enabled him to travel to Britain in 1919 to study medicine. After initial studies at Edinburgh University, he transferred to University College, Dublin, to complete his medical qualifications, and then practised as a doctor in Walthamstow, East London (where there is a blue plaque in his honour), before relocating to settle in the Gold Coast in 1929. Through her maternal line, she is a cousin of BBC newscaster Moira Stuart, and her grandfather was George James Christian (1869–1940), a delegate at the First Pan-African Conference in London in 1900, who migrated to the Gold Coast in 1902.

Her parents sent their three children to be educated in England when Busby was five. She and her sister first attended a school in the Lake District, followed by Charters Towers School, an international girls' boarding-school in Bexhill-on-Sea, Sussex. After passing her O-levels there aged 14, Busby left school at 15, went back to Ghana and took her A-levels at 16, then spent a year at a college in Cambridge so as not to begin university too young. From the age of 17, she studied English at Bedford College (later merged with Royal Holloway College), London University, where she edited her college literary magazine as well as publishing her own poetry, and graduated with a BA Honours degree at the age of 20. She was married to British jazz musician and educator Lionel Grigson (1942–1994)

Publishing

While still at university she met her future business partner Clive Allison at a party in Bayswater Road, and they decided to start a publishing company. After graduating, Busby briefly worked at the Cresset Press – part of the Barrie Group – while setting up Allison and Busby (A & B), whose first books were published in 1967, making her the then youngest publisher as well as the first African woman book publisher in the UK – an achievement she has assessed by saying: "It is easy enough to be the first, we can each try something and be the first woman or the first African woman to do X, Y or Z. But, if it's something worthwhile you don't want to be the only. ...I hope that I can, in any way, inspire someone to do what I have done but learn from my mistakes and do better than I have done."

She was Allison & Busby's Editorial Director for 20 years, publishing many notable authors. As a journalist, she has written for The Guardian (mainly book reviews or obituaries of artists and activists.

Daughters of Africa (1992) and New Daughters of Africa (2019)

Busby compiled Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Words and Writings by Women of African Descent from the Ancient Egyptian to the Present (London: Cape, 1992), described by Black Enterprise as "a landmark", which includes contributions in a range of genres by more than 200 women. Widely reviewed on publication, it is now characterised as containing work by "the matriarchs of African literature. They pioneered 'African' writing, in which they were not simply writing stories about their families, communities and countries, but they were also writing themselves into the African literary history and African historiography. They claimed space for women storytellers in the written form, and in some sense reclaimed the woman's role as the creator and carrier of many African societies' narratives, considering that the traditional storytelling session was a women's domain."

Busby edited a 2019 follow-up volume entitled New Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Writing by Women of African Descent (first published by Myriad Editions in the UK), featuring another 200-plus writers from across the African diaspora. A reviewer in The Irish Times commented: "Sometimes you need an anthology to remind you of the variety, strength and nuance of writing among a certain region or group of people. New Daughters of Africa is indispensable because African voices have been silenced or diminished throughout history, and women's voices even more so.”

Busby was a prominent participant in the major 2019 exhibition Get Up, Stand Up Now: Generations of Black Creative Pioneers at Somerset House, and contributed an introductory essay for the catalogue, as well as participating in events there.

Broadcasting and dramatisations

Busby has regularly worked for radio and television since the late 1960s, when she presented the magazine programme London Line for the Central Office of Information, as well as Break For Women on the BBC African Service, and later Talking Africa on Spectrum Radio, in addition to appearing on a range of programmes including Kaleidoscope, Front Row, Open Book, Woman's Hour, and Democracy Now! (USA).

In 2014, following the death of Maya Angelou, Busby scripted a major tribute entitled Maya Angelou: A Celebration, which took place on 5 October at the Royal Festival Hall during the Southbank Centre's London Literature Festival; directed by Paulette Randall, and chaired by Jon Snow and Moira Stuart.

Literary Activism

She has worked continuously for diversity within the publishing industry, writing in a 1984 article in the New Statesman: "Is it enough to respond to a demand for books reflecting the presence of 'ethnic minorities' while perpetuating a system which does not actively encourage their involvement at all levels? The reality is that the appearance and circulation of books supposedly produced with these communities in mind is usually dependent on what the dominant white (male) community, which controls schools, libraries, bookshops and publishing houses, will permit."In the 1980s, she was a founding member of the organization Greater Access to Publishing (GAP), which engaged in campaigns for increased Black representation in British publishing. Other members of this multi-racial group, which held a conference in November 1987 particularly to highlight publishing as an option for Black women.

Influence & Recognition

In 2018, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of women's right to vote, The Voice newspaper listed Margaret Busby – alongside Kathleen Wrasama, Olive Morris, Connie Mark, Fanny Eaton, Diane Abbott, Lilian Bader, and Mary Seacole – among eight Black women who have contributed to the development of Britain.[Bustle magazine included Busby with Mary Prince, Claudia Jones, Evelyn Dove, Olive Morris, Olivette Otele, and Shirley Thompson on a list of "7 Black British Women Throughout History That Deserve To Be Household Names In 2019". Busby was also named by the Evening Standard on a list of 14 "Inspirational black British women throughout history" (alongside Mary Seacole, Claudia Jones, Adelaide Hall, Olive Morris, Joan Armatrading, Tessa Sanderson, Doreen Lawrence, Maggie Aderin-Pocock, Sharon White, Malorie Blackman, Diane Abbott, Zadie Smith and Connie Mark).

Also in 2018, she was among 150 "Leading Women" celebrated by the University of London to mark the 150 years since women gained access to higher education in the UK in 1868, and featured in the exhibition Rights for Women: London's Pioneers in their Own Words staged at Senate House Library from 16 July to 15 December 2018.

In July 2019, she was awarded the inaugural Africa Writes Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to her at the British Library during the Royal African Society's annual literary weekend.

She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2021 Birthday Honours for services to publishing.

She has been awarded a number of honorary degrees including from the Open University, SOAS, and from Royal Holloway, the conferral taking place in June 2021 with the oration being given by Professor Lavinia Greenlaw. In June 2022, Busby also received an honorary doctorate from the University of Exeter.

In April 2023, Busby was appointed president of English *PEN, succeeding Philippe Sands in the role.

*Founded in 1921, English PEN is one of the world's first non-governmental organisations and among the first international bodies advocating for human rights. English PEN was the founding centre of PEN International, a worldwide writers' association with 145 centres in more than 100 countries.