Albert
Chinualumogu Achebe was born the son of Isaiah Okafo, a Christian
churchman, and Janet N. Achebe November 16, 1930 in Ogidi, Nigeria.
He married Christie Chinwe Okoli, September 10, 1961, and now
has four children: Chinelo, Ikechukwu, Chidi, and Nwando. He attended
Government College in Umuahia from 1944 to 1947 and University
College in Ibadan from 1948 to 1953. He then received a B.A. from
London University in 1953 and studied broadcasting at the British
Broadcasting Corp. in London in 1956.
Since the 1950's, Nigeria has witnessed "the
flourishing of a new literature which has drawn sustanence from
both traditional oral literature and from the present and rapidly
changing society," writes Margaret Laurence in her book Long
Drums and Cannons: Nigerian Dramatists and Novelists. Thirty years
ago Chinua Achebe was one of the founders of this new literature,
and over the years many critics have come to consider him the
finest of the Nigerian novelists. His acheivement, however, has
not been limited to his continent. He is considered by many to
be one of the best novelists now writing in the English language.
Unlike some African writers struggling for acceptance
among contemporary English-language novelists, Achebe has been
able to avoid imitating the trends in English literature. Rejecting
the European notion "that art should be accountable to no
one, and [needs] to justify itself to nobody," as he puts
it in his book of essays, Morning Yet on Creation Day, Achebe
has embraced instead the idea at the heart of the African oral
tradition: that "art is, and always was, at the service of
man. Our ancestors created their myths and told their stories
for a human purpose." For this reason, Achebe beleives that
"any good story, any good novel, should have a message, should
have a purpose."
Achebe's feel for the African context has influenced
his aesthetic of the novel as well as the technical aspects of
his work. As Bruce King comments in Introduction to Nigerian Literature:
"Achebe was the first Nigerian writer to successfully transmute
the conventions of the novel, a European art form, into African
literature." In an Achebe novel, King notes, "European
character study is subordinated to the portrayl of communal life;
European economy of form is replaced by an aesthetic appropriate
to the rhythms of traditional tribal life."
Things Fall Apart (1958)
No Longer at Ease (1960)
The Sacrificial Egg (1962) (short stories)
Arrow of God (1964)
A Man of the People (1966)
Chike and the River (1966)
Beware, Soul Brother (1971) (verse)
Girls at War (1972) (short stories)
How the Leopard got his Claws (1972)
Morning Yet on Creation Day (1975) (essays)
The Flute (1977)
Don't Let him Die (1978)
Anthills of the Savannah (1987)
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