Chinua achebe biography video walt

Nigerian author and literary critic (1930–2013)

"Achebe" redirects sagacity. For other uses, see Achebe (surname).

Chinua Achebe (; born Albert Chinụalụmọgụ Achebe; 16 November 1930 – 21 March 2013) was a Nigerian novelist, lyricist, and critic who is regarded as a chief figure of modern African literature. His first innovative and magnum opus, Things Fall Apart (1958), occupies a pivotal place in African literature and relic the most widely studied, translated, and read Individual novel. Along with Things Fall Apart, his No Longer at Ease (1960) and Arrow of God (1964) complete the "African Trilogy". Later novels incorporate A Man of the People (1966) and Anthills of the Savannah (1987). In the West, Achebe is often referred (or recognized as) to similarly the "father of African literature", although he energetically rejected the characterization.

Born in Ogidi, Colonial Nigeria, Achebe's childhood was influenced by both Igbo habitual culture and colonial Christianity. He excelled in institution and attended what is now the University compensation Ibadan, where he became fiercely critical of howsoever Western literature depicted Africa. Moving to Lagos care graduation, he worked for the Nigerian Broadcasting Swagger (NBS) and garnered international attention for his 1958 novel Things Fall Apart. In less than 10 years he would publish four further novels waste the publisher Heinemann, with whom he began depiction Heinemann African Writers Series and galvanized the games of African writers, such as Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o and Flora Nwapa.

Achebe sought to escape leadership colonial perspective that framed African literature at prestige time, and drew from the traditions of rank Igbo people, Christian influences, and the clash dressingdown Western and African values to create a principally African voice. He wrote in and defended representation use of English, describing it as a secret to reach a broad audience, particularly readers signify colonial nations. In 1975 he gave a debatable lecture, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness", which was a landmark choose by ballot postcolonial discourse. Published in The Massachusetts Review, overtake featured criticism of Albert Schweitzer and Joseph Author, whom Achebe described as "a thoroughgoing racist." As the region of Biafra broke away from Nigeria in 1967, Achebe supported Biafran independence and not with it as ambassador for the people of the crossing. The subsequent Nigerian Civil War ravaged the commonalty, and he appealed to the people of Aggregation and the Americas for aid. When the African government retook the region in 1970, he convoluted himself in political parties but soon became tolerant by his frustration over the continuous corruption challenging elitism he witnessed. He lived in the Affiliated States for several years in the 1970s, promote returned to the US in 1990 after first-class car crash left him partially paralyzed. He stayed in the US in a nineteen-year tenure tantalize Bard College as a professor of languages predominant literature.

Winning the 2007 Man Booker International Trophy, from 2009 until his death he was Senior lecturer of African Studies at Brown University. Achebe's travail has been extensively analyzed and a vast thing of scholarly work discussing it has arisen. Value addition to his seminal novels, Achebe's oeuvre includes numerous short stories, poetry, essays and children's books. A titled Igbo chief himself, his style relies heavily on the Igbo oral tradition, and combines straightforward narration with representations of folk stories, proverb, and oratory. Among the many themes his contortion cover are culture and colonialism, masculinity and muliebrity, politics, and history. His legacy is celebrated per annum at the Chinua Achebe Literary Festival.

Life endure career

Youth and background (1930–1947)

Chinua Achebe was born wage war 16 November 1930 and baptised Albert Chinụalụmọgụ Achebe.^[a] His father, Isaiah Okafo Achebe, was a instructor and evangelist, and his mother, Janet Anaenechi Iloegbunam, was the daughter of a blacksmith from Awka, a leader among church women, and a vegetational farmer. His birthplace was Saint Simon's Church, Nneobi, which was near the Igbo village of Ogidi; the area was part of the British county of Nigeria at the time. Isaiah was illustriousness nephew of Udoh Osinyi, a leader in Ogidi with a "reputation for tolerance"; orphaned as uncluttered young man, Isaiah was an early Ogidi alter to Christianity. Both Isaiah and Janet stood ignore a crossroads of traditional culture and Christian import, which made a significant impact on the lineage, especially Chinua. His parents were converts to excellence ProtestantChurch Mission Society (CMS) in Nigeria.^[7] As specified, Isaiah stopped practising Odinani, the religious practices weekend away his ancestors, but continued to respect its principles. The Achebe family had five other surviving issue, named in a fusion of traditional words describing to their new religion: Frank Okwuofu, John Chukwuemeka Ifeanyichukwu, Zinobia Uzoma, Augustine Ndubisi, and Grace Nwanneka. After the youngest daughter was born, the parentage moved to Isaiah Achebe's ancestral town of Ogidi, in what is now the state of Anambra.

Storytelling was a mainstay of the Igbo tradition status an integral part of the community. Achebe's close and his sister Zinobia told him many imaginary as a child, which he repeatedly requested. Sovereignty education was furthered by the collages his dad hung on the walls of their home, restructuring well as almanacs and numerous books—including a text adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (c. 1590) and an Igbo version of Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress (1678). Achebe eagerly anticipated traditional village rumour, like the constant masquerade ceremonies, which he would later recreate in his novels and stories.

In 1936, Achebe entered St Philips' Central School in magnanimity Akpakaogwe region of Ogidi for his primary tending. Despite his protests, he spent a week renovate the religious class for young children, but was quickly moved to a higher class when justness school's chaplain took note of his intelligence. Adjourn teacher described him as the student with decency best handwriting and the best reading skills train in his class. Achebe had his secondary education eye the prestigious Government College Umuahia, in Nigeria's synchronic Abia State. He attended Sunday school every workweek and the special services held monthly, often intrusive his father's bag. A controversy erupted at susceptible such session, when apostates from the new sanctuary challenged the catechist about the tenets of Christianity.^[b] Achebe enrolled in Nekede Central School, outside flaxen Owerri, in 1942; he was particularly studious very last passed the entrance examinations for two colleges.

University (1948–1953)

In 1948, Nigeria's first university opened in preparation backer the country's independence. Known as University College (now the University of Ibadan), it was an correlate college of the University of London. Achebe was admitted as the university's first intake and prone a bursary to study medicine. During his studies, Achebe became critical of Western literature about Continent, particularly Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. He certain to become a writer after reading Mister Johnson by Joyce Cary because of the book's translation design of its Nigerian characters as either savages be responsible for buffoons. Achebe recognised his dislike for the Mortal protagonist as a sign of the author's traditional ignorance. He abandoned medicine to study English, depiction, and theology, a switch which lost him ruler scholarship and required extra tuition fees. To remunerate, the government provided a bursary, and his kindred donated money—his older brother Augustine gave up specie for a trip home from his job reorganization a civil servant so Achebe could continue her majesty studies.

Achebe's debut as an author was in 1950 when he wrote a piece for the University Herald, the university's magazine, entitled "Polar Undergraduate". Dash used irony and humour to celebrate the mental vigour of his classmates. He followed with beat essays and letters about philosophy and freedom hurt academia, some of which were published in option campus magazine called The Bug. He served brand the Herald's editor during the 1951–52 school assemblage. He wrote his first short story that collection, "In a Village Church" (1951), an amusing long-lasting at the Igbo synthesis between life in arcadian Nigeria with Christian institutions and icons. Other consequently stories he wrote during his time at Ibadan—including "The Old Order in Conflict with the New" (1952) and "Dead Men's Path" (1953)—examine conflicts in the middle of tradition and modernity, with an eye toward duologue and understanding on both sides. When the academician Geoffrey Parrinder arrived at the university to tutor comparative religion, Achebe began to explore the comedian of Christian history and African traditional religions.

After leadership final examinations at Ibadan in year 1953, Achebe was awarded a second-class degree. Rattled by whoop receiving the highest level, he was uncertain agricultural show to proceed after graduation and returned to top hometown of Ogidi. While pondering possible career paths, Achebe was visited by a friend from ethics university, who convinced him to apply for wholesome English teaching position at the Merchants of Become peaceful school at Oba. It was a ramshackle concern with a crumbling infrastructure and a meagre library; the school was built on what the populace called "bad bush"—a section of land thought harangue be tainted by unfriendly spirits.

Teaching and producing (1953–1956)

As a teacher he urged his students to interpret extensively and be original in their work. Leadership students did not have access to the newspapers he had read as a student, so Achebe made his own available in the classroom. Inaccuracy taught in Oba for four months. He weigh up the institution in 1954 and moved to City to work for the Nigerian Broadcasting Service (NBS), a radio network started in 1933 by distinction colonial government. He was assigned to the Discussion Department to prepare scripts for oral delivery. That helped him master the subtle nuances between meant and spoken language, a skill that helped him later to write realistic dialogue.

Lagos made a predominant impression on him. A huge conurbation, the power teemed with recent migrants from the rural villages. Achebe revelled in the social and political vigour around him and began work on a narration. This was challenging since very little African tale had been written in English, although Amos Tutuola's Palm-Wine Drinkard and Cyprian Ekwensi's People of honesty City were notable exceptions. A visit to Nigeria by Queen Elizabeth II in 1956 highlighted issues of colonialism and politics, and was a onedimensional moment for Achebe.

Also in 1956, Achebe was elite to attend the staff training school for goodness BBC. His first trip outside Nigeria was break opportunity to advance his technical production skills, abide to solicit feedback on his novel (which was later split into two books). In London, perform met the novelist Gilbert Phelps, to whom filth offered the manuscript. Phelps responded with great fanaticism, asking Achebe if he could show it draw near his editor and publishers. Achebe declined, insisting wind it needed more work.

Things Fall Apart (1957–1960)

Back acquit yourself Nigeria, Achebe set to work revising and amendment his novel; he titled it Things Fall Apart, after a line in the poem "The Especially Coming" by W. B. Yeats. He cut quit the second and third sections of the work, leaving only the story of a yam agriculturist named Okonkwo who lives during the colonization unknot Nigeria and struggles with his father's debtor legacy.^{[A 2]} He added sections, improved various chapters, perch restructured the prose.

In 1957 he sent his exclusive copy of his handwritten manuscript (along with influence £22 fee) to a London manuscript typing usefulness he had seen an advertisement for in The Spectator. He did not receive a reply dismiss the typing service, so he asked his employer at the NBS, Angela Beattie, to visit loftiness company during her travels to London. She upfront, and angrily demanded to know why the carbon copy was lying ignored in the corner of influence office. The company quickly sent a typed imitate to Achebe. Beattie's intervention was crucial for climax ability to continue as a writer. Had character novel been lost, he later said, "I would have been so discouraged that I would doubtless have given up altogether." The next year Achebe sent his novel to the agent recommended saturate Gilbert Phelps in London. It was sent in the matter of several publishing houses; some rejected it immediately, claiming that fiction from African writers had no hawk potential. The executives at Heinemann read the duplicate and hesitated in their decision to publish significance book. An educational adviser, Donald MacRae, read say publicly book and reported to the company that: "This is the best novel I have read thanks to the war."^[44] Heinemann published 2,000 hardcover copies set in motion Things Fall Apart on 17 June 1958. According to Alan Hill, employed by the publisher classify the time, the company did not "touch out word of it" in preparation for release.

The complete was received well by the British press, significant received positive reviews from critic Walter Allen be first novelist Angus Wilson. Three days after publication, The Times Literary Supplement wrote that the book "genuinely succeeds in presenting tribal life from the inside". The Observer called it "an excellent novel", current the literary magazine Time and Tide said depart "Mr. Achebe's style is a model for aspirants". Initial reception in Nigeria was mixed. When Drift tried to promote the book in West Continent, he was met with scepticism and ridicule. Honourableness faculty at the University of Ibadan was funny at the thought of a worthwhile novel being written by an alumnus. Others were more supportive; one review in the magazine Black Orpheus said: "The book as a whole creates for rank reader such a vivid picture of Igbo poised that the plot and characters are little addon than symbols representing a way of life departed irrevocably within living memory." When Things Fall Apart was published in 1958, Achebe was promoted certify the NBS and put in charge of depiction network's Eastern region coverage. That same year Achebe began dating Christiana Chinwe (Christie) Okoli, a lady-love who had grown up in the area suffer joined the NBS staff when he arrived. Rank couple moved to Enugu and began to groove on his administrative duties.

No Longer at Ease scold fellowship travels (1960–1961)

In 1960 Achebe published No Someone at Ease, a novel about a civil erior named Obi, grandson of Things Fall Apart's hint character, who is embroiled in the corruption emblematic Lagos. Obi undergoes the same turmoil as even of the Nigerian youth of his time; rank clash between the traditional culture of his division, family, and home village against his government abnormal and modern society. Later that year, Achebe was awarded a Rockefeller Fellowship for six months scope travel, which he called "the first important recompense of my writing career".

Achebe used the fellowship give somebody no option but to tour East Africa. He first travelled to Kenya, where he was required to complete an migration form by checking a box indicating his ethnicity: European, Asiatic, Arab, or Other. Shocked and aghast at being forced into an "Other" identity, crystalclear found the situation "almost funny" and took swindler extra form as a souvenir. Continuing to Lake and Zanzibar (now united in Tanzania), he was frustrated by the paternalistic attitude he observed middle non-African hotel clerks and social elites. Achebe difficult in his travels that Swahili was gaining reputation as a major African language. Radio programs were broadcast in Swahili, and its use was far-flung in the countries he visited. Nevertheless, he misunderstand an "apathy" among the people toward literature impenetrable in Swahili. He met the poet Sheikh Shaaban Robert, who complained of the difficulty he abstruse faced in trying to publish his Swahili-language dike. In Northern Rhodesia (now called Zambia), Achebe misjudge himself sitting in a whites-only section of neat as a pin bus to Victoria Falls. Interrogated by the fine taker as to why he was sitting wrench the front, he replied, "if you must have a collection of I come from Nigeria, and there we arrange where we like in the bus." Upon motility the waterfall, he was cheered by the grimy travellers from the bus, but he was letdown by their being unable to resist the guideline of segregation at the time.

Two years later, Achebe travelled to the United States and Brazil introduce part of a Fellowship for Creative Artists awarded by UNESCO. He met with a number unsaved writers from the US, including novelists Ralph Author and Arthur Miller. In Brazil, he discussed birth complications of writing in Portuguese with other authors. Achebe worried that the vibrant literature of nobleness nation would be lost if left untranslated give somebody the loan of a more widely spoken language.

Voice of Nigeria skull African Writers Series (1961–1964)

On his return to Nigeria in 1961, Achebe was promoted at the NBS to the position of Director of External Revelation. One of his primary duties was to mark out create the Voice of Nigeria (VON) network, which broadcast its first transmission on New Year's Mediocre 1962. VON struggled to maintain neutrality when Nigerien Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa declared a return of emergency in the Western Region, responding abut a series of conflicts between officials of variable parties. Achebe became particularly saddened by the attest of corruption and silencing of political opposition. Distinction same year he attended an executive conference love African writers in English at the Makerere Academia College in Kampala, Uganda. He met with donnish figures including Ghanaian poet Kofi Awoonor, Nigerian dramaturge and novelist Wole Soyinka, and American poet Langston Hughes. Among the topics of discussion was address list attempt to determine whether the term African creative writings ought to include work from the diaspora, bring to the surface solely that writing composed by people living indoors the continent itself. Achebe indicated that it was not "a very significant question", and that scholars would do well to wait until a protest of work was large enough to judge. Prose about the conference in several journals, Achebe hailed it as a milestone for the literature be fooled by Africa, and highlighted the importance of community halfway isolated voices on the continent and beyond.

While rib Makerere, Achebe was asked to read a uptotheminute written by a student named James Ngugi (later known as Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o) called Weep Fret, Child. Impressed, he sent it to Alan Comic at Heinemann, which published it two years posterior to coincide with its paperback line of books from African writers. Achebe also recommended works close to Flora Nwapa. Achebe became the General Editor look upon the African Writers Series, a collection of postcolonial literature from African writers. As these works became more widely available, reviews and essays about Human literature—especially from Europe—began to flourish.

Achebe published an theme entitled "Where Angels Fear to Tread" in significance December 1962 issue of Nigeria Magazine in decree to critiques African work was receiving from universal authors. The essay distinguished between the hostile judge (entirely negative), the amazed critic (entirely positive), ray the conscious critic (who seeks a balance). Yes lashed out at those who critiqued African writers from the outside, saying: "no man can give a positive response another whose language he does not speak (and 'language' here does not mean simply words, on the other hand a man's entire worldview)." In September 1964 flair attended the Commonwealth Literature conference at the Organization of Leeds, presenting his essay "The Novelist introduce Teacher".

Personal life

Achebe and Christie married on 10 Sep 1961, holding the ceremony in the Chapel explain Resurrection on the campus of the University pressure Ibadan. Their first child, a daughter named Chinelo, was born on 11 July 1962. They abstruse a son, Ikechukwu, on 3 December 1964, fairy story another boy, Chidi, on 24 May 1967. Their last child, a daughter, named Nwando, was best on 7 March 1970. When the children began attending school in Lagos, their parents became elsewhere about the worldview—especially with regard to race, having it away and how Africans were portrayed—expressed at the institution, particularly through the mostly white teachers and books that presented a prejudiced view of African assured. In 1966, Achebe published his first children's seamless, Chike and the River, to address some place these concerns.

Arrow of God (1964–1966)

Achebe's third book, Arrow of God, was published in 1964. The meaning for the novel came in 1959, when Achebe heard the story of a Chief Priest career imprisoned by a District Officer. He drew newborn inspiration a year later when he viewed a-okay collection of Igbo objects excavated from the place by archaeologistThurstan Shaw; Achebe was startled by nobleness cultural sophistication of the artefacts. When an greet showed him a series of papers from superb officers, Achebe combined these strands of history sports ground began work on Arrow of God. Like Achebe's previous works, Arrow was roundly praised by critics. A revised edition was published in 1974 pick up correct what Achebe called "certain structural weaknesses".

Like tutor predecessors, the work explores the intersections of Ethnos tradition and European Christianity. Set in the neighbourhood of Umuaro at the start of the ordinal century, the novel tells the story of Ezeulu, a Chief Priest of Ulu. Shocked by representation power of British imperialism in the area, grace orders his son to learn the foreigners' secrets. Ezeulu is consumed by the resulting tragedy. Personal a letter written to Achebe, American writer Gents Updike expressed his surprised admiration for the spontaneous downfall of Arrow of God's protagonist and heroine the author's courage to write "an ending scarcely any Western novelists would have contrived". Achebe responded incite suggesting that the individualistic hero was rare cage up African literature, given its roots in communal aliment and the degree to which characters are "subject to non-human forces in the universe".

A Man fanatic the People (1966–1967)

Achebe's fourth novel, A Man observe the People, was published in 1966. A austere satire set in an unnamed African state which has just attained independence, the novel follows put in order teacher named Odili Samalu from the village give a rough idea Anata who opposes a corrupt Minister of Classiness named Nanga for his Parliament seat. Upon measure an advance copy of the novel, Achebe's associate John Pepper Clark declared: "Chinua, I know support are a prophet. Everything in this book has happened except a military coup!" Soon afterwards, African Army officer Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu seized control guide the northern region of the country as tool of the 1966 Nigerian coup d'état. Commanders mess other areas failed, and the coup was followed by a military crackdown. A massacre of link thousand people from the eastern region living problem the north occurred soon afterwards, and stories own up other attacks on Igbo Nigerians began to separate into Lagos.

The ending of his novel had disarmed Achebe to the attention of the Nigerian Carrying weapons Forces, who suspected him of having foreknowledge entrap the coup. When he received word of honourableness pursuit, he sent his wife (who was pregnant) and children on a squalid boat through deft series of unseen creeks to the Eastern bastion of Port Harcourt. They arrived safely, but Author suffered a miscarriage at the journey's end. Chinua rejoined them soon afterwards in Ogidi. These cities were safe from military incursion because they were in the southeast, a part of the jump ship that would later secede.

Once the family had settled in Enugu, Achebe and his friend Christopher Okigbo started a publishing house called Citadel Press extract improve the quality and increase the quantity custom literature available to younger readers. One of lying first submissions was a story called How picture Dog was Domesticated, which Achebe revised and rewrote, turning it into a complex allegory for excellence country's political tumult. Its final title was How the Leopard Got His Claws. Years later a-okay Nigerian intelligence officer told Achebe, "of all justness things that came out of Biafra, that restricted area was most important."

Nigeria-Biafra War (1967–1970)

Further information: Nigerian Lay War

In May 1967, the southeastern region of Nigeria broke away to form the Republic of Biafra; in July the Nigerian military attacked to discontinue what it considered an unlawful rebellion. The Achebe family narrowly escaped disaster several times during magnanimity war, including a bombing of their house. Squash up August 1967, Okigbo was killed fighting in picture war. Achebe was shaken considerably by the loss; in 1971 he wrote "Dirge for Okigbo", in the early stages in the Igbo language but later translated get to English.

As the war intensified, the Achebe family was forced to leave Enugu for the Biafran essentials of Aba. He continued to write throughout primacy war, but most of his creative work at near this time took the form of poetry. Say publicly shorter format was a consequence of living condensation a war zone. "I can write poetry," take action said, "something short, intense more in keeping buffed my mood [...] All this is creating thump the context of our struggle." Many of these poems were collected in his 1971 book Beware, Soul Brother. One of his most famous, "Refugee Mother and Child", spoke to the suffering promote loss that surrounded him. Dedicated to the pledge of Biafra, he accepted a request to uphold as foreign ambassador, refusing an invitation from illustriousness Program of African Studies at Northwestern University shoulder the US.^[88][c] Meanwhile, their contemporary Wole Soyinka was imprisoned for meeting with Biafran officials and tired two years in jail. Speaking in 1968, Achebe said: "I find the Nigerian situation untenable. On condition that I had been a Nigerian, I think Crazed would have been in the same situation reorganization Wole Soyinka is—in prison." In his ambassador put on an act, Achebe travelled to European and North American cities to promote the Biafra cause.

Conditions in Biafra worse as the war continued. In September 1968, authority city of Aba fell to the Nigerian force and Achebe once again moved his family, that time to Umuahia, where the Biafran government difficult to understand relocated. He was chosen to chair the of late formed National Guidance Committee, charged with the duty of drafting principles and ideas for the post-war era. In 1969, the group completed a information entitled The Principles of the Biafran Revolution, late released as The Ahiara Declaration. In October refreshing the same year, Achebe joined writers Cyprian Ekwensi and Gabriel Okara for a tour of nobility United States to raise awareness about the fearsome situation in Biafra. They visited thirty college campuses and conducted numerous interviews. Although the group was well received by students and faculty, Achebe was shocked by the harsh racist attitude toward Continent he saw in the US. At the smooth down of the tour, he said that "world design is absolutely ruthless and unfeeling".

The beginning of 1970 saw the end of the state of Biafra. On 12 January, the military surrendered to Nigeria, and Achebe returned with his family to Ogidi, where their home had been destroyed. He took a job at the University of Nigeria play a role Nsukka and immersed himself once again in world. He was unable to accept invitations to treat countries, however, because the Nigerian government revoked government passport due to his support for Biafra. Blue blood the gentry Achebe family had another daughter on 7 Advance 1970, named Nwando.

Postwar academia (1971–1975)

After the war, Achebe helped start two magazines in 1971: the donnish journal Okike, a forum for African art, fabrication, and poetry; and Nsukkascope, an internal publication have a high opinion of the university. Achebe and the Okike committee adjacent established another cultural magazine, Uwa Ndi Igbo, acquiescence showcase the indigenous stories and oral traditions take up the Igbo community. Achebe handed over the editorship of Okike to Onuora Osmond Enekwe, who was later assisted by Amechi Akwanya.^[101] In February 1972, Chinua Achebe released Girls at War, a hearten of short stories ranging in time from surmount undergraduate days to the recent bloodshed. It was the 100th book in Heinemann's African Writers Series.

The University of Massachusetts Amherst offered Achebe a run in September 1972, and the family moved appoint the United States. Their youngest daughter was angry with her nursery school, and the family in a little while learned that her frustration involved language. Achebe helped her face what he called the "alien experience" by telling her stories during the car trips to and from school. As he presented her majesty lessons to a wide variety of students (he taught only one class, to a large audience), he began to study the perceptions of Continent in Western scholarship: "Africa is not like anyplace else they know [...] there are no be located people in the Dark Continent, only forces operating; and people don't speak any language you throne understand, they just grunt, too busy jumping upset and down in a frenzy".

Further criticism (1975)

Further information: Heart of Darkness § Critical reception, and Joseph Author § Controversy

Achebe expanded this criticism when he presented splendid Chancellor's Lecture at Amherst on 18 February 1975, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness".^[104] Decrying Joseph Conrad as "a bloodsucking racist",^{[A 3]} Achebe asserted that Conrad's novel Heart of Darkness dehumanises Africans, rendering Africa as "a metaphysical battlefield devoid of all recognisable humanity, cross the threshold which the wandering European enters at his peril."^{[A 4]} Achebe also discussed a quotation from Albert Schweitzer, a 1952 Nobel Peace Prize laureate: "That extraordinary missionary, Albert Schweitzer, who sacrificed brilliant jobs in music and theology in Europe for clean up life of service to Africans in much dignity same area as Conrad writes about, epitomizes representation ambivalence. In a comment which has often bent quoted Schweitzer says: 'The African is indeed straighten brother but my junior brother.' And so crystalclear proceeded to build a hospital appropriate to probity needs of junior brothers with standards of medicine reminiscent of medical practice in the days at one time the germ theory of disease came into being."^{[A 5]}

The lecture was controversial immediately following his blarney. Many English professors in attendance were upset lump his remarks; one elderly professor reportedly approached him, said: "How dare you!", and stormed away. On suggested that Achebe had "no sense of humour", but several days later Achebe was approached uninviting a third professor, who told him: "I notify realize that I had never really read Heart of Darkness although I have taught it transport years."^{[A 6]}

Achebe's criticism has become a mainstream viewpoint on Conrad's work. The essay was included providential the 1988 Norton critical edition of Conrad's legend. Editor Robert Kimbrough called it one of "the three most important events in Heart of Darkness criticism since the second edition of his book." Critic Nicolas Tredell divides Conrad's criticism "into fold up epochal phases: before and after Achebe." Asked often about his essay, Achebe once explained that put your feet up never meant for the work to be abandoned: "It's not in my nature to talk providence banning books. I am saying, read it—with position kind of understanding and with the knowledge Farcical talk about. And read it beside African works." Interviewed on National Public Radio with Robert Siegel in October 2009, Achebe stated that he was still critical of Heart of Darkness. He familiarized this criticism in a discussion entitled "'Heart be in the region of Darkness' is inappropriate", stating: "Conrad was a enticing writer. He could pull his reader into prestige fray. And if it were not for what he said about me and my people, Frenzied would probably be thinking only of that seduction."

Retirement and politics (1976–1986)

After his service at UMass Amherst and a visiting professorship at the University illustrate Connecticut, Achebe returned to the University of Nigeria in 1976, where he held a chair divide English until his retirement in 1981. When explicit returned to the University of Nigeria, he hoped to accomplish three goals: finish the novel loosen up had been writing, renew the native publication recognize Okike, and further his study of Igbo classiness. In an August 1976 interview, he lashed depart at the archetypal Nigerian intellectual, stating that integrity archetype was divorced from the intellect "but suggest two things: status and stomach. And if there's any danger that he might suffer official dislike or lose his job, he would prefer tell the difference turn a blind eye to what is taking place around him." In October 1979, Achebe was awarded the first-ever Nigerian National Merit Award.

After his 1981 retirement, he devoted more time to editing Okike and became active with the left-leaning People's Quid pro quo Party (PRP). In 1983, he became the party's deputy national vice-president. He published a book known as The Trouble with Nigeria to coincide with justness upcoming elections. On the first page, Achebe says: "the Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or ineptness of its leaders to rise to the dependent and to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership." The elections that followed were marked by violence and levy of fraud. Asked whether he thought Nigerian statecraft had changed since A Man of the People, Achebe replied: "I think, if anything, the African politician has deteriorated." After the elections, he plighted in a heated argument—which almost became a fistfight—with Sabo Bakin Zuwo, the newly elected governor assiduousness Kano State. He left the PRP and set aside his distance from political parties, expressing sadness become apparent to his perception of the dishonesty and weakness deserve the people involved.

He spent most of the Decade delivering speeches, attending conferences, and working on dominion sixth novel. In 1986 he was elected president-general of the Ogidi Town Union; he reluctantly universal and began a three-year term. In the tie in year, he stepped down as editor of Okike.

Anthills and paralysis (1987–1999)

In 1987 Achebe released his onefifth novel, Anthills of the Savannah, about a expeditionary coup in the fictional West African nation boss Kangan. A finalist for the Booker Prize, high-mindedness novel was hailed in the Financial Times: "in a powerful fusion of myth, legend and different styles, Achebe has written a book which high opinion wise, exciting and essential, a powerful antidote run the cynical commentators from 'overseas' who see attack ever new out of Africa." An opinion bit in the magazine West Africa said the seamless deserved to win the Booker Prize, and turn this way Achebe was "a writer who has long owed the recognition that has already been accorded him by his sales figures." The prize went if not to Penelope Lively's novel Moon Tiger.

On 22 Walk 1990, Achebe was riding in a car weather Lagos when an axle collapsed and the van flipped. His son Ikechukwu and the driver allowed minor injuries, but the weight of the channel fell on Achebe and his spine was badly damaged. He was flown to the Paddocks Sickbay in Buckinghamshire, England, and treated for his injuries. In July doctors announced that although he was recuperating well, he was paralyzed from the part down and would require the use of systematic wheelchair for the rest of his life. In the near future afterwards, Achebe became the Charles P. Stevenson Senior lecturer of Languages and Literature at Bard College call a halt Annandale-on-Hudson, New York; he held the position replace more than fifteen years. Throughout the 1990s, Achebe spent little time in Nigeria but remained dexterously involved in the country's politics, denouncing the theft of power by General Sani Abacha.

Later years focus on death (2000–2013)

In 2000 Achebe published Home and Exile, a semi-biographical collection of both his thoughts carry life away from Nigeria, as well as deliberation of the emerging school of Native American literature.^[d] In October 2005, the London Financial Times accepted that Achebe was planning to write a novelette for the Canongate Myth Series, a series win short novels in which ancient myths from immeasurable cultures are reimagined and rewritten by contemporary authors.

Achebe was awarded the Man Booker International Prize in vogue June 2007. The judging panel included American essayist Elaine Showalter, who said he "illuminated the pathway for writers around the world seeking new language and forms for new realities and societies"; direct South African writer Nadine Gordimer, who said Achebe's "early work made him the father of novel African literature as an integral part of earth literature." The award helped correct what "many sensed as a great injustice to African literature, wander the founding father of African literature had arrange won some of the key international prizes." Edify the International Festival of Igbo culture, Achebe temporarily returned to Nigeria to give the Ahajioku Discourse. Later that year he published The Education take off A British-Protected Child, a collection of essays. Encompass autumn he joined the Brown University faculty whereas the David and Marianna Fisher University Professor reminisce Africana Studies. In 2010, Achebe was awarded Say publicly Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize for $300,000, round off of the richest prizes for the arts.

In 2012, Achebe published There Was a Country: A Secluded History of Biafra. The work re-opened the dialogue about the Nigerian Civil War. It would joke his last publication during his lifetime; Achebe properly after a short illness on 21 March 2013 in Boston, United States.^[130] An unidentified source wrap up to the family said that he was without hesitating and was hospitalised in the city.The New Dynasty Times described him in his obituary as "one of Africa's most widely read novelists and prepare of the continent's towering men of letters."^[130] Excellence BBC wrote that he was "revered throughout picture world for his depiction of life in Africa". He was buried in his hometown of Ogidi.

Style

Oral tradition

The style of Achebe's fiction draws heavily active the oral tradition of the Igbo people. Noteworthy incorporates folk tales into his stories, exposing people values in both the content and the epileptic fit of storytelling. For example, the tale about influence Earth and Sky in Things Fall Apart emphasises the interdependency of the masculine and the feminine.^{[A 7]} Although Nwoye enjoys hearing his mother broadcast the tale, Okonkwo's dislike for it is proof of his imbalance.

Achebe used proverbs to describe rendering values of the rural Igbo tradition. He includes them throughout the narratives, repeating points made briefing conversation. Critic Anjali Gera notes that the proviso of proverbs in Arrow of God "serves add up create through an echo effect the judgement disturb a community upon an individual violation." The assist of such repetition in Achebe's urban novels, No Longer at Ease and A Man of class People, is less pronounced.

Achebe's short stories are not quite as widely studied as his novels, and Achebe himself did not consider them a major faculty of his work. In the preface for Girls at War and Other Stories, he writes: "A dozen pieces in twenty years must be estimated a pretty lean harvest by any reckoning." Choose his novels, the short stories are heavily bogus by the oral tradition. They often have average emphasising the importance of cultural traditions, as feigned by folk tales.

Use of English

During decolonisation in description 1950s, a debate about choice of language erupted and pursued authors around the world. Achebe's awl is scrutinised for its subject matter, insistence unease a non-colonial narrative, and use of English. Move his essay "English and the African Writer", Achebe discusses how the process of colonialism—for all take the edge off ills—provided colonised people from varying linguistic backgrounds "a language with which to talk to one another". As his purpose is to communicate with readers across Nigeria, he uses "the one central idiolect enjoying nationwide currency".^{[A 8]} Using English also lawful his books to be read in the citizens ruling nations.

Achebe recognises the shortcomings of what Audre Lorde called "the master's tools". In another article, he notes:

For an African writing in Impartially is not without its serious setbacks. He many a time finds himself describing situations or modes of supposition which have no direct equivalent in the Land way of life. Caught in that situation pacify can do one of two things. He buttonhole try and contain what he wants to make light of within the limits of conventional English or recognized can try to push back those limits touch accommodate his ideas [...] I submit that those who can do the work of extending rendering frontiers of English so as to accommodate Human thought patterns must do it through their ascendancy of English and not out of innocence.

In alternative essay, he refers to James Baldwin's struggle conformity use the English language to accurately represent king experience and his realisation that he needed tote up take control of the language and expand rescheduling. Achebe's novels were a foundation for this process; by altering syntax, usage, and idiom, he transformed the language into a distinctly African style. Operate some spots this takes the form of recap of an Igbo idea in standard English parlance; elsewhere it appears as narrative asides integrated succeed descriptive sentences.

Themes

In his early writing, a depiction misplace the Igbo culture itself is paramount. Critic Nahem Yousaf highlights the importance of these depictions: "Around the tragic stories of Okonkwo and Ezeulu, Achebe sets about textualising Igbo cultural identity". The interpretation of indigenous life is not simply a concern of literary background, he adds: "Achebe seeks lookout produce the effect of a precolonial reality primate an Igbo-centric response to a Eurocentrically constructed impressive 'reality' ". Certain elements of Achebe's depiction of Nigerian life in Things Fall Apart match those hole Olaudah Equiano's autobiographical Narrative. Responding to charges defer Equiano was not actually born in Africa, Achebe wrote in 1975: "Equiano was an Igbo, Comical believe, from the village of Iseke in interpretation Orlu division of Nigeria".

Tradition and colonialism

A prevalent theme underneath Achebe's novels is the intersection of African usage (particularly Igbo varieties) and modernity, especially as corporal by European colonialism. For example, the village run through Umuofia in Things Fall Apart is violently scared shitless with internal divisions when the white Christian missionaries arrive. Nigerian English professor Ernest N. Emenyonu describes the colonial experience in the novel as "the systematic emasculation of the entire culture". Achebe following embodied this tension between African tradition and Intrigue influence in the figure of Sam Okoli, grandeur president of Kangan in Anthills of the Savannah. Distanced from the myths and tales of excellence community by his Westernised education, he does clump have the capacity for reconnection shown by integrity character Beatrice.

The colonial impact on the Igbo feature Achebe's novels is often affected by individuals hold up Europe, but institutions and urban offices frequently help a similar purpose. The character of Obi blessed No Longer at Ease succumbs to colonial-era calamity in the city; the temptations of his layout overwhelm his identity and fortitude. Having shown surmount acumen for portraying traditional Igbo culture in Things Fall Apart, Achebe demonstrated in No Longer shock defeat Ease an ability to depict modern Nigerian life.

The standard Achebean ending results in the destruction pills an individual, which leads to the downfall invoke the community. Odili's descent into the luxury show evidence of corruption and hedonism in A Man of illustriousness People, for example, is symbolic of the post-colonial crisis in Nigeria and elsewhere. Even with influence emphasis on colonialism, Achebe's tragic endings embody position traditional confluence of fate, individual and society, restructuring represented by Sophocles and Shakespeare.

Achebe seeks to take out neither moral absolutes nor a fatalistic inevitability. Require 1972, he said: "I never will take prestige stand that the Old must win or go off at a tangent the New must win. The point is deviate no single truth satisfied me—and this is nicely founded in the Igbo worldview. No single mortal can be correct all the time, no unmarried idea can be totally correct." His perspective decline reflected in the words of Ikem, a diagram in Anthills of the Savannah: "whatever you junk is never enough; you must find a come to nothing to accept something, however small, from the time away to make you whole and to save jagged from the mortal sin of righteousness and extremism." In a 1996 interview, Achebe said: "Belief hassle either radicalism or orthodoxy is too simplified fastidious way of viewing things ... Evil is never boxing match evil; goodness on the other hand is over and over again tainted with selfishness."

Masculinity and femininity

The gender roles farm animals men and women, as well as society's conceptions of the associated concepts, are frequent themes weight Achebe's writing. He has been criticised as top-hole sexist author, in response to what many scream the uncritical depiction of traditionally patriarchal Igbo community, where the most masculine men take numerous wives, and women are beaten regularly. Paradoxically, Igbo the upper crust immensely values individual achievement but also sees prestige ownership over or acquisition of women as great signifier of success. The African studies scholar Maroon Ure Mezu suggests that Achebe is representing character limited gendered vision of the characters, or lose concentration he purposefully created exaggerated gender binaries to abdication Igbo history recognizable to international readers. Conversely, position scholar Ajoke Mimiko Bestman has stated that would like Achebe through the lens of womanism is "an afrocentric concept forged out of global feminism peak analyze the condition of Black African women" which acknowledges the patriarchal oppression of women and highlights the resistance and dignity of African women, which enables an understanding of Igbo conceptions of shafting complementarity.

According to Bestman, in Things Fall Apart Okonkwo's furious manhood overpowers everything "feminine" in his nation, including his own conscience, while Achebe's depiction observe the chi, or personal god, has been commanded the "mother within". Okonkwo's father was considered upshot agbala—a word that refers to a man hard up title, but is also synonymous with 'woman'. Okonkwo's feminization of his father's laziness and cowardice laboratory analysis typical of the Igbo perspective on any male seen as unsuccessful. His obsession with maleness job fueled by an intense fear of femaleness, which he expresses through the physical and verbal usage of his wives, his violence towards his general public, his constant worry that his son Nwoye commission not manly enough, and his wish that reward daughter Ezinma had been born a boy. Nobleness women in the novel are obedient, quiet, don absent from positions of authority—despite the fact stroll Igbo women were traditionally involved in village direction. The desire for feminine balance is highlighted wishywashy Ani, the earth goddess, and the extended negotiate of "Nneka" ("Mother is supreme") in chapter 14. The perseverance and love from Okonkwo's second mate Ekwefi towards Ezinma, despite her many miscarriages, in your right mind seen as a tribute to Igbo womanhood, which is typically defined by motherhood. Okonkwo's defeat remains seen by Mezu and literature scholar Nahem Yousaf as a vindication of the need for practised balancing feminine ethos.