Quote: "Art is man's constant effort to create for himself a different order of reality from that which is given to him." - Chinua Achebe
Achebe's first lessons were taught in Igbo at the church school in Ogidi. He began to learn English at the age of eight. An avid reader and an outstanding student, Achebe was selected at fourteen to attend Government College, a highly selective secondary school in Umuahia, where one of his classmates was the poet Christopher Okigbo. Upon graduation, Achebe accepted a scholarship to study medicine at University College in lbadan, but after one year decided to switch to the study of English literature, forfeiting his scholarship. With the financial assistance of his older brother John, he was able to continue his studies.
In 1958 Achebe published Things Fall Apart which won him the Margaret Wrong Memorial Prize for the novel's contribution to African literature. In 1960, the year of Nigeria's independence, Achebe published No Longer at Ease and was awarded the Nigerian National Trophy for Literature. Achebe spent the remainder of 1960 and part of 1961 traveling through East Africa, interviewing other African writers. After his return to Nigeria he married Christie Chinwe Okoli, with whom he was to have four children, and was appointed Director of External Broadcasting for NBC.
After the second coup, and during the Nigerian Civil War (1967-70) he became a spokesperson for the Biafran cause in Europe and North America. He also served as a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Nigeria in Nsukka which was renamed the University of Biafra during the war.
After three years of bitter struggle, Biafra surrendered, and Achebe, more dedicated than ever to the preservation of Igbo culture, began editing Okike: An African Journal of New Writing. He published his literary response to the war in Beware Soul Brother (1971) and Girls at War and Other Stories (1972), winning the Commonwealth Poetry Prize in 1972 for Beware Soul Brother, which was published in the United States as Christmas in Biafra and Other Poems (1 973).
Quote: "When suffering knocks at your door and you say there is no seat for
him, he tells you not to worry because he has brought his own stool." - Chinua Achebe
From 1972 to 1976, Achebe taught in the United States at the
University of Massachusetts in Amherst, where his wife earned a
doctorate, and the University of Connecticut. After the 1976
assassination of Murtala Muhammed, for whom Achebe had great respect,
the author returned to teach at the University of Nigeria at Nsukka.
In 1979, Achebe was elected Chairman of the Association of Nigerian
Authors and received the Nigerian National Merit Award and the Order
of the Federal Republic. In 1982, he and Obiora Udechukwu edited Aka
Weta, an anthology of "egwu" verse.After Shagari's re-election and removal from office by a subsequent military coup, Achebe once again concentrated his energies on artistic and cultural projects, editing the bilingual Uwa ndi lgbo: a Journal of Igbo Life and Culture. In 1986, Achebe was appointed Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the State University of Anambra at Enugu. The following year, Achebe published his first novel in twenty years, Anthills of the Savannah (1987) and returned to teach in the United States at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, the City College of New York, and Bard College. In 1988, he published Hopes and Impediments: Selected Essays, 1965-87
Other Works by Chinua Achebe:
Things Fall Apart, 1958
No Longer at Ease, 1960
The Sacrificial Egg and Other Stories, 1962
Arrow of God, 1964
A Man of the People, 1966
Chike and the River, 1966
Beware, Soul-Brother, and Other Poems, 1971
How the Leopard Got His Claws (with John Iroaganachi), 1972
Girls at War, 1973
Christmas at Biafra, and Other Poems, 1973
Morning Yet on Creation Day, 1975
The Flute, 1975
The Drum, 1978
Don't Let Him Die: An Anthology of Memorial Poems for Christofer Okigbo (editor with Dubem Okafor), 1978
Aka Weta: An Anthology of Igbo Poetry (co-editor), 1982
The Trouble With Nigeria, 1984
African Short Stories, 1984
Anthills of the Savannah, 1988
Hopes and Impediments, 1988
No Longer at Ease, 1960
The Sacrificial Egg and Other Stories, 1962
Arrow of God, 1964
A Man of the People, 1966
Chike and the River, 1966
Beware, Soul-Brother, and Other Poems, 1971
How the Leopard Got His Claws (with John Iroaganachi), 1972
Girls at War, 1973
Christmas at Biafra, and Other Poems, 1973
Morning Yet on Creation Day, 1975
The Flute, 1975
The Drum, 1978
Don't Let Him Die: An Anthology of Memorial Poems for Christofer Okigbo (editor with Dubem Okafor), 1978
Aka Weta: An Anthology of Igbo Poetry (co-editor), 1982
The Trouble With Nigeria, 1984
African Short Stories, 1984
Anthills of the Savannah, 1988
Hopes and Impediments, 1988
Quote: "One of the truest tests of integrity is its blunt refusal to be compromised." - Chinua Achebe
