BIOGRAPHY
Chinua Achebe was born in Ogidi in eastern Nigeria on November 16, 1930, to Isaiah Okafor Achebe and Janet Achebe. His parents, though they instilled in him many of the values of their traditional Igbo culture, were devout evan- gelical Protestants; his childhood, therefore, was marked by the rich ambivalence of a complex inheritance. He attended mission schools, for example, but re- mained emotionally close to many of his relatives who were not Christians. These early negotiations of cultural duality would later enable him to develop a necessary distance from the competing and conflicting forces that had shaped his sense of self and formed his worldview—a distance that he now affirms as a prerequisite to see the totality of life ‘‘steadily and fully’’ (Morning Yet on Creation Day, 68).
In 1944 Achebe enrolled at the prestigious Government College in Umuahia. Four years later he entered the London-affiliated University College at Ibadan to study medicine, but soon abandoned medicine in favor of literature, philos- ophy, and history. He became involved in a variety of political and cultural activities on campus. He edited, for example, Ibadan’s University Herald, to which he also contributed essays and short fiction, and wrote occasional com- mentaries for student publications such as the Bug and Eagle.
After his graduation in 1953 Achebe joined the Nigerian Broadcasting Cor- poration. He first served as talks producer (1954–57), then became controller (1958–61), and finally assumed the directorship of the corporation’s External Broadcasting (1961–66).
In 1958 Achebe published his first novel, Things Fall Apart. Heinemann Ed- ucational Books published it rather reluctantly—the editors were unsure if Western readers would buy a novel by an African—and printed only 2,000 copies. But the novel became a stunning success: since its first publication, it has been translated into nearly fifty languages and has sold millions of copies interna- tionally. Though it was not the first novel published in English by an African author, its spectacular worldwide success inaugurated a new era in African lit- erary history and helped secure a firm foundation for an emerging tradition. Achebe has published four other novels, two collections of essays, a book of short fiction, a volume of poetry, and numerous miscellaneous pieces, but Things Fall Apart remains his most widely read work.
One of Africa’s most outspoken intellectuals, Achebe has been and continues to be a public figure deeply involved in the political life of his nation. During the Nigerian Civil War (1967–70), precipitated in part by Biafra’s attempt to secede from the Nigerian federation, Achebe—a staunch supporter of Biafran independence—became the province’s most committed and eloquent spokes- person. In 1983, upon the death of Mallan Aminu Kano, Achebe was elected the deputy national president of the People’s Redemption Party. He remains a keen observer of Nigeria’s turbulent politics and continues to be a fearless critic of the military dictators whose coups and countercoups have profoundly desta- bilized his nation’s democratic foundations.
Achebe has also played a pivotal personal role in the emergence of postco- lonial Anglophone literature in Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa. As the director of Heinemann Educational Books in Nigeria, he has encouraged and published the work of dozens of African writers. Okike: An African Journal of New Writ- ing, which he founded in 1971, has provided a forum for a generation of young African artists. Uwa ndi Igbo: A Journal of Igbo Life and Culture, a bilingual periodical that he established in 1984, is an invaluable source for students of Igbo civilization.
Achebe is a superb storyteller, a gifted poet, an insightful literary critic, and a brilliant cultural commentator; his phenomenal career as a professional writer spans five decades. Among the numerous honors he has received are the Jock Campbell Award for Literature (1964), the Commonwealth Poetry Prize (1972), the Nigerian National Merit Award (1979), and over a dozen honorary doctor- ates. He has held professorships at numerous African as well as North American universities. Achebe and his wife, Dr. Christie Okoli Achebe, until recently lived in Nsukka, where he was associated with the Institute for Africa Studies at the University of Nigeria. Currently he is at Bard College in upstate New York. They have four children: Chinelo, Ikechukwu, Chidi, and Nwando.
To appreciate fully the achievement of Chinua Achebe, one must understand his artistic credo, which he has eloquently articulated in ‘‘The Novelist as Teacher’’—an essay that first appeared in London’s New Statesman (1965) and was subsequently reprinted in his Morning Yet on Creation Day (1975). Achebe views himself, first and foremost, as a teacher who reflects as well as shapes the communal visions and values of his people. He summarily rejects the modern Western notion of the artist as an alienated individual who projects a private vision forged in isolation. To Achebe, the artist is an integral part of his or her community; what he or she creates, therefore, must have functional value and relevance to those individuals who make up the community. He also rejects the pseudo-universalist precepts and apolitical pretensions of the Western aesthetic orthodoxy. To Achebe, art and political concerns, be they local or global, are not mutually exclusive. Indeed, he insists that the artist has an obligation to remain committed to the well-being of his or her people: the most compelling duty of the current generation of African intellectuals, according to Achebe, is to help their fellow Africans regain the dignity and self-esteem lost during the colonial years. He defines himself as a cultural nationalist with a revolutionary mission: ‘‘to help my society regain belief in itself and put away the complexes of the years of denigration and self-abasement’’ (Morning Yet on Creation Day, 44). His artistic objective, then, is explicitly political: the achievement of psy- chosocial rehabilitation through cultural literacy. This educational intent is man- ifest in much of Achebe’s work.
Important Links
Short Stories by Chinua Achebe
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