Chinua Achebe

Chinua Achebe (16 November 1930 – 21 March 2013) was a Nigerian novelist, poet and critic regarded as a central figure of modern African literature (Wikipedia). Born in Ogidi and raised between Igbo tradition and colonial Christianity, he studied at what is now the University of Ibadan and worked for the Nigerian Broadcasting Service in Lagos.

His first novel, Things Fall Apart (1958), is, according to Wikipedia, the most widely studied, translated and read African novel; with No Longer at Ease (1960) and Arrow of God (1964) it forms his "African Trilogy". Later novels include A Man of the People (1966) and Anthills of the Savannah (1987). With the publisher Heinemann he began the African Writers Series, which launched the careers of writers such as Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o and Flora Nwapa.

Achebe was born at St Simon's Church, Nneobi, near Ogidi, and baptised Albert Chinualumogu. His father, Isaiah Okafo Achebe, was a teacher and evangelist and an early Christian convert in Ogidi; his mother, Janet Anaenechi Iloegbunam, a blacksmith's daughter from Awka, was a leader among church women. Both parents stood at the crossroads of traditional culture and Christian influence, which deeply affected Chinua: his father stopped practising Odinani, the religion of his ancestors, but still respected its traditions under the influence of his uncle, a titled leader who refused to convert (Wikipedia).

He went to secondary school at Government College Umuahia, in present-day Abia State, and was among the first intake of University College, Ibadan (now the University of Ibadan), then an associate college of the University of London, where he was given a bursary to study medicine. At Ibadan he became fiercely critical of the way Western literature depicted Africa (Wikipedia).

When Biafra broke away in 1967 he supported its independence and acted as an ambassador for its cause. He won the Man Booker International Prize in 2007, and from 2009 until his death was professor of African studies at Brown University in the United States (Wikipedia).