Recognizing Chinua Achebe
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| Chinua Achebe |
What I don’t want this to read like: I would hate it very
much if this reads like a mere attempt to pay tribute to a popular person who
has passed away. It is not about adding my voice to the loud voices lauding
Chinua Achebe. Headlines are already overflowing with news of how various
personalities ‘describe the late Chinua Achebe as....’
This is not the usual cliché. Rather, my sincere intention
is to recognize the laudable contributions of a good man.
He was born in 1930, precisely on the 16th of November. He
hails from Anambra State, southeastern Nigeria.
I particularly recognize that he was thirty years old when Nigeria
gained independence.
The special thing about Professor Achebe, in my opinion, is that
he gave Africa a voice when we desperately needed one. For someone my age (born after 1990),
imagining the Africa of the colonial days and early post-colonial period, would
have been very difficult but for writers like Achebe. I look into his works and
I see time periods, long before I was born. I see the people who lived in those
times. How they lived, what mattered to them, their limitations, our
similarities, our differences. I see the
changes that have occurred. I also see how the occurrences of those periods are
casual as regards the present situation.
Chinua Achebe, in my opinion spent time cataloging history in form of
realist literature. He told more than history books say, and for this, I recognize
him.
Then is the issue of the Nigerian civil war, another aspect
of my country’s history that forms a part of the clouds hanging over our heads.
As resolved as it seems, it remains vocal and its consequences lie subtly under
the carpet where we have swept it, causing a bulge on the floor that affects
our feet as we walk. Achebe added his voice to this. In a short story of his that
I have read, ‘Civil Peace’, I got a glimpse of what life became for some middle
class families in eastern Nigeria, after the war. For this again, I recognize him.
Chinua Achebe was a Mentor. Or should I say is a Mentor. Renowned
writer, Chimamanda Adiche, professes that Achebe gave her the license to write.
From reading his works, she realized that
people like her could exist in literature. She has gone ahead to make full use
of the license and is currently a leading voice in African writing. There
certainly are many more like her who have recognized that they too could tell stories
about things with which they are familiar, books are not an exclusive of the White
man. For this, I recognize Chinua
Achebe.
The impression of Africa as a place where creatures similar
to but less than humans, live rather backward lives, is said to be viral in the
West. I strongly believe that correcting
such impressions should be by Africans living excellent lives, doing excellent
things, leading our affairs in an excellent manner. By so doing, we would ‘un-tell’ the already told negative
stories. We would show that like all other human beings (regardless of skin
colour), we think, we live, we feel, we are both wise and foolish, we are not
one thing. We are many things, like all other humans in the world. Chinua
Achebe remains one of those Africans who are internationally recognized for
excellence. In 2007, he was awarded the Man-Booker
International Prize, in recognition of his lifetime literary achievements. He serves to contort the sad stories about the
black man. He makes it unarguable that the black man is not an idiot. As a matter
of fact, he proves by his life that there is no such thing as the black man,
there are black men. For this, I recognize Professor Achebe.
His works include:
Novels
- Things Fall Apart (1958)
- No Longer at Ease (1960)
- Arrow of God (1964)
- A Man of the People (1966)
- Anthills of the Savannah (1987)
Short stories
- Marriage Is A Private Affair (1952)
- Dead Men's Path (1953)
- The Sacrificial Egg and Other Stories (1953)
- Civil Peace (1971)
- Girls at War and Other Stories (1973)
- African Short Stories (editor, with C.L. Innes) (1985)
- Heinemann Book of Contemporary African Short Stories (editor, with C.L. Innes) (1992)
- The Voter
Poetry
- Beware, Soul-Brother, and Other Poems (1971) (published in the US as Christmas at Biafra, and Other Poems, 1973)
- Don't let him die: An anthology of memorial poems for Christopher Okigbo (editor, with Dubem Okafor) (1978)
- Another Africa (1998)
- Collected Poems Carcanet Press (2005)
- Refugee Mother And Child
- Vultures
Essays, criticism, non-fiction and
political commentary
- The Novelist as Teacher (1965) - also in Hopes and Impediments
- An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" (1975) - also in Hopes and Impediments
- Morning Yet on Creation Day (1975)
- The Trouble With Nigeria (1984)
- Hopes and Impediments (1988)
- Home and Exile (2000)
- Education of a British protected Child (6 October 2009)
- There Was A Country: A Personal History of Biafra, (11 October 2012 )
Children's books
- Chike and the River (1966)
- How the Leopard Got His Claws (with John Iroaganachi) (1972)
- The Flute (1975)
- The Drum (1978)
Source of list: Wikipedia Encyclopedia
There is so much more to be said. I cannot say it all. I
have said my bit in recognition. I refuse to mourn his departure regretfully. I
realize that he was human and had mortality hanging over his head, so I recognize
him for the works he spent his time doing, for his legacy.
