Chinua Achebe

Plot

Chinua Achebe (1930-2013) was a Nigerian writer and principal figure in modern African literature most famous for his novel Things Fall Apart (1958). His well-known 1975 lecture on Joseph Conrad (whom he described as ‘a thoroughgoing racist’) is a landmark text in postcolonial criticism. Achebe won the Man Booker International Prize in 2007 and received over thirty honorary degrees. Arthur Ravenscroft’s study examines Achebe’s contribution to postcolonial writing and criticism, including his Editorship of Heinemann’s acclaimed African Writers Series (AWS) which has shaped African literature for international audiences since 1962.