Florence Onyebuchi "Buchi" Emecheta was a Nigerian-born novelist, based in the UK from 1962, who also wrote plays and an autobiography, as well as works for children. She was the author of more than 20 books, including Second Class Citizen (1974), The Bride Price (1976), The Slave Girl (1977) and The Joys of Motherhood (1979). Most of her early novels were published by Allison and Busby, where her editor was Margaret Busby.
Bediako Asare is a Ghanaian journalist and author, initially from Ghana. He began his career working on local newspapers, then relocated to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in 1963, to help launch The Nationalist newspaper.
Nigerian literature may be roughly defined as the literary writing by citizens of the nation of Nigeria for Nigerian readers, addressing Nigerian issues. This encompasses writers in a number of languages, including not only English but Igbo, Urhobo, Yoruba, and in the northern part of the county Hausa and Nupe. More broadly, it includes British Nigerians, Nigerian Americans and other members of the African diaspora.
The Bride Price is a 1976 novel by Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta. It concerns, in part, the problems of women in post-colonial Nigeria. The author dedicated this novel to her mother, Alice Ogbanje Emecheta.
Florence Nwanzuruahu Nkiru Nwapa, was a Nigerian author who has been called the mother of modern African Literature. She was the forerunner to a generation of African women writers, and the first African woman novelist to be published in the English language in Britain. She achieved international recognition with her first novel Efuru, published in 1966 by Heinemann Educational Books. While never considering herself a feminist, she was best known for recreating life and traditions from an Igbo woman's viewpoint.
Miriam Tlali was a South African novelist. She was the first black woman in South Africa to publish an English-language novel, Muriel at Metropolitan, in 1975. She was also one of the first to write about Soweto. She also wrote Amandla in 1980 which focuses on the Soweto Uprising in 1976, as well as a collection of short stories called Soweto Stories which was published in 1989. Most of her writing was originally banned by the South African apartheid regime.
Frank Kobina Parkes was a Ghanaian journalist, broadcaster and poet. He was the author of one book, Songs from the Wilderness, but is widely anthologised and is perhaps best known for his poem "African Heaven", which echoes the title of Carl Van Vechten's controversial 1926 novel Nigger Heaven, and was selected by Langston Hughes for inclusion in the groundbreaking anthology of African writing An African Treasury (1960). Parkes' poetic style, an intelligent, rhythmic free verse brimming with confidence and undercut with humour, is believed to owe much to the Senegalese poet David Diop, one of the pioneers of the négritude movement. Reviewing Songs from the Wilderness, Mbella Sonne Dipoko said: "Mr Parkes is one of the fine poets writing today about Africa and the world." The book was hailed as "...a landmark not only in Ghanaian poetry but in African poetry as a whole".
Pacesetter Novels are a collection of 130 works of popular fiction written by notable African authors, published by Macmillan. The series was started in 1977, with the first book being Director! by Agbo Areo.
Dessa Rose is a novel by Sherley Anne Williams published in 1986 by HarperCollins. The book is a neo-slave narrative, incorporating many elements of traditional slave narratives. The book is divided into three sections: "The Darky", "The Wench" and "The Negress". The sections represent a different stage of growth in the life of the protagonist, Dessa Rose.
Gwendolen a 1989 novel by Nigerian-born writer Buchi Emecheta, also known by its United States title The Family. It is her tenth novel.
Ifeoma Okoye is a Nigerian novelist. She has been referred to by fans as "the most important female novelist from Nigeria after Flora Nwapa and Buchi Emecheta," according to Oyekan Owomoyela. She was born in Anambra State in Eastern Region, Nigeria. She went to school at St. Monica's College in Ogbunike to receive a teaching certificate in 1959. She then graduated from the University of Nigeria in Nsukka to earn a Bachelor of Arts honours degree in English in 1977. She wrote novels including Behind the Clouds, children's novels and short stories, such as The Village Boy and Eme Goes to School.
Mother Reader: Essential Writings on Motherhood is an anthology of writings on motherhood edited by Canadian artist Moyra Davey.
The Slave Girl is a 1977 novel by Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta that was published in the UK by Allison and Busby and in the US by George Braziller. It won the Jock Campbell Award from the New Statesman in 1978. The novel was Emecheta's fourth book; it was dedicated to her editor Margaret Busby.
Idu is a 1970 novel and the second novel put out by Nigerian novelist Flora Nwapa. The book centers around Idu, a young woman in a Nigerian village whose husband has died, and her efforts to be reunited with him. The novel has been seen as one of Nwapa's more controversial works for its focus on Idu's reliance on her husband.
Second Class Citizen is a 1974 novel by Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta, first published in London by Allison and Busby, where her editor was Margaret Busby. It was subsequently published in the US by George Braziller in 1975. A poignant story of a resourceful Nigerian woman who overcomes strict tribal domination of women and countless setbacks to achieve an independent life for herself and her children, the novel is often described as semi-autobiographical. The protagonist Adah's journey from Nigeria to London – where despite atrocious living conditions and a violent marriage, she "finds refuge in her dream of becoming a writer" – follows closely Emecheta's own trajectory as an author.
Pauline Ada Uwakweh is a Nigerian writer and academic. Writing as Pauline Onwubiko, she published Running for Cover (1988), a children's novel giving a child's-eye view of the Nigerian civil war. She is a Professor of Literature in the English Department at North Carolina A&T State University. Her specialism is African writing and literature from the African diaspora, particularly women's writing.
Double Yoke is a 1982 novel written by Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta. It was published in the United States on September 2, 1982, by George Braziller.
In the Ditch is a 1972 novel written by Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta. It was first published on New Statesman as a regular column then published in 1972 by Allison & Busby in London, where her editor was Margaret Busby.
The Son of the House is a family saga novel written by the Nigerian author Cheluchi Onyemelukwe. Her debut novel, it was first published by Parrésia Publishers and Penguin Random House South Africa in 2019.
Destination Biafra is a 1982 novel by Nigerian writer Buchi Emecheta, first published in London by Allison & Busby. It is considered to be Emecheta's personal account of the Biafra War. Destination Biafra was republished in paperback on 1 March 1994 by Heinemann Educational Books as part of the African Writers Series.
