Podcast
Questions and Answers
Match the African writers with their nationalities:
Match the African writers with their nationalities:
Chinua Achebe = Nigerian Wole Soyinka = Ghanian Kofi Awoonor = Kenyan Ngungi wa Thiong'o = Ugandan
Match the African writers with their notable works:
Match the African writers with their notable works:
Chinua Achebe = Things Fall Apart Wole Soyinka = A Dance of the Forests Kofi Awoonor = Weep Not, Child Ngungi wa Thiong'o = This Earth, My Brother
Match the African writers with their awards/recognitions:
Match the African writers with their awards/recognitions:
Chinua Achebe = Grand Prix de la Memoir Wole Soyinka = Nobel Prize for Literature Kofi Awoonor = None Ngungi wa Thiong'o = None
Match the African writers with their literary styles:
Match the African writers with their literary styles:
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Match the African writers with the themes of their works:
Match the African writers with the themes of their works:
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Match the African writers with their occupations:
Match the African writers with their occupations:
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Match the African writers with the languages they wrote in:
Match the African writers with the languages they wrote in:
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Match the African writers with their notable poetry collections:
Match the African writers with their notable poetry collections:
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Match the following authors with their notable works:
Match the following authors with their notable works:
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Match the following authors with their nationalities:
Match the following authors with their nationalities:
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Match the following authors with their literary genres:
Match the following authors with their literary genres:
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Match the following authors with their awards:
Match the following authors with their awards:
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Match the following authors with their works that critique social conditions:
Match the following authors with their works that critique social conditions:
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Match the following authors with their languages of composition:
Match the following authors with their languages of composition:
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Match the following authors with their notable works in the 21st century:
Match the following authors with their notable works in the 21st century:
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Match the following authors with their historical subjects:
Match the following authors with their historical subjects:
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Study Notes
Prominent African Writers
- Chinua Achebe: a Nigerian novelist, poet, critic, and professor, honored with the Grand Prix de la Memoir of the 2019 edition of the Grand Prix of Literary Associations.
- Achebe's first novel, "Things Fall Apart", is the most widely read book in modern African literature, exploring traditional Igbo life at the time of colonialism and missionary arrival.
Wole Soyinka
- First black African to be awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize for Literature.
- Soyinka's play "A Dance of the Forests" was written for Nigerian independence celebrations, parodying the emerging nation by stripping it of romantic legend.
Kofi Awoonor
- Ghanian novelist and poet who wrote "This Earth, My Brother", a novel-poem hybrid.
- The novel explores the new nation of Ghana through a dual narrative, representing a day in the life of an attorney and a symbol-laden mystical journey.
Ngungi wa Thiong'o
- East Africa's leading novelist, author of "Weep Not, Child", the first major novel in English by an East African.
- "Weep Not, Child" deals with the Mau-Mau Uprising, a war in the British Kenya Colony.
Okot p' Bitek
- Ugandan poet, novelist, and social anthropologist who wrote three verse collections: Song of Lawino, Song of Ocol, and Two Songs.
- Song of Lawino, a long poem, deals with the tribulations of a rural African wife whose husband has taken up urban life and wishes everything to be westernized.
Nadine Gordimer
- South African writer and recipient of the 1991 Nobel Prize in Literature.
- Gordimer wrote "The Conservationist", a novel that critiques South Africa through the character study of a successful industrial executive.
Jacques Rabemananjara
- Malagasy playwright and poet who wrote "Les dieux malgaches", the first modern Malagasy play in French.
- The play deals with the pre-colonial past and the coup that unseated King Radama II in 1863.
Es'kia Mphahlele
- Author of the South African classic autobiography "Down Second Avenue", which explores the growth of a young man into adulthood with penetrating social criticism of institutionalized racial segregation.
Thomas Mofolo
- Greatest writer from the Sotho people in Africa, who created the first Western-style novels in the Basotho language.
- Mofolo's novel "Chaka" is a classic historical novel about the rise and fall of the Zulu king Shaka.
Examples of African Literature in the 21st Century
- "My Black is Beautiful (Woman)" and "My Black is Beautiful (Man)" by Naomi Johnson (2012)
- "A Private Experience" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2009)
- "Inscape" by Yaa Gyasi (2015)
- "War for God" by Zaynab Quadri (2016)
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Description
Test your knowledge of prominent African writers, including Chinua Achebe and Wole Soyinka, and their contributions to modern African literature.
