Heinemann Book of Contemporary African Short Stories

by Achebe, Chinua; Innes, C.L.

• ISBN13: 9780435905668
• ISBN10: 043590566X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-08-03
• Publisher: Longman

Summary

This important anthology draws together well-established authors and the best of new writers, capturing the diversity of African writing across the continent.

Author Biography

CHINUA ACHEBE was born in 1930 in the village of Ogidi in Eastern Nigeria. After studying medicine and literature at the University of Ibadan, he went to work for the Nigerian broadcasting company in Lagos. Things Fall Apart, his first novel was published in 1958. It sold over 2,000,000 copies, and has been translated into 30 languages. It was followed by No Longer at Ease, then Arrow of God (which won the first New Statesman Jock Campbell Prize), then A Man of the People (a novel dealing with post-independence Nigeria). Achebe has also written short stories and children's books, and Beware Soul Brother, a book of his poetry, won the Commonwealth Poetry Prize in 1972.Achebe has been at the Universities of Nigeria, Massachusetts and Connecticut, and among the many honours he has received are the award of a Fellowship of the Modern Language Association of America, and doctorates from the Universities of Stirling, Southampton and Kent. He followed Heinrich Boll, th

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
SOUTHERN AFRICA
The prophetess	8	(17)
Njabulo S. Ndebele
Amnesty	25	(8)
Nadine Gordimer
Wake	33	(24)
Lindiwe Mabuza
A wasted land	57	(10)
Daniel Mandishona
The birds of God	67	(5)
Mia Couto
CENTRAL AFRICA
The rubbish dump	72	(9)
Steve Chimombo
The man	81	(6)
E. B. Dongala
EAST AFRICA
Cages	87	(7)
Abdulrazak Gurnah
Government by magic spell	94	(6)
Saida Hagi-Dirie Herzi
A night out	100	(4)
Tololwa Marti Mollel
On the market day	104	(10)
Kyalo Mativo
Leaving	114	(7)
M. G. Vassanji
NORTHERN AFRICA
The foreigner, sister of the foreign woman	121	(8)
Assia Djebar
Road block	129	(5)
Jamal Mahjoub
WEST AFRICA
Converging city	134	(12)
Ben Okri
The hotel	146	(3)
Adewale Maja-Pearce
The housegirl	149	(16)
Okey Chigbo
The miracle	165	(14)
Ba'Bila Mutia
Weaverdom	179	(6)
Tijan M. Sallah
Vacancy for the post of Jesus Christ	185	(12)
Kojo Laing
Biographical notes	197