Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, PRH Literary Giant, Dies at 87
© Daniel Anderson
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, an award-winning novelist, playwright, and essayist from Kenya whose novels have been translated into more than thirty languages, has died at 87.
Ngũgĩ’s works are celebrated for their rich, poignant storytelling and their insightful reflections on the socio-political landscape of his homeland in Kenya.
Read his obituary in The New York Times here.
About Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o‘s works:
IN THE HOUSE OF THE INTERPRETER: A Memoir
by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Anchor)
Renowned novelist, poet, playwright, and literary critic Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o was a student at a prestigious, British-run boarding school near Nairobi when the tumultuous Mau Mau Uprising for independence and Kenyan sovereignty gripped his country. While he enjoyed scouting trips and chess tournaments, his family home was razed to the ground and his brother, a member of the insurgency, was captured by the British and taken to a concentration camp. But Ngũgĩ could not escape history, and eventually found himself jailed after a run in with the forces of colonialism.
DREAMS IN A TIME OF WAR: A Childhood Memoir by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Anchor)
Born in 1938 in rural Kenya, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o came of age in the shadow of World War II, amidst the terrible bloodshed in the war between the Mau Mau and the British. The son of a man whose four wives bore him more than a score of children, young Ngũgĩ displayed what was then considered a bizarre thirst for learning, yet it was unimaginable that he would grow up to become a world-renowned novelist, playwright, and critic.
WIZARD OF THE CROW: A Novel by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Anchor)
Set in the fictional Free Republic of Aburiria, WIZARD OF THE CROW dramatizes with corrosive humor and keenness of observation a battle for the souls of the Aburirian people, between a megalomaniac dictator and an unemployed young man who embraces the mantle of a magician. Fashioning the stories of the powerful and the ordinary into a dazzling mosaic, in this magnificent work of magical realism, Ngugi wa’Thiong’o—one of the most widely read African writers—reveals humanity in all its endlessly surprising complexity.
WEEP NOT, CHILD by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Penguin Classics)
Two brothers, Njoroge and Kamau, stand on a garbage heap and look into their futures: Njoroge is to attend school, while Kamau will train to be a carpenter. But this is Kenya, and the times are against them: In the forests, the Mau Mau is waging war against the white government, and the two brothers and their family need to decide where their loyalties lie. For the practical Kamau, the choice is simple, but for Njoroge the scholar, the dream of progress through learning is a hard one to give up.
DEVIL ON THE CROSS by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Penguin Classics)
One of the cornerstones of Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s fame, DEVIL ON THE CROSS is a powerful fictional critique of capitalism. It tells the tragic story of Wariinga, a young woman who moves from a rural Kenyan town to the capital, Nairobi, only to be exploited by her boss and later by a corrupt businessman. As she struggles to survive, Wariinga begins to realize that her problems are only symptoms of a larger societal malaise and that much of the misfortune stems from the Western, capitalist influences on her country. An impassioned cry for a Kenya free of dictatorship and for African writers to work in their own local dialects, DEVIL ON THE CROSS has had a profound influence on Africa and on post-colonial African literature.
THE RIVER BETWEEN by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Penguin Classics)
A legendary work of African literature, this moving and eye-opening novel lucidly captures the drama of a people and culture whose world has been overturned. THE RIVER BETWEEN explores life in the mountains of Kenya during the early days of white settlement. Faced with a choice between an alluring new religion and their own ancestral customs, the Gikuyu people are torn between those who fear the unknown and those who see beyond it.
A GRAIN OF WHEAT by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Penguin Classics)
Set in the wake of the Mau Mau rebellion and on the cusp of Kenya’s independence from Britain, A GRAIN OF WHEAT follows a group of villagers whose lives have been transformed by the 1952–1960 Emergency. At the center of it all is the reticent Mugo, the village’s chosen hero and a man haunted by a terrible secret. As we learn of the villagers’ tangled histories in a narrative interwoven with myth and peppered with allusions to real-life leaders, including Jomo Kenyatta, a masterly story unfolds in which compromises are forced, friendships are betrayed, and loves are tested.
PETALS OF BLOOD by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (Penguin Classics)
The puzzling murder of three African directors of a foreign-owned brewery sets the scene for this fervent, hard-hitting novel about disillusionment in independent Kenya. A deceptively simple tale, PETALS OF BLOOD is on the surface a suspenseful investigation of a spectacular triple murder in upcountry Kenya. Yet as the intertwined stories of the four suspects unfold, a devastating picture emerges of a modern third-world nation whose frustrated people feel their leaders have failed them time after time.