Chinua Achebe was a novelist, poet, professor at Brown University and critic. He is best known for his first novel, Things Fall Apart (1958), which is the most widely read book in modern African literature.
Raised by Christian parents in the Igbo town of Ogidi in southeastern Nigeria, Achebe excelled at school and won a scholarship for undergraduate studies. He became fascinated with world religions and traditional African cultures, and began writing stories as a university student. After graduation, he worked for the Nigerian Broadcasting Service and soon moved to the metropolis of Lagos. He gained worldwide attention for Things Fall Apart in the late 1950s; his later novels include No Longer at Ease (1960), Arrow of God (1964), A Man of the People (1966), and Anthills of the Savannah (1987). Achebe writes his novels in English and has defended the use of English, a "language of colonizers", in African literature. In 1975, his lecture An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" became the focus of controversy, for its criticism of Joseph Conrad as "a bloody racist".
When the region of Biafra broke away from Nigeria in 1967, Achebe became a devoted supporter of Biafran independence and served as ambassador for the people of the new nation. The war ravaged the populace, and as starvation and violence took its toll, he appealed to the people of Europe and the Americas for aid. When the Nigerian government retook the region in 1970, he involved himself in political parties but soon resigned due to frustration over the corruption and elitism he witnessed. He lived in the United States for several years in the 1970s, and returned to the U.S. in 1990 after a car accident left him partially disabled.
Achebe's novels focus on the traditions of Igbo society, the effect of Christian influences, and the clash of values during and after the colonial era. His style relied heavily on the Igbo oral tradition, and combines straightforward narration with representations of folk stories, proverbs, and oratory. He also published a number of short stories, children's books, and essay collections. He became the David and Marianna Fisher University Professor and Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, United States.
Achebe died at age 82 following a brief illness.
More than two million copies of Things Fall Apart have been sold in the United States since it was first published here in 1959. Worldwide, there are eight million copies in print in fifty different languages. This is Chinua Achebe's masterpiece and it is often compared to the great Greek tragedies, and currently sells more than one hundred thousand copies a year in the United States.
A simple story of a "strong man" whose life is dominated by fear and anger, Things Fall Apart is written with remarkable economy and subtle irony. Uniquely and richly African, at the same time it reveals Achebe's keen awareness of the human qualities common to men of all times and places.
五年前,我曾经在巴西利亚大学跟一个靠行贿混进访问教师公寓居住的尼日利亚留学生做了一段时间的室友,这是我第一次跟黑非洲兄弟走得这么近。这哥们是尼日利亚三大民族(伊博、豪塞、优鲁巴)中的优鲁巴人,虽是学生,但从不见去上课,终日在看电视和无来由的手舞足蹈中愉...
评分2007年6月13日,第二届国际布克文学奖评委会主席、哥伦比亚大学教授Elaine Showalter这样评价他:“In Things Fall Apart and his other fiction set in Nigeria, Chinua Achebe inaugurated the modern African novel. He also illuminated the path for writers around the w...
评分是什么原因使得一个人觉得这个世界土崩瓦解了,再也回不到从前? 那就是一个人精神世界所信仰的那个神被彻底的摧毁! 奥贡喀沃是个勇敢的战士,他信奉着他的宗族的神,他信奉勇敢、勤劳、荣誉、地位带来的心理的满足。当帝国的代表带来了众神之神—“上帝”来到这个非洲的部落...
评分是什么原因使得一个人觉得这个世界土崩瓦解了,再也回不到从前? 那就是一个人精神世界所信仰的那个神被彻底的摧毁! 奥贡喀沃是个勇敢的战士,他信奉着他的宗族的神,他信奉勇敢、勤劳、荣誉、地位带来的心理的满足。当帝国的代表带来了众神之神—“上帝”来到这个非洲的部落...
评分goodreads上看到一句书评:这类文学通常要么坚信原有文化保持,要么抱有西方帝国主义的抱负,但这本书拒绝将任何一种看法过度简化。我最喜欢的一点是,在将这个并无多大跌宕起伏的故事娓娓道来的同时,他把在启蒙精神的手术刀下分崩离析的神秘主义又重新赋予给了生命和自然,归还给了这片
评分读完忘记标回来。这书被过誉了,文学性不足,叙事过散乱,超现实意味太强,当奇幻文学看稍微好一些。
评分另一个旁听的seminar式课程(字译English literature outside Major English speaking countries
评分Achebe’s novel shatters the stereotypical European portraits of native Africans. He is careful to portray the complex, advanced social institutions and artistic traditions of Igbo culture prior to its contact with Europeans. Yet he is just as careful not to stereotype the Europeans.
评分比较喜欢前面半本
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