Critical examination of Achebe's fiction using cultural and political rubrics, such as colonial rule and post - independent black Africa. Notes, bib, 164 pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS. 0865437750

'Things Fall Apart' (1958) is the best known African novel, selling 12 million copies since publication, with translations into more than 50 languages. Despite its undoubted success, its apparent simplicity has tended to blind readers to its storytelling resources and the inventive language, plot, setting, and characterization. This guide sets the novel in its historical, intellectual and cultural contexts. It offers analyses of its themes, style and structure and provides an account of its critical reception and its afterlife in literature, film and popular culture. It includes points for discussion, suggestions for further study and an annotated guide to relevant reading. 176pp, UK. CONTINUUM.

Special issue of African Theatre devoted to the early revue sketches of Wole Soyinka, Nobel prize-winner for Literature and 2004 Reith lecturer. Soyinka's recent plays draw strongly on this early material, much of which is previously unpublished. Brings Soyinka's rare early satirical writing back to life and makes it accessible to students of his work. 216pp, UK. JAMES CURREY PUBLISHERS.

Latest study of Achebe showing how his work is an interrogative epic of African humanity over the past 500 years. Notes, bib, index, vii, 186pp, SENEGAL. CENT.CROSS-CULTURAL STUDIES, DAKAR, 1903625106

Comprehensive study of satire in the stage plays of Wole Soyinka. Index, bib, notes, xv, 221pp, NIGERIA. JANYEKO PUBLISHING CENTRE LTD., 997051003X

A collection of essays and book review presentations in literary journals and publisher forums within and outside Nigeria in the last decade by Nigerian novelist, poet, and critic. The pieces are permeated with what Ce characterises as an Africa pulled in "two opposing and irremediable directions by her bards and petty tyrants. While one involves a visionary literati that seek to elevate the potentials of their educational and cultural inheritance, the other embraces the politics of tyrannosaurs who hasten to drag the continent to a state of complete and total degeneracy." 244pp, NIGERIA. HANDEL BOOKS.

First full length study of Ben Okri's life and work based on the author's twenty year friendship with Okri. Argues that his writing is best appreciated against the background of his life as a Nigerian and as a witness to the devastating Civil War. Fraser has lectured at the Universities of West Africa, Leeds, London and Trinity College, Cambridge. Index, bib, notes, xviii, 121pp, UK. NORTHCOTE HOUSE PUBLISHERS, 0746309937

Examines satirical and critical modes both as objective and creative media. BNS, 160pp, NIGERIA. FOURTH DIMENSION, 9781564598

A comprehensive bibliography of Nigerian literature including prose fiction, poetry, drama and children's literature. The text is divided into several historical periods from the early colonial period up to 1999, the late post colonial period. The author introduces each period and describes its literary development. Also includes listings of critical studies, periodicals and anthologies. Index, xvii, 236pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 1592210333

Now in paperback, the first biography of the Nigerian novelist, describing his childhood, early career in radio, travels, observations and writings. Index, bib, notes, map, b/w illus, xii, 326pp, UK. JAMES CURREY PUBLISHERS, 0852555458

A comprehensive and authoritative guide to Achebe's life and writings. A Z entries cover his major works, important characters and settings, key concepts and issues. 318pp, USA. GREENWOOD PRESS.

Uses the critical essay format to assess Chinua Achebe as a person, a writer and the inaugura-tor of the literary tradition of cultural nationalism. It progressively and thematically analyses his novels and works, comparing them with those of African literary and cultural groundbreakers in the Diaspora, including the pioneering works of Olaudah Equiano and Zora Neale Hurston. Index, bib, 274pp, UK. ADONIS & ABBEY PUBLISHERS.

Oral biography compiled from interviews with family members, servants, and personal and professional relationships. It retraces the writer's steps from his hometown to Europe and the US. B/w ill, notes, index, xiii, 214pp, NIGERIA. MALTHOUSE, 978023148X

A collection of press interviews with Achebe which took place between 1979 and 1989, tackling mainly African concerns. x, 157 pages. NIGERIA. THE STONE PRESS.

2003 978056229X Paperback

A biography of Chinua Achebe intended for the general reader. The authors describe the author's childhood in south-eastern Nigeria, his difficult negotiation between Anglican and Igbo beliefs and the influence of his family and teachers in his decision to write. The authors also look at the impact of the Nigerian civil war on Achebe's political and personal ideology and discuss his current role as a teacher, essayist and political commentator. Index, bib, xiv, 160pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 1592210325

A collection of ten essays examining various aspects of Things Fall Apart, looking as cosmology, gender, history, piety, and other issues. Also includes an interview with Chinua Achebe, and his influential essay 'The African Writer and the English Language'. Notes, 275pp, UK. OXFORD UNIV PRESS, 0195147642

A study Achebe's work examining his contribution to postcolonial writing and criticism. The author also looks at Achebe's fiction in terms of Nigerian history and national situation. Index, bib, notes, x, 134pp, UK. NORTHCOTE HOUSE PUBLISHERS, 074630885X

Compiles critical essays written about the Nigerian writer. Notes, bib, app, index, 219pp, NIGERIA . MALTHOUSE, 9780230432

The historical heritage of Nigeria, from its religions to the colonial influence and Nigeria's own idigenous cultures have all shaped the dramatic narrative and content of the theatrical traditions. Dugga looks at Soyinka, Osofisan Braide and Tsevende to illustrate the changes in the dramtic tradition and the impact of such diversity on Nigerian cultural identity. BNS, GERMANY. BAYREUTH A S, 3927510726

An important collection of 11 critical essays on Ken Saro Wiwa's first novel. The contributors to this volume are Nigerian scholars who each shed light on various aspects of the novelists' craft, language and his social and historical context. Refs, 128pp, NIGERIA. SAROS.

1992 9782460214 Paperback

Presents an African orientated approach to the study of creative and performing arts from contemporary literary and traditional perspectives; and integrates traditional theatre practices with modern models influenced by foreign practice. BNS, 161pp, NIGERIA. FOURTH DIMENSION PUBLISHING CO.LTD, 9781565098

Six essays on writings by Wole Soyinka composed prior to the publication of his first books in 1963. These early works reveal his precocious talent as a writer of stories, dramas, essays, letters, humorous sketches and jokes, the argument being that they cannot be dismissed as juvenilia or immature scribblings for they already exhibit an impressive command of language as well as dexterous handling of techniques of characterisation and plot construction. Concludes with an examination of the mixed Nigerian response to his Nobel Prize for Literature. 296pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS.

Volume one of a major study of Chinua Achebe's work. Organised into eight parts, this volume discusses Achebe's artistry and global significance. Parts one to five collects essays examining the author's major novels, including Things Fall Apart and Arrow of God, looking at issues of feminism, political symbolism, military dictatorships, the tragic muse and Igbo cosmology. Part six looks at Achebe's response to the Nigerian civil war, while parts seven and eight discuss Achebe's short stories and his writings for children. Index, notes, xxi, 475pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 0865438765

Volume two of a major study of Chinua Achebe's work. Organised into six parts, this volume discusses Achebe's influence on contemporary African literature and literary criticism. Thirty essays look at issues such as art and aesthetics, Igbo worldview and Christianity, visions of history and the artist and society. Index, notes, xxiii, 459pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS.

Since the emergence of Things Fall Apart in 1958, Chinua Achebe has come to be regarded by many as the 'Godfather' of modern African writing. Over 150 full length studies of his work have been published, together with many hundreds of scholarly articles. This guide enables students to navigate the rich and bewildering field of Achebe criticism, setting out the key areas of critical debate, the most influential alternative approaches to his work and the controversies that have so often surrounded it. 200pp, UK. PALGRAVE.

A comparative study of the theatre of Wole Soyinka and W.B. Yeats looking at their similar and contrasting approaches to national experiences, the use of myth and Western Theatrical thought. Index, refs, vi, 269pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 1592211046

Charts the story of the English novelist and poet, John Moray Stuart-Young 1881-1939) as he travelled from the slums of Manchester to West Africa in order to escape the homophobic prejudices of late-Victorian society. Leaving behind a criminal record for forgery and embezzlement and his notoriety as a spirit rapper, Stuart-Young found a new identity as a wealthy palm oil trader and a celebrated author, known to Nigerians as Odeziaku. In this fascinating bio-graphical account, Newell draws on queer theory, African gender debates, and new imperial history to open up a wider study of imperialism, (homo)sexuality, and non-elite culture between the 1880s and the late 1930s. Pays close attention to different forms of West African cultural production in the colonial period and to public debates about sexuality and ethics, as well as to movements in mainstream English literature. Index, bib, notes, 233pp, USA. OHIO.

Scholarship on the literature of Chinua Achebe is growing by the minute and much of the intellectual intervention into the literature of the man who invented African literature has focused on his most prolific work, 'Things Fall Apart'. In this collection of essays, Okome pushes the frontiers of the scholarship on Achebe beyond TFA and explores the writer's entire catalogue of works. These essays are diverse in tone and intellectual attitude and aim to put all of Achebe's work into global context. 284pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS.

Critical appraisal of the works of Africa's most prolific woman playwright, highlighting the close connections between the writer, the African continent and the Diaspora. Includes an interview and a chronology of her life and work. Index, bib, xxii, 306pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS.

Recounts the history of the Oyin Adejobi Theatre Company through archival sources, interviews and transcriptions of plays. Through this detailed case study the author reveals the genesis and development of Yoruba popular drama. 60 b/w photos, app, notes, bib, index,576pp, USA. INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Provides a valuable introduction to the influences that have shaped Nigerian theatre. illus, refs, index, short bib, 188pp, NIGERIA. OXFORD UNIV. PRESS NIGERIA.

Contributors attempt to identify whether there is any relevance or value in traditional concepts of heroism for modern Igbo society. BNS, 486pp, NIGERIA. FOURTH DIMENSION PUBLISHING CO.LTD, 9781564776

This Festschrift, containing twenty-two essays by African scholars of African literature, is published as a tribute to Oyin Gunba, a renowned scholar of African literature, specifically oral literature and drama. The contributors include Femi Osofisan, Ahmed Yerima, Ayo Kehinde and Niyi Osundare. Some subjects broached are the development of a cultural economy in Africa; the early plays of Osofisan; language and identity in African drama; cross-cultural engagement in Remi Raji's travel poetry; classifying Yoruba oral poetry; and Yoruba cultural nationalism. BNS, 283pp, NIGERIA. OBAFEMI AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY PRESS. 9781361360

An analysis of the characteristics of the varieties of Igbo English and their use in modern Nigerian literature. The author also looks at the implications of the use of English in a Nigerian context. Index, bib, ix, 136pp, NIGERIA. ENICROWNFIT PUBLISHERS, 9783422561

Founder of the Nigerian Publishers Association, Aigboje Higo enjoys a reputation as one of Nigeria's most minent and highly respected publishers. His long association was with Heine-mann in Nigeria. Initially the publisher under the British, he oversaw the periods of indigenisa-tion of editorial policy and transition to majority local ownership. With Alan Hill and Henry Chakava, he was one of the inspirations behind the success of the Heinemann African Writers Series, bringing in titles to the series by authors such as Ayi Kwei Armah, which are now regarded as classic texts of African literature. This festschrift comprises fifteen chapters from eminent contributors, including: Niyi Osundare, Victor Nwankwo (deceased), Henry Chakava and Keith Sambrook. The editors are Ayo Ojeniyi who is the current Managing Director of Heinemann Nigeria, and Festus Adesanye, the long-standing publisher of the pre-eminent scholarly Ibadan University Press. 291pp, NIGERIA. HEINEMANN NIGERIA.

Miscellany of writings about the writings of Soyinka, charting an extraordinary friendship over five decades. Includes much highly original material. B/w photos, 232pp, GERMANY. SELF-PUBLISHED TITLES/NO IMPRINT.

'Any time, anywhere, whenever the subject of discourse is freedom, I shall be happy to be on the podium. And when the topic is linked with literature, I feel doubly impelled. The contribution of literacy, of books to the possibilities of freedom in human society is a dimension too vast and intangible to grasp.' This volume brings together several of the author's unpublished speeches, papers and literary reflections from the 1980s and 1990s Subjects include: the writer, artist and journalist as mirrors of a nation's ethos; press freedom and its enemies; theatre and the question of national development; and literacy, reading and books as integral to cultural freedom. 210pp, NIGERIA. OPON IFA READERS.

Originally published in 1968 and long out-of-print, the book also contains Laurence's previously unpublished essay 'Tribalism As Us Versus Them', which provides her own postscript to her book. Up-to-date biographies with a list of works for each of the writers, detailed annotations to the original text, and a glossary complete this edition. A classic of early postcolonial criticism. 270pp, CANADA. ALBERTA UNIVERSITY PRESS.

An examination of historical realities in Nigeria through the fiction of Flora Nwapa. The author looks at the role of Igbo women in society, the position of mothers and its centrality in women's lives, political influence and spirituality. Index, bib, notes, viii, 248pp, UK. AFRICAN RENAISSANCE.

Explores the complete works of Tayo Olafioye, including prose, verse and critical essays. Index, 273pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS.

With over 1,200 video films produced each year, Nigeria has become one of the most prolific producers of film fiction in the world. The majority of the films are of poor quality, made on very low budgets and in a very short time, but their production has a big impact on people in Nigeria and the industry's influence is extending across the continent. This book examines how the experiences and lives of Nigerians are narrated through the storyboards of the video producers, who copy with confidence and energy the recipes and formulas of popular films. As a home-grown industry that emerged spontaneously and without outside support, its vitality is a counter to 'Afro-pessimism' and demonstrates the possibility of reviving the African film industry and developing a cinema-going public to support it. Index, bib, b/w film stills, 148pp, UK. JAMES CURREY PUBLISHERS.

This collection is dedicated to a distinguished scholar and writer who for a quarter of a century wrote consistently on African literature and the arts and was a major voice in Nigerian literary circles. First and foremost, however, Ezenwa-Ohaeto was someone who un-masked ideas and meanings hidden in the folds of literary works and made them available to an international academic public. With his outstanding work on Chinua Achebe, he influenced the reception of African literary biography. 370pp, NETHERLANDS. RODOPI.

A collection of essays on Soyinka's post Nobel works. Includes studies of the plays From Zia with Love and the Beatification of Area Boy. Bib, xi, 378pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 0865436673

Exploration of the writing, cultural and theatrical aesthetics of African writer and director, Ola Rotimi. Focuses on the aesthetic dimensions of the Ori Olokun theatre under the artistic direction of Rotimi. It reviews his vision and impact with the Ori Olokun Company, and his quest to formulate a truly authentic African theatre, void of the imported European sensibility and colonially inherited aesthetic. Three of Rotimi’s historical plays are analysed to and and locate his historical perspective. BNS, 172pp, USA. EDWIN MELLEN PRESS.

A collection of essays by a wide range of scholars looking at various aspects of the poets' craft and work. Index, notes, xxxv, 629pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 0865438501

A critical review of Soyinka's poetry looking at his work in relation to his persona, views and ideas. Index, bib, notes, 140pp, NIGERIA. MALTHOUSE, 9780230068

A selection of essays on Nigerian literature. Topics in volume one include literary development in Nigeria, Hausa literature, Yoruba writers, Fulani Jihadist scholars, literature and the Nigerian Civil War, Igbo literature, the language factor in modern Nigerian literature, and the role of oral literature in the development of Nigerian lit-erature. Contributors include Toyin Falola, Ernest Emenyonu, Olu Obafemi, Abiola Irele, Biodun Jeyifo, Wole Soyinka, and Isidore Okpewho. Index, 203pp, NIGERIA. GUARDIAN BOOKS NIGERIA.

A collection of 57 essays on Nigerian literature. Volume two looks at specific authors including Olaudah Equiano, Pita Nwana, Daniel Fagunwa, Cyprian Ek-wensi, Amos Tutola, Chinua Achebe, J.P. Clarke, Flora Nwapa, Wole Soyinka, Kole Omotoso, Oladejo Okediji, Elechi Amadi, Niyi Osundare, Ken Saro-Wiwa, Ola Rotimi, Buchi Emecheta, Femi Osofisan, I.N.C. Aniebo, and Ben Okri. Index, 359pp, NIGERIA. GUARDIAN BOOKS NIGERIA.

A comprehensive look at Nigerian literary traditions combining extracts with commentary on imaginative prose writing, the tale tradition, popular song, Islamic religious poetry and modern TV drama, among other topics. Notes, bib, index, maps, xi, 326pp, UK. EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY PRESS, 0748607862

Contributors include: Biodun Jeyifo, James Gibbs, Olu Obafemi, Barbara Goff and Martin Banham. 259pp, GERMANY. BAYREUTH.

Re-examines Soyinkas representation of postcolonial African identity in the light of his major plays, novels and poetry to show how this writers idiom of cultural authenticity both embraces hybridity and defines itself as specific and particular. Argues that for Soyinka, such authenticity involves recovering tradition and inserting it in postcolonial modernity to facilitate transformative moral and political justice. The past can be both our enabling future and our nemesis. Soyinkas treatment of the relationship between individual selfhood and the various framing social and collective identities, so the book argues, is yet another aspect linking his work to the broader intellectual currents of today. 176pp, NETHERLANDS. RODOPI.

Anthology which brings together original critical comments on Nigerian literatures written in the 1970s and 1980s. It is a celebration of Nigeria's contribution to the world's heritage of letters. The twenty-three essays explore the fundamental role of the intelligentsia in defining and describing the nation state in space and time. The contributions represent some of the best and most articulate assessments of Nigeria's literary discourses in their pre-colonial and colonial phases and includes contributions by Chinua Achebe, J.P. Clarke, Femi Osofisan and Kole Omotoso. Index, 342pp, NIGERIA. MALTHOUSE.

A compendium of scholarship on the English language and literature in the African, and especially Nigerian, contexts. Topics addressed include multilingualism and national development, the influence of Yoruba on secondary school English in Nigeria, humour in Achebe's Anthills of the Savannah, and the tragic hero characterisation of Ola Rotimi. BNS, 290pp, NIGERIA. OBAFEMI AWOLOWO UNIVERSITY PRESS.

A study employing the insights and techniques of postcolonial comparative theories to revisit Western formulations of satire, looking at irony, allegory, narrative and the grotesque. The using the work of V.S. Naipaul, Chinua Achebe and Salman Rushdie, the author presents a detailed study of the complex and multidirectional ways satire has engaged with the history and aftermath of empire. BNS, 224pp, UK. ROUTLEDGE, 0415965934

Provides a history and ethnography of media in Nigeria, asking what media theory looks like when Nigeria rather than a European nation or the United States is taken as the starting point. Concentrating on the Muslim city of Kano in the north of Nigeria, Larkin charts how the material qualities of technologies and the cultural ambitions they represent feed into the everyday lived world of urban Nigeria. Media technologies were introduced to Nigeria by colonial regimes as part of an attempt to shape political subjects and create modern, urban Africans. Larkin analyses the introduction of media with electric plants and railroads as part of the wider infrastructural project of colonial and postcolonial urbanism. Focusing on radio networks, mobile cinema units, and the building of cinema theatres, he argues that what media come to be in Kano is the outcome of technology's encounter with the social formations of northern Nigeria and with norms shaped by colonialism, postcolonial nationalism, and Islam. Index, bib, b/w illus, 314pp, USA. DUKE UNIVERSITY PRESS.

Posthumous publication of Ezenwa-Ohaeto's study of the major concerns of recent Nigerian fiction: literary representations of political, military and social power; gender issues and the image of childhood; the potential for social and cultural change through l;iterary representation. Bib, 183pp, GERMANY. BAYREUTH A S.

A selection of essays which make a significant contribution to the study of African literature. Osundare analyses recent theoretical advances, such as post-structuralism, and looks at their impact on critical patterns. Index, notes, 152pp, USA/ERITREA. AFRICA WORLD PRESS, 0865438668

South Asian readers and scholars find Wole Soyinka's work especially fascinating for the way it deals with colonial and postcolonial experiences, the metaphysics in its commentaries on Yoruba heritage and its cross-cultural referencing. The essays in this volume focus on the major genres in Soyinka's oeuvre: fiction, poetry, criticism, autobiography and drama. Includes a checklist of South Asian writing on Soyinka. Index, 334pp, USA. AFRICA WORLD

A comprehensive study of the various critical approaches to the fiction of Buchi Emecheta. Looks at the feminist, post?structuralist and Marxist methods of enquiry into her work and shows how post?colonial criticism illuminate her cross cultural background. Bib, notes, iv, 243pp, USA. RODOPI !, 9042012986

The essays in this volume present a poet who is not only committed to the Urhobo culture and its people, but a poet with a strong political and poetic vision. Refs, 234pp, GERMANY. BAYREUTH A S, 392751067X