BOOK REVIEWS

|HOME AND EXILE|

CHINUA ACHEBE

In Home and Exile, Africa’s most prominent writer, Chinua Achebe, reveals the man behind some of the continent’s most powerful works. The book is an extended exploration of the European impact on African culture, viewed through the most vivid experiences available to the author—his own life. It is an evocation snapshot of a major writer’s childhood, illuminating his roots as an artist. 

Chinua Achebe (1930-2013)

Achebe also discusses his English education and the relationship between colonial writers and the European literary tradition. He argues that if colonial writers try to imitate and, indeed, go one better than the Empire, they run the danger of undervaluing their homeland and their own people. Achebe contends that to redress the inequalities of global oppression, writers must focus on where they come from, insisting that their value systems are as legitimate as any other. Stories are a real source of power in the world, he concludes, and to imitate the literature of another culture is to give that power away.