Description: The story of a man whose foreign education has separated him from his African roots and made him parts of a ruling elite whose corruption he finds repugnant. More than thirty years after it was first written, this novel remains a brilliant statement on the challenges still facing African society.
Review Quotes: "A magical writer--one of the greatest of the twentieth century." --Margaret Atwood
"African literature is incomplete and unthinkable without the works of Chinua Achebe." --Toni Morrison"Chinua Achebe is gloriously gifted with the magic of an ebullient, generous, great talent." --Nadine Gordimer "Achebe's influence should go on and on . . . teaching and reminding that all humankind is one." --The Nation "The father of African literature in the English language and undoubtedly one of the most important writers of the second half of the twentieth century." --Caryl Phillips, The Observer "We are indebted to Achebe for reminding us that art has social and moral dimension--a truth often obscured." --Chicago Tribune "He is one of the few writers of our time who has touched us with a code of values that will never be ironic." --Michael Ondaatje "For so many readers around the world, it is Chinua Achebe who opened up the magic casements of African fiction." --Kwame Anthony Appiah "[Achebe] is one of world literature's great humane voices." --Times Literary Supplement "Achebe is one of the most distinguished artists to emerge from the West African cultural renaissance of the post-war world." --The Sunday Times (London) "[Achebe is] a powerful voice for cultural decolonization." --The Village Voice "Chinua Achebe has shown that a mind that observes clearly but feels deeply enough to afford laughter may be more wise than all the politicians and journalists." --Time "The power and majesty of Chinua Achebe's work has, literally, opened the world to generations of readers. He is an ambassador of art, and a profound recorder of the human condition." --Michael Dorris 3/25/2021