Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (1938–2025): Five things to know about one of Africa’s greatest ever writers
One of Africa’s most celebrated authors, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, has passed away. The Kenyan writer and academic was 87 years old.
Having published his first novel – Weep Not Child – in 1964, Ngũgĩ pursued a rich and acclaimed career as a writer, teacher and decolonial thinker. His last creative effort was Kenda Muiyuru (The Perfect Nine), a Gikuyu epic that was longlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize.
He understood the politics of his time
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o is regarded as one of Africa’s greatest writers of all time. He grew up in what became known as Kenya’s White Highlands at the height of British colonialism. Unsurprisingly, his writing examines the legacy of colonialism and the intricate relationships between locals seeking economic and cultural emancipation and the local elites serving as agents of neo-colonisers.
The great expectations for the new country, as captured in his seminal play, The Black Hermit, anticipated the disillusionment that followed. His fiction, from the foundational trilogy of Weep Not, Child, The River Between and A Grain of Wheat, amplify those expectations, before the optimism gives way in Petals of Blood, and is replaced by disillusionment.
He shaped a new African story
African fiction is fairly young. Ngũgĩ stands in the continent’s pantheon of writers who started writing when Africa’s decolonisation gained momentum. In a certain sense, the writers were involved in constructing...
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