Chinua Achebe was born in the Igbo town of Ogidi in southeastern Nigeria in 1930. His father was a missionary instructor in catechism at the Church Missionary Society's school; this is where Achebe started his education. His mother instilled a love in him for traditional storytelling by constantly telling him and reading to him Nigerian stories. Because of his familie's skill in speaking English, and due to the fact that Nigeria was still a British colony at the time, his family was very powerful in his town. Achebe went to school at Government College, Umuahia and then at University College, Ibadan, to study liberal arts. His first stories were published while he was going to these schools and then they became the collection published in 1972 called Girls at War and Other Stories. After he had published this collection, he had the funds to visit Britain and the United States...