by Ayi Kwei Armah

Born in Ghana in 1939, Ayi Kwei Armah participated in the events that took Ghana from British colony to independent country. His first novel, The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born established him as a writer of world renown. The work, whose title has an intentional misspelling taken from an inscription on a bus, portrays both the euphoria of independence and the disillusionment that followed in Ghana. It was a sobering period, in which the early promise of freedom gave way to economic malaise, political corruption, and continued financial dependence on Europe. Since 1968 Armah has generally lived outside Ghana, and occasionally outside Africa, though remaining a vital figure in African literature. His subsequent novels have continued to address the issues of modern African culture. A vocal proponent of pan-African unity, Armah has proposed...