Chinua Achebe -- RIP

Chinua Achebe, the Nigerian writer best known for his pathfinding novel Things Fall Apart, died this week at age 82. The obit in the online edition of the BBC provides a useful overview of his literary output, political activities, and global impact.

Chinua Achebe (left) with Nelson Mandela
(photo: BBC)

Achebe's work is often found in high school curricula in the United States. That was not the case for me. I first encountered Achebe's prose when I was a raw freshman at the University of Wisconsin. At that time, I thoughtlessly registered for a class in African literature. That mindless choice turned out to be one of the best intellectual encounters I experienced in any academic setting. The professor, Harold Scheub, was a very adept collector of oral stories. He walked -- yes, walked -- through South Africa, recording storytellers speaking what I discovered was the very beautiful Xhosa language. He accomplished this feat during the height of apartheid -- a tall order for a Caucasian carrying a tape recorder and a backpack. He also showed slides (those were the days!) of South African landscapes that entirely projected the country's marvelous physical setting. The professor, through the works he explored, opened my eyes to a world of thinking. His imagination and rigor changed my intellectual development in profound, beneficial ways.

Cover of First UK Edition

The class consisted of quite a number of purposeful graduate students, a few undergrads who had an affinity or compelling academic interest in the subject, and me. In addition to a thick course packet and a fascinating collection of African folktales, the required reading list for the semester included fourteen novels. One of them was Things Fall Apart. I had never heard of it prior to that class. I enjoyed the book, but its larger lessons were lost on me at the time. However, over the years, I kept seeing Achebe's masterpiece around and eventually understood its significance in world literature.

Achebe's life and work stand as potent reminders of how "engaged" writers impact our world. One may encounter a book by accident, as I did with Things Fall Apart, but continue to be touched decades later by its tone, its perspective, its characters, its message, its mysterious magic.