Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi

▪ 2008

born Sept. 15, 1977, Enugu, Nigeria

 In 2007 Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie won the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction for her second novel, Half of a Yellow Sun (2006). The young novelist, who stated that she had been writing stories since she was old enough to spell, was no stranger to the awards podium, however. She had already collected a number of honours for her short stories, including an O. Henry Prize in 2003 for The American Embassy, and her debut novel, Purple Hibiscus (2003), had garnered the Commonwealth Writers' Prize in 2005 for Best First Book (Africa) and that year's Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book (overall).

      Early in life Adichie, the fifth of six children, moved with her parents to Nsukka, Nigeria. She was a voracious reader but found Things Fall Apart by fellow Igbo novelist Chinua Achebe transformative. After studying medicine for a time in Nsukka, in 1997 she left for the U.S., and she graduated (2001) summa cum laude with a bachelor's degree in communication and political science from Eastern Connecticut State University. Splitting her time between Nigeria and the U.S., she later earned a master's degree in creative writing from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md., and studied African history at Yale University.

      In 1998 Adichie's play For Love of Biafra was published in Nigeria. She later dismissed it as “an awfully melodramatic play,” but it was among the earliest works in which she explored the war in the late 1960s between Nigeria and its secessionist Biafra republic. She later wrote several short stories about that conflict, which would become the subject of Half of a Yellow Sun.

      Adichie began writing Purple Hibiscus while a student at Eastern Connecticut. Set in Nigeria, it is the coming-of-age story of Kambili, a 15-year-old whose family is wealthy and well-respected but is terrorized by her fanatically religious father. Besides winning Commonwealth Prizes, the work was short-listed for the 2004 Orange Prize.

      Half of a Yellow Sun was the result of four years of research and writing. It was built primarily on the experiences of her parents during the Nigeria-Biafra war. The result was an epic novel that vividly depicted the savagery of the war (which resulted in the displacement and deaths of perhaps a million people) but did so by focusing on a small group of characters, mostly middle-class Africans. Although Half of a Yellow Sun became an international best seller, Adichie told the BBC that its reception in Nigeria was especially important. Biafra “is a subject that we are not honest about,” she said of her fellow Nigerians. “What I hope this book will do…is get us to examine our history and ask questions.” For her next project, Adichie planned to explore the experience of Nigerian immigrants in the U.S.

J.E. Luebering

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▪ Nigerian author

born Sept. 15, 1977, Enugu, Nigeria

 

 Nigerian author whose work drew extensively on the Biafran war in Nigeria during the late 1960s.

      Early in life Adichie, the fifth of six children, moved with her parents to Nsukka, Nigeria. A voracious reader from a young age, she found Things Fall Apart by novelist and fellow Igbo Chinua Achebe (Achebe, Chinua) transformative. After studying medicine for a time in Nsukka, in 1997 she left for the United States, where she studied communication and political science at Eastern Connecticut State University (B.A., 2001). Splitting her time between Nigeria and the United States, she received a master's degree in creative writing from Johns Hopkins University and studied African history at Yale University.

      In 1998 Adichie's play For Love of Biafra was published in Nigeria. She later dismissed it as “an awfully melodramatic play,” but it was among the earliest works in which she explored the war in the late 1960s between Nigeria and its secessionist Biafra republic. She later wrote several short stories about that conflict, which would later become the subject of her highly successful novel Half of a Yellow Sun (2006). As a student at Eastern Connecticut State University, she began writing her first novel, Purple Hibiscus (2003). Set in Nigeria, it is the coming-of-age story of Kambili, a 15-year-old whose family is wealthy and well-respected but who is terrorized by her fanatically religious father. Purple Hibiscus garnered the Commonwealth Writers' Prize in 2005 for Best First Book (Africa) and that year's Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Book (overall). It was also short-listed for the 2004 Orange Prize.

      Half of a Yellow Sun, Adichie's second novel, was the result of four years of research and writing. It was built primarily on the experiences of her parents during the Nigeria-Biafra war. The result was an epic novel that vividly depicted the savagery of the war (which resulted in the displacement and deaths of perhaps a million people) but did so by focusing on a small group of characters, mostly middle-class Africans. Half of a Yellow Sun became an international best seller and was awarded the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction in 2007. In 2008 Adichie received a MacArthur Foundation fellowship.

J.E. Luebering

 

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