Nkem Nwankwo
{{Short description|Nigerian writer}}
{{More citations needed|date=September 2014}}
Nkem Nwankwo {{IPAc-en||audio=Ig-Nkem_Nwankwo.ogg}} (12 June 1936 – 12 June 2001) was a Nigerian novelist and poet.{{Cite web|title=Nkem Nwankwo|url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100242686|website=Oxford Reference|language=en|access-date=2020-05-30}}
Biography
Born in Nawfia-Awka, a village near the Igbo city of Onitsha in Anambra State, southeastern Nigeria, Nwankwo attended University College in Ibadan (the capital city of Oyo State, southwest Nigeria), gaining a BA in 1962.{{Cite web|title=Nkem Nwankwo|url=https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/261022.Nkem_Nwankwo|website=www.goodreads.com|access-date=2020-05-30}} After graduating he took a teaching job at Ibadan Grammar School, before going on to write for magazines, including Drum and working for the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation.Oyekan Owomoyela, [https://books.google.com/books?id=VaZx0Q2O3l8C&pg=PA132 The Columbia Guide to West African Literature in English Since 1945], Columbia University Press, 2008, pp. 132–33.
He wrote several stories for children that were published in 1963 such as Tales Out of School.{{Cite book|last=Owomoyela|first=Oyekan|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VaZx0Q2O3l8C&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+wrote+several+stories+for+children+that+were+published+in+1963+such+as+Tales+Out+of+School&pg=PA133|title=The Columbia Guide to West African Literature in English Since 1945|date=2008-10-21|publisher=Columbia University Press|isbn=978-0-231-51215-2|language=en}} He then wrote More Tales out of School in 1965.{{Cite book|last=Nwankwo|first=Nkem|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=m9wIAQAAIAAJ&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+More+Tales+Out+of+School|title=More Tales Out of School|date=1965|publisher=African Universities Press|isbn=9789934702020|language=en}}
Writer of short stories and poems, Nwankwo gained significant attention with his first novel Danda (1964),Lynn, Thomas J., [https://web.archive.org/web/20141006065807/http://connection.ebscohost.com/c/literary-criticism/15119739/tricksters-dont-walk-dogma-nkem-nwankwos-danda "Tricksters Don't Walk the Dogma: Nkem Nwankwo's 'Danda'"], College Literature, Summer 2005, Vol. 32, Issue 3, p. 1. which was made into a widely performed musical that was entered in the 1966 World Festival of Negro Arts in Dakar, Senegal. During the Nigerian Civil War Nwankwo worked on Biafra's Arts Council.{{Cite book|last=Owomoyela|first=Oyekan|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VaZx0Q2O3l8C&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+worked+on+Biafra's+Arts+Council&pg=PA132|title=The Columbia Guide to West African Literature in English Since 1945|date=2008-10-21|publisher=Columbia University Press|isbn=978-0-231-51215-2|language=en}} In 1968, in collaboration with Samuel X. Ifekjika, he wrote Biafra: The Making of a Nation. After the civil war, he returned to Lagos and worked on the national newspaper, the Daily Times. His subsequent works included the satire My Mercedes Is Bigger than Yours.
During the 1970s, Nwankwo earned a Master's and Ph.D. at Indiana University.{{Cite book|last1=Killam|first1=G. D.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4Xty33CsRBYC&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+earned+a+Master's+and+Ph.D.+at+Indiana+University&pg=PA189|title=The Companion to African Literatures|last2=Rowe|first2=Ruth|date=2000|publisher=Indiana University Press|isbn=978-0-253-33633-0|language=en}} He also wrote about corruption in Nigeria. He spent the latter part of his life in the United States and taught at Michigan State University and Tennessee State University.[http://andersonbrownliterary.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/nkem-nwankwo.html "Nkem Nwankwo"]. Anderson Brown's Literary Blog, 11 January 2010.
He died in his sleep in Tennessee, from complications from a heart imbalance that he had been battling for some years.Tunde Okoli, [http://allafrica.com/stories/200107030159.html "Nigeria: Author, Nkem Nwankwo is Dead"], AllAfrica, 3 July 2001.
Books
- The Scapegoat — 1984 (Enugu: Fourth Dimension Publishers){{Cite book|last=Nwankwo|first=Nkem|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4Y7PAAAAMAAJ&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+The+Scapegoat+%E2%80%94+1984+(Enugu:+Fourth+Dimension+Publishers)|title=The Scapegoat|date=1984|publisher=Fourth Dimension|isbn=978-978-156-150-4|language=en}}
- My Mercedes Is Bigger than Yours — 1975{{Cite journal|last=Okeke-Ezigbo|first=Emeka|date=1984-07-01|title=The Automobile as Erotic Bride: Nkem Nwankwo's My Mercedes Is Bigger Than Yours|journal=Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction|volume=25|issue=4|pages=199–208|doi=10.1080/00111619.1984.9937802|issn=0011-1619}}
- Danda - 1963 (Lagos: African Universities Press; London: Deutsch, 1964){{Cite book|last=Nwankwo|first=Nkem|url=https://www.amazon.com/Danda-novel-Nigeria-Nkem-Nwankwo/dp/B001L4JKL4|title=Danda|date=1964|publisher=Andre Deutsch|edition=First}}
- Tales Out of School (short stories; 1963){{Cite book|last1=Killam|first1=G. D.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RPQpYJcI1I4C&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+worked+on+Biafra's+Arts+Council&pg=PA2187|title=Student Encyclopedia of African Literature|last2=Kerfoot|first2=Alicia L.|date=2008|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-0-313-33580-8|language=en}}
Short stories
- The Gambler, in: Black Orpheus no. 9Black Orpheus was an influential literary periodical in Ibadan, founded in 1957 by Ulli Beier, see Bernth Lindfors, [https://books.google.com/books?id=D6PrqVKaZtgC&dq=Black+Orpheus+%28Nigeria%29&pg=PA669 Black Orpheus], in: European-language Writing in Sub-Saharan Africa, Vol. 2, John Benjamins Publishing, 1986, pp. 669–679.
- His Mother, in: Nigeria Magazine no. 80, March 1964{{Cite book|last1=Roscoe|first1=Adrian A.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SS47AAAAIAAJ&q=Nkem+Nwankwo+short+stories&pg=PA76|title=Mother is Gold: A Study in West African Literature|last2=Roscoe|first2=Adrian|date=1971|publisher=CUP Archive|isbn=978-0-521-09644-7|language=en}}
- The Man Who Lost in: Nigeria Magazine no. 84, March 1965
Other
- Sex Has Been Good To Me (reprint of essays), 2004{{citation needed|date=May 2020}}
- Shadow of the Masquerade (autobiography), Nashville, TN: Niger House Publications 1994, pp. 58–61
- A Song for Fela & Other Poems. Nashville, TN: Nigerhouse, 1993{{citation needed|date=May 2020}}
- Theatre reviews in: Nigeria Magazine no. 72, March 1962{{citation needed|date=May 2020}}
References
{{Reflist}}
- Akwanya, A. N. The Self in the Mirror: Nkem Nwankwo and the Study of Exhibitionism in: OKIKE 39 (1988) 39–52.
External links
- [http://andersonbrownliterary.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/nkem-nwankwo.html "Nkem Nwankwo"]. Anderson Brown's Literary Blog, 11 January 2010.
- G. D. Killam and Alicia L. Kerfoot, [https://books.google.com/books?id=RPQpYJcI1I4C&q=Shadow+of+a+masquerade+Nkem+Nwankwo Student Encyclopedia of African Literature, ABC-CLIO, 2008, p 221]
{{Authority control}}
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Category:Indiana University alumni
Category:Michigan State University faculty
Category:Tennessee State University faculty
Category:Nigerian male novelists
Category:Nigerian satirical novelists
Category:People from Anambra State
Category:Nigerian emigrants to the United States
Category:20th-century Nigerian novelists
Category:People of the Nigerian Civil War