143069 VO Topics in African Literature: Past and Present (2025W)

This is not the reading list. It is only the content of the lectures. You can choose what you want to read.

PRIMARY LITERATURE:
Thomas Mofolo, Moeti oa bochabela (The Traveler to the East, 1907), Chaka (1925)
R. R. R. Dhlomo, An African Tragedy (1928)
Solomon Plaatje, Mhudi (1930)
A.C. Jordan, Ingqumbo Yezinyanya (The Wrath of Ancestors, 1940)
Jomo Kenyatta, Facing Mount Kenya (1938)
D. O. Fagunwa, Ògbójú Ọdẹ nínú Igbó Irúnmalẹ̀ (The Forest of A Thousand Demons, 1938)
Okot p’Bitek, Wer pa Lawino (Song of Lawino, 1949, 1969)
Amos Tutola, The Palm-Wine Drinkard (1952)
Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart (1958) and “Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness”
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, The River Between (1965) and “Karen Blixen’s Dog”
Muthoni Likimani, They Shall Be Chastised (1974)
Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions (1988)
Flora Nwapa, Efuru (1966) and “Women and Creative Writing in Africa” (1995)
Buchi Emecheta, Joys of Motherhood (1979) and “Feminism with a small f”
Ama Ata Aidoo, No Sweetness Here (1971)
Charity Waciuma, Daughter of Mumbi (1969)
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Weep Not, Child (1964)
Wilson Katiyo, A Son of the Soil (1976)
Peter Abrahams, Tell Freedom (1954)
Chinua Achebe, “The African Writer and the English Language” (1965) from Morning Yet… (1975)
Chinua Achebe, “Politics and Politicians of Language in African Literature”, from Education of a British-Protected Child (2009)
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, “The Language in African Literature” from Decolonising the Mind (1986)
Aye Kwei Armah, The Beautyful Ones are Not Yet Born (1968) and “Masks and Marx” (1985)
Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart (1958,) No Longer at Ease (1960) and A Man of the People (1966)
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Caitaani Mutharaba-Ini (Devil on the Cross, 1980)
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Writing against Neo-colonialism (1986) and “Writers in Politics” (1997)
Ben Okri, “When Lights Return” from Stars of the New Curfew (1988) and The Famished Road (1991)
Ama Ata Aidoo, No Sweetness Here (1971)
Binyawanga Wainaina, “How to Write About Africa” (2005)
NoViolet Bulawayo, We Need New Names (2013)
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “African ‘authenticity’ and the Biafran experience” (2008)
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, “The Danger of a Single Story” (2009), Americanah (2013), “You in America” and “New Husband” (2003)
Chika Unigwe, On Black Sisters’ Street (2009) and “The Secret” (2007)
Brian Chikwava, Harare North (2009)
Taiye Selasi, “Bye-Bye Babar” (2005)
Emma Dabiri, “Why I am (still) not an Afropolitan” (2016)
Sefi Atta, A Bit of Difference (2013)

SECONDARY LITERATURE:
Adejunmobi, Moradewun and Carli Coetzee, eds., Routledge Handbook of African Literature (2019)
Coundouriotis, E., Claiming History: Colonialism, Ethnography, and the Novel (NY: Columbia UP, 1999)
Fyfe, Alexander and Madhu Krishnan, eds., African Literatures as World Literature (2022)
Gaylard, Gerald, After Colonialism: African Postmodernism and Magical Realism (2005)
Gikandi, Simon and Abiola Irele, eds., The Cambridge History of African and Caribbean Literature (2004)
Griffith, Garreth, African Literatures in English: East and West (Routledge, 2000)
Innes, C. L. , Introduction to Postcolonial Literatures in English (Cambridge UP, 2007)
Ngara, Emanuel, Art and Ideology in the African Novel (1985)
Ngugi, Mukoma, The Rise of the African Novel: Politics of Language, Identity, and Ownership (2018)
Ogunyemi, Chikwenye Okonjo, African Wo/Man Palava: The Nigerian Novel by Women (1995)
Ojaide, T. and J. Obi, Culture, Society and Politics in Modern African Literature: Texts and Contexts (2002)
Olaniyan, T. and Ato Quayson, eds., African Literature: An Anthology of Criticism and Theory (2007)
Ricard, Alain, The Languages and Literatures of Africa (James Currey 2004)
Schipper, Mineke, African Literature and Literary Theory (1989)
Wright, Derek, New Directions in African Fiction (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1997)