By Dan Amor
When
the celebrated and consummate novelist, Prof. Chinua Achebe died on Thursday
March 21, 2013 in
a hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, United
States of America at 82, his loss was
mourned not only by African writers but by statesmen and citizens of the world
whom one would not readily accuse of an interest in literature. What this means
is that the romantic emphasis upon the human ego which is implied in the last
degree of subjectivity in romantic thought brought about a characteristic motif
in the twentieth-century social life-the cult of the superman, the leader, the
hero, the born man of genius, who can raise himself above the common herd and
lead his people to greater height of attainment than mankind had previously
reached. There seems to be a commonly held view, even among literary
practitioners, that Achebe was a genius- the Eagle on Iroko in the African
literature forest. He was a novelist. But there are novelists and there are
novelists.
 |
| *Chinua Achebe |
In
fact, there were great novelists before him in the vast cosmos of comparative
literature: Henry James, Thomas Hardy, DH Lawrence, etcetera. Yet, Achebe was a
logical successor to these great men of letters in the last literary generation
of the twentieth century. Prof. Abiola Irele, easily one of Africa's
most distinguished literary scholars and critics, noted in his reaction to the
news of Achebe's death: "My first
reaction when I heard the news of Achebe's death was of sadness. I am very sad
to hear the news of the death of Achebe. It is a great loss. I have known him
since 1962. He was a wonderful man personally. Somehow, he was not sentimental.
It was Achebe who shaped African literature and gave it a standing in the
world. It is something that should be commended".
There
was indeed no African writer who ever influenced the thinking of his time,
either in his literary output or political interventions, more than Achebe. By
working so conscientiously at the interface between indigenous and English
literatures, Achebe more than any living African novelist, has cultivated the
English language with superstitious veneration. No writer has conceived it
possible that the dialect of peasants and market women should possess
sufficient energy and precision for a majestic and durable work. Achebe
ventures African thought into the English language with remarkable simplicity.
He detects the rich treasures of thought and diction, which still lay latent in
their ore in the African traditional life. He refines them into purity and
burnishes them into splendor thus fitting them for every purpose of use and
magnificence.
