By OSELOKA OBAZE
In a couple of months, literary icon, Chinua Achebe, will release his latest book, whose title is still being kept under wraps. Oseloka Obaze writes on how the book surveys the trajectory of a noble and richly lived life, with its inevitable ups and downs, from the writer’s birth to his fame and present disability and involuntary sojourn in the United States.

UNquestionably, the intimate aspects of Chinua Achebe’s life — all 80 years plus — could never be better told by anyone than the man himself. The book, dubbed “a semi-autobiographical tour de force” by some of those who have been privileged to read the entire manuscript or proof copy, could only be qualified in a nutshell, with that Cronkitenian, assurance, “and that’s the way it is”.

Prof. Chinua Achebe

Many will be thrilled that Achebe, the legend and celebrated writer, whom Nobel laureate, Toni Morrison once acknowledged as “one of her main literary inspirations in writing about her own people”, has gone the extra mile to write introspectively, intimately and from a looking glass perspective, about himself, not just as a famed writer, but about his antecedents, the early beginnings, “from his father, mother and great uncle through his own birth, early education, to college and university.”

This justifiably lengthy book, already described as vintage Achebe, does not only offer critical insights into the emergence of Africa’s literary tradition, but also delves into the origin and writing of Things Fall Apart, his other major novels, such as No longer At Ease, and “children’s books and poetry and fundamentally, about his role in the founding of the African Writers Series.” Factual and forthright, it is Achebe at his profoundly intimate, candid and illuminating best.

The book showcases Achebe, the student, the writer, the parent, the social and political activist and most importantly, a humanist and unrepentant social conscience of Nigeria.

Ever a faithful and abiding loyalist to those whom he call friends, Achebe devotes an entire section of the volume to his friend, schoolmate and fellow writer, the late iconoclast poet, Christopher Okigbo. His rendition will no doubt add to Okigbo’s already full-blown enigma and legendary status.

If this volume has one value, it is Achebe’s accentuation of his advocacy and going beyond precepts, to affirm that if Africans do not tell their own stories, others would, as is often the case. Some of the facts in the volume are already well known and reside in the public domain.

But in this volume and from the vantage position of the author, some finer details and revelations emerge, about events, peoples and places that are clearly beyond footnotes, and some, anecdotally so.

As one of the readers of the manuscript noted, “His focus on the dissolution of the Nigerian state is moving, refreshing and novel. He provides a historical overview of the clash between traditional African and European civilisations, the colonial period, agitation for independence and the Nigerian nationalists and independence fighters (with a special focus on Nnamdi Azikiwe’s pivotal role).”

In this context, Achebe does not merely reframe in a more illuminated form, our basic understanding of Nigerian politics, but offers unvarnished assessment of how Nigeria found itself at this critical juncture and present governance quandary. This volume will, as most of Achebe’s works, provoke debate and discourse, if not controversy.

Biafra was tackled not so much as a light and passé topic, now embedded in the deep recesses of nebulous memory or a topic fittingly belonging to history, but with all the seriousness and bluntness it deserved. As has been noted, “he also pays particular attention to the Biafran tragedy that claimed three million lives and raises questions about genocide, ethnic cleansing, a Nigerian version of the ‘final solution’ and historical suppression — all fodder for an explosive debate and reaction.

For Chinua Achebe, life has come to a full circle, and true to style, he has done things his own way – deliberately, quietly, humbly, fastidiously and without apologies. Surely, this volume, which will be reviewed in greater detail once in published form, is not just merely a captivating and well-told-tale, but one that spans a broad historical timeframe and places some vexatious, prickly and disquieting issues in their proper context, albeit from Achebe’s vantage point as an observer and in many instances, as a key player.

This seminal work is delighting and instructing at the same time, much like autobiography of great nations that are written in three strands – deeds, words and arts. It is a moving overview of the quintessential Chinua Achebe. The anticipation for many of Achebe’s readers and admirers is surely worth the wait.