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Anowa
Based on the old Ghanaian legend this is the story of a young women who decides, against her parents wishes, to marry the man she loves. After many trials and tribulations the couple amass a fortune, but Anowa realizes that something, somewhere is wrong.This edition of Ama Ata Aidoo’s well-known play has been specially developed for JSS pupils to use in preparation for BECE. It contains:- Complete text of the play
- Introductory notes that develop pupils’ skills in literary criticism
- Notes following each part of the play
- Questions and activities
- BECE exam-style questions covering the whole play
₵55.00Anowa
₵55.00 -
The Black Hermit (African Writers Series, AWS51)
In this play, Remi, the first of his tribe to go to university, ponders whether or not he should return to his people. Or should he continue to be a black hermit in the town? Amidst the backdrop of a politically torn country, Remi himself is torn between his sense of tribalism and nationalism. This struggle runs deep, as he finds it at the heart of his afflictions between himself, his marriage and familial relations, and his greater sense of obligations to his people and the country. The overwhelming nature of these problems drives him into isolation as a black hermit. His self-imposed exile into the city leads him to find contentment in the Jane, his new lover, and nightly clubbing. However, after he is lobbied to return to the tribe, he must now confront the demons of his past.
The Black Hermit was the first published East African play in English. The play was published in a small edition by Makerere University Press in 1963, and republished in Heinemann’s African Writers Series in 1968.
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The Lovers (African Writers Series)
The Lovers collects Head’s short fiction of the 1960s and 70s, written mainly in Serowe, Botswana, and depicting the lives and loves of African village people pre- and post-independence.
An earlier selection called Tales of Tenderness and Power was published in the Heinemann African Writers Series in 1990, but this expanded and updated volume adds many previously unavailable stories collected here for the first time. Anthology favourites like her breakthrough The Woman from America and The Prisoner who Wore Glasses are included, leading up to the first complete text of her much translated title story.
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Gathering Seaweed: African Prison Writing (African Writers Series)
This anthology introduces the African literature of incarceration to the general reader, the scholar, the activist and the student. The visions and prison cries of the few African nationalists imprisoned by colonialists, who later became leaders of their independent dictatorships and in turn imprisoned their own writers and other radicals, are brought into sharper focus, thereby critically exposing the ironies of varied generations of the efforts of freedom fighters.
Extracts of prose, poetry and plays are grouped into themes such as arrest, interrogation, torture, survival, release and truth and reconciliation.
Contributors include: Kunle Ajibade, Obafemi Awolowo, Steve Biko, Breyten Breytenbach, Dennis Brutus, Nawal El Saadawi, M J Kariuki, Kenneth Kaunda, Caesarina Kona Makhoere, Nelson Mandela, Emma Mashinini, Felix Mnthali, Augustino Nato, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Kwame Nkrumah, Abe Sachs, Ken Saro Wiwa, Wole Soyinka, and Koigi wa Wamwere.
Although an often harrowing indictment of the history, culture and politics of the African continent and the societies from which this literature comes, the anthology presents excellent prose, poetry and drama, which stands up in its own right as serious literature to be cherished, read and studied.
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The Return of the Water Spirit (African Writers Series)
Set in Angola in the late 1980s, a time of war, and when the Marxist-orientated ruling elite became engulfed by corruption, nepotism and rampant capitalism.Three centuries earlier, a hideous crime occurred, the beheading of a slave who had had inappropriate relations with his Master’s daughter. Now, in the very same Kinaxixi Square in the city of Luanda buildings are falling down one by one baffling the country’s engineers. Many describe this mysterious process as ‘Luanda Syndrome, God’s punishment on a degenerate society.
Drawing on the essence of African mythology which had all but been obliterated by history, could this be explained by the return of a Water Spirit (the ‘kianda’)?
The novel focuses on the interplay between these two forces-the forces of old and new. Just like faith can move mountains, the spirit of the water can move cities.
This book is a scathing critique of Angola’s ruling elite, for abandoning their socialist principles in favour of rampant capitalism.
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Bookset: African Writers Series (25 titles)
Relive all the literary joys of yesteryears by purchasing this jumbo set of all your favourite African Writers Series titles such as Things Fall Apart, The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born, Weep Not Child, So Long A Letter, No Sweetness Here and many more!
Exact titles will vary depending on availability.
₵1,490.00₵1,500.00Bookset: African Writers Series (25 titles)
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Ordained by the Oracle (African Writers Series, AWS55)
Boateng, a prosperous trader in Elmina, has the beginnings of disbelief in the old customs. His wife dies suddenly and he is put through forty days and forty nights of rituals. The conflicting strains of emotion on social behavior are vividly shown by this practised writer.
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Africa Writes Back: The African Writers Series & the Launch of African Literature
June 17, 2008, is the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart by Heinemann. This publication provided the impetus for the foundation of the African Writers Series in 1962 with Chinua Achebe as the editorial adviser. This narrative, drawing liberally on the correspondence with the authors, concentrates on the adventurous first twenty-five years.
Africa Writes Back: The African Writer’s Series & the Launch of African Literature captures the energy of literary publishing in a new and undefined field. Portraits of the leading characters and the many consultants and readers providing reports and advice to new and established writers make Africa Writes Back a stand-out book. James Currey’s voice and insights are an added bonus.
₵65.00