Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, a giant of African literature, champion of indigenous African languages and perennial contender for the Nobel prize, died Wednesday at the age of 87.
Born in 1938, when Kenya was still under British colonial rule, Ngũgĩ dealt with the legacy of colonialism through essays, plays and novels including Weep Not, Child (1964), Devil on the Cross (1980) and Wizard of the Crow (2006). Long critical of the post-colonial Kenyan government, he was arrested by the regime of Jomo Kenyatta in 1977 and imprisoned for over a year without trial. During that time, in a cell for 23 hours a day, Ngũgĩ began to write in his native language, Gĩkũyũ, instead of English, a political statement and practice he continued for the rest of his career in exile.
