Posted at 07:05h
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Features,
Lit
Chinua Achebe was my hero.
As a second generation Nigerian immigrant growing up in England, role models who I could genuinely identify with were few and far between – especially in the 1980s, when it was still a big deal to see a black face on TV. So much so that we’d receive phone calls from family and friends whenever there was a Nigerian representative on the news, a film or more notably,
Family Fortunes.
I think I was 10. The world was smaller and the answers to the big questions were much bigger. I remember asking my mother why God was white and I was black. Instead of answering my question directly, she [as she often did] asked me why I thought so. I hadn’t a clue, so she asked me about what I had learned in school about religious history, about black religious history to be specific. My blank expression was enough for her to reach up onto the mantelpiece and pass me a book.
I looked at the title:
Things Fall Apart. Did the customary flick through for illustrations and saw nothing. Mum noticed my lack of interest and promised me to stick with it and it would be worth it. I sat down and devoured the entire thing in one weekend.
