Home and Exile

Rating:
Summary: A Great Peice of Compact History
Review: Achebe's work was informative, thought provocing, and at times amusing. His work is another example of how important it is for all people to tell their own story/history, especially people who were once disposessed. This little book inspired me to write a few ideas to prevent my experiences from being misinterpreted.

Rating:
Summary: Long Live our blessed Statesman and elder
Review: Long live the proud son of Africa and our respected statesman.
Achebe the honest and truthful dispenser of both sides of the story. Colonial griots (to borrow Achebe's words) such as Elspeth Huxley and other apologists have for too long been left alone to justify the dispossession of precious lands and cultures. Until the proud son of Africa made them eat their own words and exposed them for what they are. Dishonest griots deftly laying the groundwork for self-enrichment at the expense of peace loving and decent Human Beings.
Chinua Achebe as exemplified by his few but precious books writes not to make money but only when he must say something useful. Unlike modern day "authors" who are more about money than substance. I have no doubt Achebe can write profound and moving accounts of African and world issues at the rate of one book a day but he chose only to spend his time teaching.
It is obvious why the Nobel Prize went to Wole Soyinka instead of Chinua Achebe. Achebe refuses to write for a "foreign" audience and does not take his marching orders from anybody. He is his own man. Africans and honest people all over the world have in their own ways given Achebe the best prize in the world.
Continuous interest in his worthwhile classics such as Things Fall Apart,The Man of the People,No longer at Ease,Anthills of the Savannah, Morning Yet on Creation Day,Hopes and Impediments and many others.

Home and Exile may be a small book but has enough three pence (from Achebes "somebody knock me down and have three pence!") to liberate nations and individuals from the grip and stench of colonial and racist apologia masquerading as literature.

Long live Achebe, proud son of Africa and citizen of the world.
To know Achebe (by reading his books) is to know how to be an unassuming and proud Human Being who quitely and calmly states his truth for the benefit of us all.

Rating:
Summary: Insightful ramblings from the ascetic, Achebe
Review: The physical brevity of Achebe's "autobiography" truly belies the intrisic wisdom he so effortlessly spews upon his listeners. Mr. Achebe sets out to deconstruct the manifold, post-colonial ills (endemic to the dispossessed of African diasopora) with the assistance of historical literature, creation fables, and his own personal memories. Indeed, a thought provoking manifesto for any fan of the great Achebe; one which will aid the reader to pursue further literature with a new sense of enlightenment.