Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Popular Books

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Biography & Facts

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie ( ; born 15 September 1977) is a Nigerian writer, novelist, poet, essayist, and playwright of postcolonial feminist literature. She is the author of the award-winning novels Purple Hibiscus (2003), Half of a Yellow Sun (2006) and Americanah (2013). Her other works include the book essays We Should All Be Feminists (2014); Dear Ijeawele, or A Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions (2017); a memoir tribute to her father, Notes on Grief (2021); and a children's book, Mama's Sleeping Scarf (2023). Born in Enugu, Enugu State, Adichie's childhood was influenced by postcolonial rule in Nigeria, including the aftermath of the Nigerian Civil War, which took the lives of both of her grandfathers and was a major theme of Purple Hibiscus and Half of a Yellow Sun. She excelled in academics and attended the University of Nigeria, where she initially studied medicine and pharmacy. She moved to the United States at 19, and studied communications and political science at Drexel University in Philadelphia before transferring to and graduating from Eastern Connecticut State University. Adichie later received a master's degree from Johns Hopkins University. She first published the poetry collection Decisions in 1997, which was followed by a play, For Love of Biafra, in 1998. In less than ten years, she published eight books: novels, book essays and collections, memoirs, and children's books. Adichie has cited Chinua Achebe—in whose house she lived while at the University of Nigeria—Buchi Emecheta, Enid Blyton and other authors as inspirations; her style juxtaposes Western influences and the Igbo language and culture. Adichie's words on feminism were encapsulated in her 2009 TED talk "We Should All Be Feminists", which was adapted into a book of the same title in 2014. Most of her works delve the themes of immigration, racism, gender, marriage, motherhood and womanhood. In 2023, she made statements about LGBT rights in Nigeria in an interview with the British newspaper The Guardian, after which she was criticized for being transphobic. Adichie has received several academic awards and fellowship grants. She was shortlisted for the Caine Prize for African Writing and has won the O. Henry Award, Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and the PEN Pinter Prize, among others. She was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2008 and inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2017. Early life, education, and family Family and background Ngozi Adichie, whose English name was Amanda, was born on 15 September 1977, in Enugu, Nigeria, as the fifth out of six children, to Igbo parents, Grace (née Odigwe) and James Adichie. She made up the name "Chimamanda" in the 1990s to keep her legal English name of "Amanda" and conform with Igbo Christian naming customs of the time, which she admitted in an interview with the Nigerian television personality Ebuka Obi-Uchendu. She was raised in Enugu, which lies in the southern part of Nigeria, and had been the capital of the short-lived Republic of Biafra. Her father was born in Abba, Anambra State, and studied mathematics at University College, Ibadan. After graduating in 1957, he worked for a few years and then in 1963, moved to Berkeley, California, to complete his PhD at the University of California. He returned to Nigeria and began working as a professor at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in 1966. Her mother was born in Umunnachi, Anambra State. James met and married Grace on 15 April 1963, moving together to California. While in the United States, the couple had two daughters. She began her university studies in 1964, at Merritt College in Oakland, California, and then earned a degree in sociology and anthropology from the University of Nigeria. Shortly after the family returned to Nigeria, the Biafran War broke out and James began working for the Biafran government at the Biafran Manpower Directorate. The family lost almost everything including Adichie's maternal and paternal grandfathers during the 1966 anti-Igbo pogrom. James wrote that his brother, Michael Adichie, and brother-in-law, Cyprian Odigwe, both fought for Biafra in the war. James' father, David, and his father-in-law both died in refugee camps during the war. Obligated by custom which required the oldest child to bury the father, when the war ended, James went to the refugee camp at Nteje to find his father's body. He was told by officials that those who had died had been buried in a mass grave and were unidentifiable. In a symbolic gesture, James took sand from the site of the mass grave to the cemetery in Abba to bury David with his family. Education and influences After Biafra ceased to exist in 1970, James returned to the University of Nigeria in Nsukka while Grace worked for the government at Enugu until 1973 when she became an administration officer at the university, later becoming the university's first female registrar. The family stayed at the campus of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, previously occupied by Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe. When they moved in, the family included Ijeoma Rosemary, Uchenna "Uche", Chukwunweike "Chuks", Okechukwu "Okey", Ngozi, and Kenechukwu "Kene" and her father was then, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor of the university. Adichie was Catholic and when she was young, she wished she could be a priest. Her family's home parish was St. Paul's Parish in Abba. As a child, Adichie read only English-language stories, especially by Enid Blyton. Adichie's juvenilia which included stories with characters who were white and blue-eyed, modeled on British children she had read about. At ten, she discovered African literature and began reading Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, The African Child by Camara Laye, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's Weep Not, Child and Joys of Motherhood by Buchi Emecheta. Adichie began to study her father's stories about Biafra when she was thirteen. The war occurred before she was born, but in visits to Abba, she saw houses that were destroyed and some rusty bullets on the ground. She would later incorporate her memories and father's descriptions into her novels. Adichie started her education in Igbo and English. Although Igbo was not a popular subject, she continued taking courses in the language throughout high school. She completed her secondary education at the University of Nigeria Campus Secondary School, Nsukka with top distinction in West African Examinations Council (WAEC). and academic prizes. She was admitted to the University of Nigeria, and studied medicine and pharmacy for a year and half. She was also the editor of The Compass, a student-run magazine in the university campus. Education abroad and early literary efforts Adichie published Decisions, a collection of poems, in 1997 and then left for the United States. At the age of 19, she moved from Nigeria to study communications at Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She wrote For Love of Biafra, a play, in 1998, which was her init.... Discover the Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie books.