Buchi Emecheta

Template:Short description Template:EngvarB Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox person Buchi Emecheta Template:Post-nominals (born Florence Onyebuchi Emecheta; 21 July 1944 – 25 January 2017) was a Nigerian writer<ref name=Busby>Template:Cite news</ref> who was the author of novels, plays, autobiography, and children's books. She first received notable critical attention for her 1974 novel, Second Class Citizen.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Her other books include The Bride Price (1976), The Slave Girl (1977) and The Joys of Motherhood (1979). Emecheta has been characterized as "the first successful black woman novelist living in Britain after 1948".<ref>Dawson, Ashley, "Beyond Imperial Feminism: Buchi Emecheta's London Novels and Black British Women's Emancipation", in Mongrel Nation: Diasporic Culture and the Making of Postcolonial Britain, University of Michigan Press, 2007, p. 117.</ref>

Born in Lagos, Nigeria, Emecheta drew in her writing on themes of child slavery, motherhood, female independence and freedom through education, gaining recognition from critics and honours especially with her debut novel, Second Class Citizen. Her works often explore the themes of culture, and tensions between tradition and modernity.<ref name="britannica.com">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Most of her early novels were published by Allison and Busby, and her editor was Margaret Busby.<ref name=Busby />

LifeEdit

Background and marriageEdit

Emecheta was born on 21 July 1944, in Lagos, Colonial Nigeria, to Igbo parents of Anioma extraction,<ref name="The Atlantic Companion to Literature in English">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="Colonial and Postcolonial Fiction: An Anthology">Template:Cite book</ref> Alice Okwuekwuhe and Jeremy Nwabudinke Emecheta<ref name="Something about the Author">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="The International Who's Who of Women 2002">Template:Cite book</ref> from Umuezeokolo Odeanta village in Ibusa, Delta State. Her father was a railway worker and moulder.<ref name="Something about the Author"/> Her mother, Alice Ogbanje Ojebeta Emecheta,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> was a former slave girl sold into slavery by her brother to a relative to buy silk head ties for his coming-of-age dance. When her mistress died, Ogbanje Emecheta returned home to freedom.

Emecheta completed her early childhood education at an all-girls' missionary school. At nine, she lost her father, who died of the complications from a wound which he contracted in the swamps of Burma, where he had been conscripted to fight for Lord Louis Mountbatten and the remnants of the British Empire.<ref name="Remembering my mother">Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref name="A Study Guide for Buchi Emecheta's The Joys of Motherhood">Template:Cite book</ref> After a year, she received a fully funded scholarship to Methodist Girls' School in Yaba, Lagos, where she remained until the age of 16. During this time, her mother died, leaving Emecheta an orphan, with books and her imagination becoming her refuge.<ref name="Remembering my mother" /> In 1960, she married Sylvester Onwordi,<ref name="Colonial and Postcolonial Fiction: An Anthology"/><ref name="The International Who's Who of Women 2002"/> a schoolboy to whom she had been engaged since she was 11 years old.<ref name="telegraph">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="A Study Guide for Buchi Emecheta's The Bride Price">Template:Cite book</ref> Later that year, she gave birth to a daughter, and in 1961 their younger son was born.<ref name=Busby />

Onwordi moved to London for his studies, and Emecheta joined him there with their first two children in 1962.<ref name=Busby /> In the next six years, she would give birth to five children; three daughters and two sons.<ref name="A Study Guide for Buchi Emecheta's The Bride Price"/> According to Emecheta, her marriage was an unhappy and sometimes violent one; details of which she would incorporate in her autobiographical book, Second Class Citizen.<ref name=Busby /><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} Updated May 2017.</ref> To keep her sanity, Emecheta wrote in her spare time. However, her husband was deeply suspicious of her writing, and he ultimately burned her first manuscript,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The Bride Price, which was eventually published in 1976. She had had to rewrite it after the earlier version was destroyed; as she later said, "There were five years between the two versions."<ref>Jussawalla, Feroza F., Reed Way Dasenbrock, "Buchi Emecheta", Interviews with Writers of the Post-colonial World, University Press of Mississippi, 1992, p. 84.</ref>

At the age of 22, pregnant with her fifth child, Emecheta left her husband.<ref name="theguardian"/><ref>Adeleye-Fayemi, Bisi, "LOUD WHISPERS: The First Class Citizen (Buchi Emecheta 1944-2017)", Above Whispers, 18 February 2017.</ref> While working to support her children alone, she earned a B.Sc. (Hons) degree in sociology in 1972 from the University of London.<ref name="Colonial and Postcolonial Fiction: An Anthology"/><ref name="Something about the Author"/><ref name="theguardian">Template:Cite news</ref> In her 1984 autobiography, Head above Water, she wrote: "As for my survival for the past twenty years in England, from when I was a little over twenty, dragging four cold and dripping babies with me and pregnant with a fifth one—that is a miracle."<ref>Emecheta, Buchi, Head Above Water, p. 5, quoted in Stephen Jantuah Boakye, "Suspense Strategies in Buchi Emecheta's Head Above Water", Language in India, Vol. 13:4, April 2013. ISSN 1930-2940.</ref> She would go on to gain her PhD from the university in 1991.<ref name="Contemporary Authors">Template:Cite book</ref>

WritingEdit

Keeping a diary, Emecheta typed up episodes about her experiences of Black British life and sent them to the weekly New Statesman magazine, at the time edited by Richard Crossman, who in 1971 began to publish Emecheta's sketches in a regular column.<ref name=Busby /><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref> A collection of these pieces became her first published book in 1972, In the Ditch<ref name="Colonial and Postcolonial Fiction: An Anthology"/><ref name="theguardian"/> (Barrie and Jenkins).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> This semi-autobiographical documentary novel<ref name="The Atlantic Companion to Literature in English"/> chronicled the struggles of a main character named Adah, who is forced to live in a housing estate while working as a librarian to support her five children.<ref name="Colonial and Postcolonial Fiction: An Anthology"/> Emecheta's second novel, Second-Class Citizen, which also drew on her own experiences, was published two years later (Allison and Busby, 1974).<ref name="bbc"/><ref>Harris, Hermione, "Book Reviews: Second Class Citizen by Buchi Emecheta (London, Allison and Busby, 1974)", Race & Class (Institute of Race Relations), Vol. 16, issue 4, 1 April 1975, pp. 433–435. Via Sage Journals.</ref> In 1979, a revised edition of In the Ditch was published by Allison and Busby,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> where both In the Ditch and Second Class Citizen were eventually published in one volume under the title Adah's Story (1983).<ref name="British Book News">Template:Cite book</ref> These books introduced Emecheta's three major themes, which were the quest for equal treatment, self-confidence and dignity as a woman.

Her later works Gwendolen (1989, also published as The Family), Kehinde (1994) and The New Tribe (2000) differ in some way, as they address the issues of immigrant life in Great Britain.<ref name="britannica.com"/> Most of her fictional works are focused on sexual discrimination and racial prejudice, informed by her own experiences as both a single parent and a black woman living in the United Kingdom.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

From 1965 to 1969, Emecheta worked as a library officer for the British Museum in London.<ref name="Something about the Author"/> From 1969 to 1976, she was a youth worker and sociologist for the Inner London Education Authority,<ref name="Something about the Author"/><ref>Busby, Margaret, "Buchi Emecheta", Daughters of Africa, London: Jonathan Cape, 1992, p. 656.</ref> and from 1976 to 1978 she worked as a community worker in Camden, North London,<ref name="The Atlantic Companion to Literature in English"/><ref name="Something about the Author"/> while continuing to produce further novels at Allison and Busby, with Margaret Busby as her editor<ref name=Busby /> – The Bride Price (1976), The Slave Girl (1977), The Joys of Motherhood (1979) and Destination Biafra (1982) – as well as the children's books Titch the Cat (1979, based on a story by her 11-year-old daughter Alice)<ref>"Buchi EMECHETA (Nigeria)", L'AFRIQUE ECRITE AU FEMININ | Les auteures anglophones.</ref> and Nowhere To Play (1980).<ref>"A Life well lived – Buchi Emecheta's life in novels", The Guardian (Nigeria), 26 January 2017.</ref>

Following Emecheta's success as an author, she travelled widely as a visiting professor and lecturer. She visited several American universities, including Pennsylvania State University, Rutgers University, the University of California, Los Angeles, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.<ref name="Something about the Author"/><ref name="Society and Solitude">Template:Cite book</ref> From 1980 to 1981, she was senior resident fellow and visiting professor of English at the University of Calabar, Nigeria.<ref name="The International Who's Who of Women 2002"/> From 1982 to 1983, Emecheta, together with her son Sylvester, ran the Ogwugwu Afor Publishing Company, producing her own work under the imprint,<ref name="theguardian"/> beginning with Double Yoke (1982).<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> She received an Arts Council of Great Britain bursary, 1982–83,<ref name="The Atlantic Companion to Literature in English"/><ref name="The International Who's Who of Women 2002"/> and was one of Granta magazine's "Best of Young British Novelists" in 1983.<ref name="theguardian"/> In 1982, she lectured at Yale University, and the University of London.<ref name="The International Who's Who of Women 2002"/> She became a Fellow at the University of London in 1986.<ref name="International Who's Who of Authors and Writers 2004">Template:Cite book</ref>

Over her career, Emecheta worked with many cultural and literary organizations, including the Africa Centre, London, and with the Caine Prize for African Writing as a member of the Advisory Council.<ref>The Council of the Caine Prize for African Writing, "Tribute to Buchi Emecheta (1944–2017)", Caine Prize blog, 1 February 2017.</ref>

Later yearsEdit

Emecheta suffered a stroke in 2010,<ref name="theguardian"/> and her last years were marked by increasing disability and illness.<ref name="Remembering my mother" /> She died in London on 25 January 2017, aged 72.<ref name="theguardian"/><ref name="bbc">Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Adesanya, Femi, "Nigerian Literary Icon, Buchi Emecheta Has Died", Information Nigeria, 25 January 2017.</ref>

Awards and recognitionEdit

Among the honours received during her literary career, Emecheta won the 1978 Jock Campbell Prize<ref name=Busby /> from the New Statesman (first won by Chinua Achebe's Arrow of God)<ref>Amoia, Alba, and Bettina Liebowitz Knapp, Multicultural Writers Since 1945: An A-to-Z Guide, Greenwood Press, 2004, p. 26.</ref> for her novel The Slave Girl,<ref name="The Atlantic Companion to Literature in English"/><ref name=ency /> and she was on Granta magazine's 1983 list of 20 "Best of Young British Novelists".<ref name="theguardian"/><ref name=ency>"Buchi Emecheta 1944–", Concise Major 21st Century Writers , encyclopedia.com.</ref><ref>Emecheta, Buchi, "Head Above Water", Granta 7: Best of Young British Novelists | Essays & Memoir, 1 March 1983.</ref> She was a member of the British Home Secretary's Advisory Council on Race in 1979.<ref name="The International Who's Who of Women 2002"/>

In September 2004, she appeared in the "A Great Day in London" photograph taken at the British Library, featuring 50 Black and Asian writers who have made major contributions to contemporary British literature.<ref>Levy, Andrea (18 September 2004), "Made in Britain. To celebrate the impact of their different perspectives, 50 writers of Caribbean, Asian and African descent gathered to be photographed. Andrea Levy reports on a great day for literature", The Guardian.</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In 2005, she was made an OBE for services to literature.<ref name="theguardian"/>

She received an Honorary doctorate of literature from Farleigh Dickinson University in 1992.<ref>Jagne, Siga Fatima, and Pushpa Naidu Parekh (eds), Buchi Emecheta biography, Postcolonial African Writers: A Bio-bibliographical Critical Sourcebook, Routledge, 1998, p. 149.</ref>

LegacyEdit

In 2017, Emecheta's son Sylvester Onwordi announced the formation of the Buchi Emecheta Foundation – a charitable organisation promoting literary and educational projects in the UK and in Africa<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> – which was launched in London on 3 February 2018 at the Brunei Gallery, SOAS, together with new editions of several of her books published by Onwordi through his Omenala Press.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>"Celebrating Buchi Emecheta" Template:Webarchive, Royal African Society</ref><ref>"Celebrating Buchi Emecheta – February Event" Template:Webarchive. Buchi Emecheta website.</ref> Among participants in the "Celebrating Buchi Emecheta" day-long event<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> – "a gathering of writers, critics, artists, publishers, literature enthusiasts and cultural activists from all over the world, including London and other parts of the U.K., France, Germany, U.S., Canada, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, and the Caribbean" – were Diane Abbott, Leila Aboulela, Carole Boyce Davies, Margaret Busby, James Currey, Louisa Uchum Egbunike, Ernest Emenyonu, Akachi Ezeigbo, Kadija George, Mpalive Msiska, Grace Nichols, Alastair Niven, Irenosen Okojie, Veronique Tadjo, Marie Linton Umeh, Wangui wa Goro, and Bibi Bakare-Yusuf.<ref>Ezeigbo, Akachi, "Celebrating Buchi Emecheta in London a year after", The Guardian (Nigeria), 11 February 2018.</ref><ref>Cobbinah, Angela, "How African writer gave women and girls a voice", Camden New Journal, 16 February 2018.</ref>

Emecheta features at number 98 on a list of 100 women recognised in August 2018 by BBC History Magazine as having changed the world.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>"100 Women Who Changed the World: the results", History Extra, 9 August 2018.</ref>

In March 2019, Camden Town Brewery launched a football kit using artwork featuring "some of the most inspiring female icons to have influenced the brewery's home borough of Camden".<ref>"Women of Camden – How a football kit became a work of art", London Post, 5 March 2019.</ref>

On 21 July 2019, which would have been Emecheta's 75th birthday,<ref>Adekunle, "Google doodle celebrates Buchi Emecheta 75th posthumous birthday", Vanguard, 21 July 2019.</ref> Google commemorated her life with a Doodle.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Perrone, Alessio, "Buchi Emecheta: Google Doodle celebrates prolific British-Nigerian author", The Independent, 21 July 2019.</ref><ref>Mackrell, Daniel, "Who is Buchi Emecheta and why is she today's Google Doodle?", Metro, 21 July 2019.</ref><ref>"Google Doodle celebrates Buchi Emecheta on 75th posthumous birthday", The Punch (Nigeria), 21 July 2019.</ref><ref>"Google Doodle: 5 tins to sabi about Buchi Emecheta", BBC News, Pidgin, 21 July 2019.</ref>

In October 2019, a new exhibition space in the library for students at Goldsmiths, University of London, was dedicated to Buchi Emecheta, marked by a reception with short talks by Goldsmiths warden Frances Corner and the Head of Library Services, Leo Appleton, preceding an address by Margaret Busby.<ref>"Buchi Emecheta Space Opening and Present Futures Exhibition", Goldsmiths Students' Union, 23 October 2019.</ref><ref>Gabi-Williams, Olatoun, "When Goldsmiths College honoured Buchi Emecheta", The Guardian (Nigeria), 24 November 2019.</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In October 2021, Emecheta's second novel, Second Class Citizen, was reissued as a Penguin Modern Classic,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> as was In the Ditch in 2023.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>