Wednesday, February 21, 2018

From Wole Soyinka to Orikinla


Seven years ago, in February 2011, the greatest black writer and the "Lion of African Literature", Prof. Wole Soyinka, the first black person to win the Nobel Prize for Literature sent me the following letter by email in reply to an email I sent to him. It is one of my most treasured possessions, including a thank you note from the great Tai Solarin and emails from Hans Jürgen Pohland, the great German filmmaker and director of Francis Oladele's film adaptation of two classic novels of the great Chinua Achebe; "Things Fall Apart" and "No Longer At Ease" starring Princess Elizabeth of Toro, Orlando Martins and Johnny Sekka.
Dear 'Orikinla',
Quickly to thank you for news of yourself and your literary achievement. I shall now look out for your books to add to my reading list. Unfortunately however, owing to the frequency of such requests, I found myself obliged, albeit reluctantly, to routinely decline writing forewords and blurbs to new works. The minuscule exceptions have been in truly exceptional circumstances.
I hope you do understand, and will kindly accept my excuses.
With sincere warm wishes to you and your writing,
Wole Soyinka
The book I wanted him to write the foreword, "In the House of Dogs" is distributed by Amazon and displayed on my https://www.amazon.com/author/ekenyerengozimichaelchima.



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