Ngugi’s work critiqued each British colonialism in Kenya and postcolonial Kenyan society.
Famend Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong’o has died at age 87, his members of the family have introduced.
“It’s with a heavy coronary heart that we announce the passing of our dad, Ngugi wa Thiong’o,” his daughter Wanjiku Wa Ngugi wrote on Fb on Wednesday.
“He lived a full life, fought a superb combat,” she mentioned.
On the time of his demise, Ngugi was reportedly receiving kidney dialysis therapies, however his fast explanation for demise remains to be unknown.
Born in Kenya in 1938, Ngugi might be remembered as certainly one of Africa’s most vital postcolonial writers. Formative occasions in Ngugi’s formative years included the brutal Mau Mau struggle that swept British-ruled Kenya within the Nineteen Fifties.
Ngugi’s work was equally essential of the British colonial period and the postcolonial society that adopted Kenya’s independence in 1963. Different matters in his work lined the intersection between language, tradition, historical past, and id.
Ngugi made a mark for himself within the Seventies when he determined to modify from writing in English to the Kikuyu and Swahili languages – a controversial resolution on the time.
“All of us thought he was mad… and courageous on the identical time,” Kenyan author David Maillu informed the AFP information company.
“We requested ourselves who would purchase the books.”
Certainly one of his most well-known works, “Decolonising the Thoughts”, was revealed in 1986 whereas residing overseas. The ebook argues that it’s “inconceivable to liberate oneself whereas utilizing the language of oppressors”, AFP stories.
In addition to holding the place of acclaimed author, Ngugi was a prisoner of conscience. In 1977, he was jailed in Kenya for staging a play deemed essential of latest society.
He as soon as described the nation’s new elite class as “the demise of hopes, the demise of goals and the demise of magnificence”.
In 1982, Ngugi went into self-imposed exile within the UK following a ban on theatre teams and performances in his house nation. He later moved to the US, the place he labored as a professor of comparative literature on the College of California, Irvine. He additionally continued writing a spread of works, together with essays, memoirs and novels about Kenya.
Following information of Ngugi’s demise, reward for his life and work rapidly appeared on-line.
“My condolences to the household and associates of Professor Ngugi wa Thiong’o, a famend literary big and scholar, a son of the soil and nice patriot whose footprints are indelible,” Kenya’s opposition chief Martha Karua wrote on X.
“Thanks Mwalimu [teacher] on your freedom writing,” wrote Amnesty Worldwide’s Kenya department on X. “Having already earned his place in Kenyan historical past, he transitions from mortality to immortality.”
Margaretta wa Gacheru, a sociologist and former pupil of Ngugi, mentioned the writer was a nationwide icon.
“To me, he’s like a Kenyan Tolstoy, within the sense of being a storyteller, within the sense of his love of the language and panoramic view of society, his description of the panorama of social relations, of sophistication and sophistication struggles,” she mentioned.
