"I met him, back in the late-Eighties, right before he had an horrific car accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down. He was a professor at the University of Massachusetts then."
Dear friends,
The great Chinua Achebe passed yesterday.
I met him, back in the late-Eighties, right before he had an horrific car accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down. He was a professor at the University of Massachusetts then.
It was during that time that he brought a then fairly young Nigerian writer/scholar named Okey Ndibe to America, for the purpose of the latter becoming Editor of an international, progressive magazine that changed names a few times, before becoming African World magazine@1995. I was one of several progressive intellectuals who, occasionally, had pieces published in that now-defunct, albeit important, periodical.
However, my lifelong friendship with one of Chinua's prize student, the aforementioned Dr. Okey Ndibe of Brown University, is still going strong more than two decades later.
Finally, my condolences go out to our beloved Chinua Achebe's family, and the Ndibe family (which includes his wife, Professor Sheri Ndibe, and their three wonderful progeny/my boxing students Chibu, Chiamaka, and Chidibe).
One Love!
G. Djata Bumpus
http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/22/world/obit-chinua-achebe/index.html Read full post
