Research Guides: The Novel in Africa: Books on Selected Authors

Selected Authors and Their Works

A select list of works often considered critical and exemplary in the development of the contemporary and modern novel genre in African literature:

Chris Abani, GraceLand . (Nigeria, 2004)

Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart . (Nigeria, 1996)
-- See also: E-text (1962)
-- See other editions: 2009 Norton ed. ; 2001 ; 1994 ; 1992 ; 1983 ; 1959

Ama Ata Aidoo. Out Sister Killjoy, or, Reflections from a black-eyed squint. (New York, 1979)
--See also: London, 1977 ; 2000

Ayi Kwei Armah. The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born. (Ghana, 1988)
--See also: 1968 ed.

J. M. Coetzee. Disgrace. (South Africa, 1999, 2000)
--See also: 2000 ed.

Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions . (Zimbabwe, 1988, 2001)
-- See other editions: 1989 ; 2004

Cyprian Ekwensi, People of the City. (Nigeria, 1968)
-- See also: 1963 ed.
-- See also: E-text (1963)

Nuruddin Farah. Gifts. (London, 1992)
--See also: 1993 ; 2000

Nadine Gordimer. July's People. (South Africa, 1981)
-- See also: E-book
--Plus: 1982 ed.

A. C. Jordan. The wrath of the ancestors. (South Africa, 1980) English translation from the Xhosa: Ingqumbo yeminyanya.
--See also: 2004 ed. ; 1980 Xhosa ed.

Zakes Mda. Ways of dying. (South Africa, 1995, 2002)
--See also: 1995 ed.

Phaswane Mpe. Welcome to our Hillbrow : a novel of postapartheid South Africa. (South Africa, 2001, 2011)
--See also: 2001 ed.

Es'kia Mphahlele. Down Second Avenue. (South Africa, 1959, 1984)
--See also: 1971 ed.

Thomas Mofolo, Chaka. (Lesotho, 1931 translation,1981)

Fiston Mwanza Mujila, Tram 83. (USA [Democratic Republic of Congo], 2015 translation)
--See also: Original French edition, 2014

Nnedi Okorafor, Lagoon. (USA [Nigeria], 2015)
--See other editions: 2014 ; 2016
--See also: E-book (2015)

Alan Paton. Cry, the beloved country. (South Africa, 1948, 2003)
--See also: 1948 ; 1967

Sol. T. Plaatje. Mhudi. (South Africa, 1930, 1975)
--See also other editions: 1970 ; 1978
--Plus: E-book (1930 ed.)

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Matigari. (Kenya, 1990)
-- See other editions: 1987, 1989 ; 1998

Amos Tutuola, The Palm-Wine Drinkard and His Dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Dead's Town. (Nigeria, 1953)
-- See other editions: 1952 (copy 1) ; 1952 (copy 2) ; 1961 (Butler Reserves) ; 1961 ; 1970 (Barnard) ; 1984

Yvonne Vera, Without a Name. (Zimbabwe, 1994)
-- See other editions: 1995 ; 2002 (with Under the Tongue )
-- See also: E-text (1994)

Books on Selected Authors

Comparative works

Ahmad, Hena. Postnational feminisms : postcolonial identities and cosmopolitanism in the works of Kamala Markandaya, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Ama Ata Aidoo, and Anita Desai. (New York : Peter Lang, c2010)
-- See also: E-book
Andrade, Susan Z. The nation writ small : African fictions and feminisms, 1958-1988. Durham : Duke University Press, 2011.
--See also: E-book
Breidlid, Anders. Resistance and consciousness in Kenya and South Africa : subalternity and representation in the novels of Ngugi wa Thiongó and Alex La Guma. (Frankfurt am Main ; New York : Peter Lang, c2002)
Briault Manus, Vicki. Emerging traditions : towards a postcolonial stylistics of black South African fiction in English. (Lanham, Md. : Lexington Books, c2011)
--See also: E-book
Emerging African voices : a study of contemporary African literature. Edited by Walter P. Collins, III. (Amherst, NY : Cambria Press, c2010)
--Chapters on Abani, Adichie, Diome, Habila, Ifowodo, Iweala, Mpe, Okesipe, Oyeyemi, and Soyinka.
Foundational African writers : Peter Abrahams, Noni Jabavu, Sibusiso Nyembezi and Es'kia Mphahlele. Edited by Bhekizizwe Peterson, Khwezi Mkhize and Makhosazana Xaba. (Johannesburg : Wits University Press, 2022)
--See also: E-book
George, Olakunle. Relocating agency : modernity and African letters. (Albany : State University of New York Press, c2003)
--Chapters on Achebe, Fagunwa, Soyinka, and Tutuola.
--See also: E-book
Griswold, Wendy. Bearing witness : Readers, writers, and the novel in Nigeria. (Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, c2000)
Hannerz, Ulf. Afropolitan horizons : essays toward a literary anthropology of Nigeria. (New York : Berghahn, 2022)
--See also: E-book
Helgesson, Stefan. Transnationalism in southern African literature : modernists, realists, and the inequality of print culture. (New York : Routledge, 2009)
Helgesson, Stefan. Writing in crisis : ethics and history in Gordimer, Ndebele, and Coetzee. (Scottsville, South Africa : University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, c2004)
Jacobs, J. U. Diaspora and identity in South African fiction. (Scottsville, Kwazulu-Natal : University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2015)
Larson, Charles R. The ordeal of the African writer. (London ; New York : Zed Books ; New York : Distributed exclusively in the USA by St. Martin's Press, 2001)
--Focus on the lives and works of Amos Tutuola, Cyprian Ekwensi, Veronique Tadjo, Elinor Sisulu, Yvonne Vera, Camara Laye, Ken Saro-Wiwa, and others.
Lindfors, Bernth. Early West African writers : Amos Tutuola, Cyprian Ekwensi & Ayi Kwei Armah. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c2010)
Maja-Pearce, Adewale. A mask dancing : Nigerian novelists of the eighties. (London ; New York : Hans Zell Publishers, 1992)
Mũkoma wa Ngũgĩ. The rise of the African novel : politics of language, identity, and ownership. (Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, [2018])
Newell, Stephanie. West African literatures : ways of reading. (Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2006)
--See also: E-book
Nkosi, Lewis. Writing home : Lewis Nkosi on South African writing. Edited by Lindy Stiebel and Michael Chapman. (Pietermaritzburg, South Africa : University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2016)
--See also: E-book
Nfah-Abbenyi, Juliana Makuchi. Gender in African women's writing : identity, sexuality, and difference. (Bloomington : Indiana University Press, c1997.
--See also: E-book
O'Brien, Sara Talis and Renée T. Schatteman. Voices from the continent : a curriculum guide to selected Southern African literature. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c2005)
-- Focus on selected works of Njabulo Ndebele, Bessie Head, Nadine Gordimer, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Sindiwe Magona.
Oil fictions : world literature and our contemporary petrosphere. Edited by Stacey Balkan and Swaralipi Nandi. (University Park, Pennsylvania : The Pennsylvania State University Press, c2021)
--See also: E-book
Omotoso, Kole. Achebe or Soyinka? : a study in contrasts. (Northvale, N.J. ; London : Hans Zell Publishers, 1996)
Postcolonial literatures : Achebe, Ngugi, Desai, Walcott. Edited by Michael Parker and Roger Starkey. (New York : St. Martin's Press, 1995)
Quayson, Ato. Strategic transformations in Nigerian writing : orality & history in the work of Rev. Samuel Johnson, Amos Tutuola, Wole Soyinka & Ben Okri. (Oxford : J. Currey ; Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 1997)
Transnational Africana women's fictions. E-book. Edited by Cheryl Sterling. Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, [2022])
Van der Vlies, Andrew. Present imperfect : contemporary South African writing. Oxford ; New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2017.
--Close readings of works by J.M. Coetzee, Nadine Gordimer, Ivan Vladislavic, Zoe Wicomb, Marlene van Niekerk, Ingrid Winterbach, Songeziwe Mahlangu, & Masande Ntshanga.
--See also: E-book
Words gone two soon : a tribute to Phaswane Mpe & K. Sello Duiker. Edited by Mbulelo Vizikhungo Mzamane. (Pretoria : Umgangatho Media & Communications, 2005)
Writing African women : gender, popular culture, and literature in West Africa. Edited by Stephanie Newell. London [England] ; Atlantic Highlands, N.J. : Zed Books, 1997.
--See also: 2017 edition
Zulfiqar, Sadia. African women writers and the politics of gender. (Newcastle upon Tyne : Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2016)
-- Focus on selected works by Mariama Bâ, Leila Aboulela, Buchi Emecheta, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, & Tsitsi Dangarembga.

Abani

Abani, Chris. The face : cartography of the void. (Brooklyn, New York : Restless Books, 2016, c2013)

Achebe

Achebe, Chinua. Conversations with Chinua Achebe. Edited by Bernth Lindfors. (Jackson, MS : University Press of Mississippi, 1997)
Achebe, Chinua. The education of a British-protected child : essays. (New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2009)
Achebe, Chinua. Home and exile. (New York : Oxford University Press, 2000)
Achebe, Chinua. Things fall apart : authoritative text, contexts and criticism. Edited by Francis Abiola Irele. (New York : W. W. Norton & Co., c2009)
Achebe's women : imagism and power. Edited by Helen Chukwuma. (Trenton, N.J. : Africa World Press, c2012)
Blazing the path : fifty years of Things Fall Apart. Edited by Chima Anyadike and Kehinde A. Ayoola. (Ibadan, Nigeria : HEBN Publishers, 2012)
The Chinua Achebe encyclopedia. Edited by M. Keith Booker. (Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2003)
Chinua Achebe's legacy : illuminations from Africa. E-book. Edited by James Ogude. (Pretoria, South Africa : Africa Institute of South Africa, 2015)
Chinua Achebe's Things fall apart : 1958-2008. Cross/cultures ; 137. Edited by David Whittaker. (Amsterdam ; New York : Rodopi, 2011)
-- See also: E-book
Chinua Achebe's Things fall apart : a casebook. Edited by Isidore Okpewho. (Oxford, UK ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2003)
Egejuru, Phanuel Akubueze. Chinua Achebe : pure and simple, an oral biography. (Lagos, Nigeria : Malthouse Press, 2002)
Emenyo̲nu, Ernest and Charles E. Nnolim. Remembering a legend : Chinua Achebe. E-book. (New York [USA] ; Lagos [Nigeria] ; London [England] : African Heritage Press, 2014)
-- See also: Print copy
Emerging perspectives on Chinua Achebe. 2 vols. Edited by Ernest N. Emenyonu. (Trenton NJ : Africa World Press, c2004)
Ezenwa-Ohaeto. Chinua Achebe : a biography. (Oxford : James Currey ; Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 1997)
Illuminations on Chinua Achebe : the art of resistance. Edited by: Mĩcere Gĩthae Mũgo & Herbert G. Ruffin II. (Trenton, New Jersey : Africa World Press, [2017])
Lindfors, Bernth. Early Achebe. (Trenton NJ : Africa World Press, 2009)
Lynn, Thomas Jay.: Chinua Achebe and the politics of narration : envisioning language. ([Cham, Switzerland] : Palgrave Macmillan, [2017])
Mezu, Rose Ure. Chinua Achebe : the man and his works. (London : Adonis & Libby Pub.,Ltd., 2006)
-- See also: E-book
Morrison, Jago. Chinua Achebe. E-book. Contemporary world writers. (Manchester, UK : Manchester University Press, 2014)
Ochiagha, Terri. Achebe and friends at Umuahia : the making of a literary elite. (Woodbridge, Suffolk : James Currey, 2015)
Ogbaa, Kalu. The life and times of Chinua Achebe. (Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2022)
--See also: E-book
Ogbaa, Kalu. Understanding Things fall apart : a student casebook to issues, sources, and historical documents. (Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 1999)
Ogede, Ode. Achebe's things fall apart : a reader's guide. Continuum reader's guides. (London : Continuum, 2007)
--See also: E-book
Okechukwu, Chinwe. Achebe the orator : the art of persuasion in Chinua Achebe's novels. (Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2001)
Sallah, Tijan M. and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. Chinua Achebe, teacher of light : a biography. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c2003)

Aidoo

Emerging perspectives on Ama Ata Aidoo. Edited by Ada Uzoamaka Azodo & Gay Wilentz. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c1999)
Essays in honour of Ama Ata Aidoo at 70 : a reader in African cultural studies. Edited by Anne V. Adams. (Banbury, UK : Ayebia Clarke ; Boulder, CO : Lynne Rienner, 2012)
Odamtten, Vincent O. The art of Ama Ata Aidoo : polylectics and reading against neocolonialism. (Gainesville : University Press of Florida, c1994)

Armah

Critical perspectives on Ayi Kwei Armah. Edited by Derek Wright. ([Washington, D.C.] : Three Continents Press, c1992)
Fraser, Robert. The novels of Ayi Kwei Armah : a study in polemical fiction. (London : Heinemann, 1980)
Lazarus, Neil. Resistance in postcolonial African fiction. (New Haven : Yale University Press, c1990)
Ogede, Ode. Ayi Kwei Armah, radical iconoclast : pitting imaginary worlds against the actual (Athens : Ohio University Press, c2000)
Wright, Derek. Ayi Kwei Armah's Africa : the sources of his fiction. (London ; New York : Hans Zell Publishers, c1989)
Yankson, Kofi E. Ayi Kwei Armah's novels. (Accra : [s.n.], 1994)

Coetzee

A companion to the works of J.M. Coetzee. Edited by Tim Mehigan. (Rochester, N.Y. : Camden House, 2011)
Attwell, David. J.M. Coetzee : South Africa and the politics of writing. (Berkeley : University of California Press ; Cape Town : David Philip, c1993)
--See also: E-book (US ed.) -or- E-book (South African ed.)
Attwell, David. J.M. Coetzee and the life of writing : face to face with time. (Auckland Park : Jacana, 2015)
Critical essays on J.M. Coetzee. Edited by Sue Kossew. (New York : G.K. Hall ; London : Prentice Hall International, c1998)
Hayes, Patrick. J.M. Coetzee and the novel : writing and politics after Beckett. E-book. (Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2010)
Head, Dominic. J.M. Coetzee. (New York : Cambridge University Press, 1997)
Head, Dominic. The Cambridge introduction to J.M. Coetzee. (Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2009)
--See also: E-book

Dangarembga

Negotiating the postcolonial : emerging perspectives on Tsitsi Dangarembga. Edited by Ann Elizabeth Willey & Jeanette Treiber. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c2002)

Farah

Alden, Patricia and Louis Tremaine. Nuruddin Farah. Twayne's world author series. New York : Twayne Publishers, c1999.
--See also: E-book
Emerging perspectives on Nuruddin Farah. Edited by Derek Wright. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c2002)
Moolla, F. Fiona. Reading Nuruddin Farah : the individual, the novel & the idea of home. (Woodbridge, Suffolk : James Currey, c2014)
The Novels of Nuruddin Farah. Edited by Derek Wright. Revised, and enlarged edition. (Bayreuth, Germany : Bayreuth University, c2004)

Gordimer

Brahimi, Denise. Nadine Gordimer : weaving together fiction, women and politics. (Cape Town : UCT Press, 2012)
-- See also: E-book
Clingman, Stephen. The novels of Nadine Gordimer : history from the inside. 2nd ed. (Amherst : University of Massachusetts Press, c1992)
-- See also: 1986 ed.
Head, Dominic. Nadine Gordimer. ([England] ; New York, NY, USA : Cambridge University Press, 1994)
Nadine Gordimer : a bibliography of primary and secondary sources, 1937-1992. Compiled by Dorothy Driver ... [et al.] ; with an introduction by Dorothy Driver. (London ; New Jersey : H. Zell, 1994)
-- See also: 1993 ed.
Nadine Gordimer's Burger's daughter : a casebook. Edited by Judie Newman. (Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, c2003)
Roberts, Ronald Suresh. No cold kitchen : a biography of Nadine Gordimer. (Johannesburg, South Africa : STE Publishers : [Distributed by] Thorold's Africana Books, 2005)
Temple-Thurston, Barbara. Nadine Gordimer revisited. Twayne's world authors series. (New York : Twayne Publishers, 1999)
-- See also: E-book
Wagner, Kathrin M. Rereading Nadine Gordimer. (Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 1994)
A Writing life : celebrating Nadine Gordimer. Edited by Andries Walter Oliphant ; photographs by David Goldblatt. (London ; New York : Viking, 1998)

Mda

Fincham, Gail. Dance of life : the novels of Zakes Mda in post-apartheid South Africa. (Claremont, South Africa : UCT Press, 2011)
--See also: E-book
Mda, Zakes. Sometimes there is a void : memoirs of an outsider. (New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012)
--See also: South African ed.
Ways of writing : critical essays on Zakes Mda. Edited by David Bell and J.U. Jacobs. (Scottsville, South Africa : University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2009)

Ngugi wa Thiong'o

Cook, David and & Michael Okenimkpe. Ngugi wa Thiong'o : an exploration of his writings. 2nd ed. (Oxford : J. Currey ; Portsmouth, NH : Heinemann, 1997)
Critical essays on Ngũgĩ wa Thiongʾo. Edited by Peter Nazareth. (New York : Twayne Publishers, c2000)
Gikandi, Simon. Ngugi wa Thiong’o. (Cambridge, UK ; New York : Cambridge University Press, c2000)
-- See also: E-book
Lovesey, Oliver. Ngũgĩ wa Thiongʾo. Twayne's world authors series. (New York : Twayne Publishers, c2000.
-- See also: E-book
Ngũgĩ : reflections on his life of writing. Edited by Simon Gikandi and Ndirangu Wachanga. (Woodbridge, Suffolk : James Currey, 2018)
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o speaks : interviews with the Kenyan writer. Edited by Reinhard Sander & Bernth Lindfors ; with the assistance of Lynette Cintrón. (Oxford : James Currey ; Nairobi [Kenya] : EAEP ; [Trenton, NJ] : Africa World Press, 2006)
Ngũgĩ wa Thiongʼo : text and contexts. Edited by Charles Cantalupo. (Trenton, NJ : Africa World Press, c1995)
Ogude, James. Ngugi's novels and African history : narrating the nation. (London ; Sterling, Va. : Pluto Press, 1999)
-- See also: E-book
Sicherman, Carol. Ngugi wa Thiong'o, the making of a rebel : a source book in Kenyan literature and resistance. (London ; New York : H. Zell Publishers, 1990)
The World of Ngūgī wa Thiong'o. Edited by Charles Cantalupo. (Trenton, N.J. : Africa World Press, Inc., c1995)

Okorafor

Lindow, Sandra J. Nnedi Okorafor : magic, myth, morality and the future. (Jefferson, North Carolina : McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, [2023])

Paton

Callan, Edward. Alan Paton. (New York, Twayne, 1968)
--See also: E-book
Callan, Edward. Cry, the beloved country : a novel of South Africa : [a study]. (Boston : Twayne Publishers, 1991)

Plaatje

A collection of Solomon T. Plaatje memorial lectures, 1981-1992. [Bophuthatswana, South Africa] : Institute of African Studies, University of Bophuthatswana, in conjunction with the Centre for Development Analysis, c1993) Contributions by Stephen Gray, Richard Rive, Es'kia Mphahlele, Njabulo Ndebele, Alan Paton, Timothy Couzens, among others.
Gray, Stephen. Sources of the first Black South African novel in English : Solomon Plaatje's use of Shakespeare and Bunyan in Mhudi. (Pasadena : Munger Africana Library, 1976)
Midgley, Peter. Sol Plaatje : an introduction. NELM introductions series ; no. 3. (Grahamstown, South Africa : National English Literary Museum, 1997)
Molema, S. M. Lover of his people : a biography of Sol Plaatje. Translated and edited by D.S. Matjila and Karen Haire. (Johannesburg : Wits University Press, 2012)
Plaatje, Sol. T. Sol Plaatje : selected writings. Edited by Brian Willan. (Johannesburg, South Africa : Witswatersrand University Press ; Athens, Ohio : Ohio University Press, 1997)
Willan, Brian. Sol Plaatje : a life of Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje, 1876-1932. (Sunnyside, Auckland Park, South Africa : Jacana Media, 2018)
--See also: U.S. edition
Willan, Brian. Sol Plaatje : South African Nationalist 1876-1932. (London : Heinemann, 1984)

Tutuola

Critical perspectives on Amos Tutuola. Edited by Bernth Lindfors. (Washington : Three Continents Press, c1975)
Owomoyela, Oyekan. Amos Tutuola revisited. Twayne's world authors series. (New York : Twayne Publishers, 1999)

Vera

Emerging perspectives on Yvonne Vera. Edited by Helen Cousins and Pauline Dodgson-Katiyo. (Trenton, N.J. : Africa World Press, c2012)
Gwetai, Ericah. Petal thoughts : Yvonne Vera : a biography. (Gweru, Zimbabwe : Mambo Press, 2008)
Sign and taboo : perspectives on the poetic fiction of Yvonne Vera. Edited by Robert Muponde and Mandivavarira Maodzwa-Taruvinga. (Oxford : Currey, 2003)