Personality of the Week - 25th to 31st July 2011

BEN OKRI

Ben Okri OBE FRSL (born 15 March 1959) is a Nigerian poet and novelist. Having spent his early childhood in London, he and his family returned to Nigeria in 1968. He later came back to England, embarking on studies at the University of Essex. He has received honorary doctorates from the University of Westminster (1997) and the University of Essex (2002), and was awarded an OBE in 2001.

Since he published his first novel, Flowers and Shadows (1980), Okri has risen to an international acclaim, and he is often described as one of Africa's greatest writers. His best known work, The Famished Road, was awarded the 1991 Booker Prize. He has also won the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Africa, the Aga Khan Prize for Fiction, and was given a Crystal Award by the World Economic Forum. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

He has also been described as a magic realist, although he has shrugged off that tag. His first-hand experiences of civil war in Nigeria are said to have inspired many of his works. He writes about the mundane and the metaphysical, the individual and the collective, drawing the reader into a world with vivid descriptions.

Okri is a Vice-President of the English Centre for the International PEN, an association of writers with 130 branches in over 100 countries. He is also a member of the United Kingdom's Royal National Theatre. He lives in London.

After a 5 year break, Okri's eleventh book, Starbook, was published by Rider. Tales of Freedom, a novella and collection of short stories, was published in 2009.

Awards

1987 Commonwealth Writers Prize (Africa Region, Best Book) - Incidents at the Shrine
1987 Paris Review/Aga Khan Prize for Fiction - Incidents at the Shrine
1988 The Guardian Fiction Prize - Stars of the New Curfew (shortlisted)
1991 Booker Prize for Fiction - The Famished Road
1993 Chianti Ruffino-Antico Fattore International Literary Prize - The Famished Road
1994 Premio Grinzane Cavour (Italy) -The Famished Road
1995 Crystal Award (World Economic Forum)
2000 Premio Palmi (Italy) - Dangerous Love
2008 International Literary Award Novi Sad (International Novi Sad Literature Festival, Serbia).
2010 D Lit awarded by School of Oriental and African Studies

Bibliography

Flowers and Shadows (novel); Longman, 1980
The Landscapes Within (novel); Longman, 1981
Incidents at the Shrine (novel); Heinemann, 1986
Stars of the New Curfew (short stories); Secker & Warburg, 1988
The Famished Road (novel); Cape, 1991
An African Elegy (poetry); Cape, 1992
Songs of Enchantment (novel); Cape, 1993
Astonishing the Gods (novel); Phoenix House, 1995
Birds of Heaven; Orion, 1995
Dangerous Love (novel); Phoenix House, 1996
A Way of Being Free (essays); Phoenix House, 1997
Infinite Riches (novel); Phoenix House, 1998
Mental Fight (poetry); Phoenix House, 1999
In Arcadia (novel); Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2002
Starbook (novel); Rider, 2007
Tales of Freedom (short stories); Rider, 2009
A Time for New Dreams (essays); Rider, 2011

Sources include Wikipedia