Gabriel Okara by Gabriel Okara

Gabriel Okara by Gabriel Okara

Gabriel Okara, a prize-winning author whose literary career spans six decades, is rightly hailed as the elder statesman of Nigerian literature. The first Modernist poet of anglophone Africa, he is best known for The Fisherman’s Invocation (1978), The Dreamer, His Vision (2005), and for his early experimental novel, The Voice (1964).                Arranged in six sections, Gabriel Okara: Collected Poems includes the poet’s earliest lyric verse along with poems written in response to Nigeria’s war years; literary tributes and elegies to fellow poets, activists, and loved ones long dead; and recent dramatic and narrative poems. The introduction by Brenda Marie Osbey contextualizes Okara’s work in the history of Nigerian, African, and English language literatures. Gabriel Okara: Collected Poems is at once a treasure for those long in search of a single authoritative edition and a revelation and timely introduction for readers new to the work of one of Africa’s most revered poets.

“Gabriel Okara [is] the only person who could ever be called both ‘the elder statesman of Nigerian literature and the first Modernist poet of Anglophone Africa’ Those who know, know who he is; who no know, go know.”—Aaron Brady, Literary Hub
“It is with publication of Gabriel Okara’s first poem that Nigerian literature in English and modern African poetry in this language can be said truly to have begun.”—from the introduction by Brenda Marie Osbey

Gabriel Okara was born at Bumoundi, Bayelsa State, in the Niger Delta in 1921 and educated at Government College Umuahia in Nigeria and Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. He worked as a bookbinder and printer for Federal Government Press at Lagos, served as the director of cultural and information services for the short-lived Republic of Biafra, and was the general manager of the Rivers State newspaper and broadcasting corporations. He is an honorary member of the Pan-African Writers’ Association, a fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Letters, and is currently writer in residence at the University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria. 

Brenda Marie Osbey is a poet and essayist. Her most recent volumes are History and Other Poems and All Souls: Essential Poems. A native of New Orleans, she is poet laureate emerita of Louisiana and distinguished visiting professor of Africana Studies at Brown University.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780803286870
ISBN 10	0803286872
Title	Gabriel Okara
Author	Gabriel Okara
Series	African Poetry Book
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	University of Nebraska Press
Year published	2016-04-01
Number of pages	168
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
Note	Unavailable