One of the best-known figures in African literature will be giving a public lecture at the University of Cambridge this November.

Chinua Achebe, who is the author of five novels including the groundbreaking book, Things Fall Apart, will give the first in an annual series of lectures in honour of the Cambridge anthropologist, Dr. Audrey Richards, who established the University’s Centre of African Studies.

The event will take place on Friday 19 November at the Faculty of Law. Professor Achebe will read from his autobiographical book on the Nigeria-Biafra War, which is due to be published next year.

Now resident in the US, Achebe lived through the turbulent period in which Nigeria emerged as an independent state. His books were some of the first works of African literature to receive international acclaim.

Things Fall Apart, his most famous novel, has sold 50 million copies in the English language alone. First published in 1958, it remains a literary landmark.

Achebe is currently Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University in the US. An inspirational character whose work has also provoked controversy, he remains a central figure in African literature.

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