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Buchi Emecheta

Renowned Nigerian writer, Buchi Emecheta has died. She passed on yesterday in her London home at the age of 72.

Emecheta, a very creative and prolific writer, authored such world-famous titles as The Bride Price,  The Slave Girl, Second-Class Citizen, The Joys of Motherhood, and Destination Biafra.

Born on July 21, 1944 in Lagos, she relocated to Britain in 1960. She worked as a librarian and later studied for a degree in Sociology at the University of London. For two years (1776 – 1978), she was a community worker at Camden in North London.

Living her life as she did as a black woman and a single parent in London, she wrote from the perspective of her experiences and struggles. Naturally, a lot of people saw her through her works as a feminist. About that however, she said of herself: “I work toward the liberation of women, but I’m not feminist. I’m just a woman.” Emecheta was more comfortable being called a “womanist” than a “feminist.”

Her full names were Florence Onyebuchi Emecheta but “Buchi Emecheta” was the name that drove into the consciousness of several hundreds of thousands of minds around the world.

Her literary art and her education in sociology looked like a natural blend. Very few writers have so seamlessly drawn their themes from African myths and traditions, the social and economic realities of existing as an African woman, the socio-cultural and psychological conflicts that erupt when Western values try to define African ones and of course, universal issues of gender.

Emecheta was also an academic. Having taught in the United States as Visiting Professor, she returned to Nigeria in 1980 and worked as Senior Research Fellow and Visiting Professor of English at the University of Calabar.

Her permanent abode however was London where she owned a personal house. She was a member of the British Home Secretary’s Advisory Council on Race.