dumbfoundry

Although Soyinka intended to stay at Harvard for much of his exile, which ended in 1998 with [General Sani] Abacha’s death, something made him change his mind.

“I must confess that the first winter drove me south,” says Soyinka (pronounced shaw-YIN-ka). “One winter blast and I realized that I was not as tough as I thought I was.”

Here is a man who lived in exile four different times during his life, who was arrested ten times and who spent more than two years in prison, most of it in solitary confinement in a 4-by-8 foot cell. He had a price on his head at least five times. He is tougher than most. [...]

There is no doubt in Du Bois Institute Chair Henry Louis “Skip” Gates Jr.’s mind that Soyinka deserved to be the first African to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.

“Being with Soyinka is a bit like I imagine having had the privilege of being with Shakespeare four centuries ago,” Gates says. “After all, as many Africans point out, they have the same initials.”

This entry was posted by Ivy on Friday, November 19, 2004 at 10:19 AM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.