Author: Chigozie Obioma

Booker nominated author Chigozie Obioma reflects on losing a ‘literary mother’ and her encouragement for generations of black and African writers to come It was with a heavy heart that I woke up, like many, to the news of the passing of the great African American writer Toni Morrison. As I have mourned and digested the news, my reaction has slowly gone from shock to dismay, then to a sense of inchoate peace. If we judge being old as a more feeble state, or characterised by a gradual withdrawal from work, then Morrison, like most great writers, had not become old. At the age of 88, she had continued to give us her stories and thoughts. The Source of Self-Regard – a further exploration on some of the broader themes of race and dignity that she explored throughout her life in novel...