Kenyan author Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o during a visit to Sweden in 2017. Archive photo. Photo: Jonas Ekströmer/TT
Kenyan author Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o has died. He was mentioned for several decades as a possible Nobel Prize winner in literature.
TT
Published2025-05-28
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o has died, reports Kenyan newspaper The Star.
He was born in 1937 in Kamiriithu in central Kenya, during an era marked by British colonialism. His upbringing during the struggle for independence from British rule left a clear mark on his writing.
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o studied at the University of Kampala, Uganda, and later at Leeds, England. There he wrote his debut novel, Up Through the Darkness, under the pen name James Ngũgĩ. In the 1970s, inspired by Karl Marx and Frantz Fanon, he abandoned his colonial name James and instead took back his Kikuyu name Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o.
In 1977, perhaps his most famous novel, "A Flower of Blood", was published.
During his lifelong exile from Kenya, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o lived mainly in the UK and the US. In 1985 and 1986, he studied film at the Dramatic Institute in Sweden as part of a later failed plan to try to start an African film industry.
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's political struggle also meant a longer break in his writing. In 2006, the novel "Wizard of the Crow" was published, his first in 20 years.
In addition to his writing, Ngũgĩ wa Thiongo received honorary doctorates from several universities and was an editor for a number of newspapers. He also became director of the International Center for Writing and Translating in California and held a professorship in literature at the University of California.
Ngũgĩ was mentioned for several decades as a possible Nobel Prize winner in literature, often as a symbol of linguistic and cultural independence in post-colonial Africa.
Ngũgĩ had nine children, four of whom have become published authors themselves. He suffered from heart problems and underwent bypass surgery in 2019. He had previously survived prostate cancer.
Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o was 87 years old.
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