People of the City

(Paperback)

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A vivid coming-of-age tale set in a big Nigerian city about a young man trying to make his way as a journalist and band leader in the big city. When People of the City was published in 1954 it was immediately acclaimed as the first major novel in English by a West African to be widely read throughout the English-speaking world. People of the City tells the story of a young crime reporter and dance-band leader in a great West African city who comes to see that what he can do for the developing country in which he lives is more important than the considerable and varied personal pleasures he can find in the hectic life of the city. Ekwensi's delicious first book book has the swagger, bravado, and elation of the great bands of West Africa.

Reviews

"Electric. . . . Ekwensi paints a vivid picture of cultural cacophony in a modernizing Nigeria filled with colonizers, revolutionaries, dreamers, and schemers. The mesmerizing tale and its feckless, frustrating protagonist provide stark glimpses into the class struggles, misogyny, and violence that often lurk beneath a bustling metropolis." Publishers Weekly

"Lagos was a central character in much of Ekwensis fiction, portrayed with undertones of the noir thriller, his episodic style mirroring the urgency and restlessness of the city. His lower-middle-class characters . . . are stripped naked in public, confront nasty landlords, battle inane bureaucracies, have pepper put into their vaginas, die of political violence, seduce powerful politicians, commit murder-suicides and contract sexually transmitted diseases; one senses verisimilitude in Ekwensis unabashed melodrama. . . . The women did a lot of hip-swinging but they were often wonderfully bold." Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie,The Guardian

"People of the Citytells the story of a young crime reporter who doubles as a bandleader in a large west African city. As one British critic wrote, the novel said more about west Africa than 50 government reports." Shola Adenekan,The Guardian

"One of the most prolific African writers of the twentieth century." Charles Larson

Ekwensi saw [Nigerias] contradictions more clearly than most. And he was unusual, at least among what we might call the first generation of Nigerian writers, in not merely depicting women as people in their own right, with their own wants and desires, but being unafraid to explore the kind of power they can exert over men. . . . He also remains the most cosmopolitan, the most at ease with exploring the existential loss that is the modern Nigerian condition. Adewale Maja-Pearce,The Baffler

"Throughout the novel, Ekwensi critiques are electric, his narrative is mesmerizing. As such,People of the Cityis a vivid tale of class struggle and identity reclamation in the shadows of colonialism's reign. Elisabeth Woronzoff,PopMatters

Author Bio

Cyprian Ekwensi (1921-2007) wrote novels, short stories, and children's books. He is from Nkwelle Ezunaka, Anambra State, Nigeria, and his father was a known storyteller and elephant hunter. He worked at the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation and the Ministry of Information, which he directed during the First Republic. He resigned from his position at the ministry before the Nigerian Civil War in the late 60s. Ekwensi wrote hundreds of short stories, radio and television scripts, and several dozen works of fiction, including Drummer Boy and Jagua Nana. In 1968, he won the Dag Hammarskj ld International Prize in Literature and in 2001 he was made an MFR. He became a fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Letters in 2006, the year before his death.