Just 20 years ago, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s debut novel Purple hibiscus first burst onto the world literary scene to critical acclaim, including shortlists for the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book.
It marked an important turning point in the representation of African voices in literature. The novel, which tells the story of a Nigerian girl navigating family tensions and societal expectations, was praised for its compelling narrative and exploration of complex themes. Adichie’s most successful later novels, including Half a yellow sun (2006) and Americanah (2013) also won several accolades.
Her masterful storytelling captivated readers around the world and opened the door for subsequent African writers to share their stories with international audiences.
The legacy of Adichie (pictured above receiving the WEB Du Bois Medal, Harvard University’s highest honor in the field of African and African American studies) can be seen in the growing success of novels written by authors of African descent, both born on the continent . and from the diaspora, to the global publishing scene.
2018 novel by Nigerian-British novelist Oyinkan Braithwaite My sister, the serial killer enjoyed worldwide success, winning several awards, including the 2019 Anthony Award for Best First Novel, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, as Purple hibiscus I was. In 2021, Zanzibar-born author Abdulrazak Gurnah won that year’s Nobel Prize in Literature for what the academy called his “uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the plight of the refugee on the divide between civilizations and continents.” Just weeks later, South African author Damon Galgut won the prestigious Booker Prize for his novel The promise (2021).
Rising acclaim
The accolades enjoyed by talented African writers continue to grow. Set just four months after 2024, the novels of Nigerian author Ayobami Adebayo and British-Ghanaian author Caleb Azumah Nelson, A spell of good things and Small Worlds respectively, have been shortlisted for this year’s prestigious Dylan Thomas Prize, which honors young writers and brings international prestige, as well as a £30,000 ($37,800) prize
The debut novel by Zimbabwean author Farai Mudzingwa Avenues with the train is a coming-of-age story set in modern Zimbabwe and tells the story of the protagonist’s life after witnessing the death of his friend as a young boy. It has been nominated for the 2024 Republic of Consciousness Award, which supports publishers in their continued commitment to work of high literary value. Avenues with the train it was described by the reviewers as “an assured debut” that “addresses the objective truth of these lives but also deftly conveys the subjective understanding of the character of the forces influencing their fate”.
Bibi Bakare-Yusuf is the co-founder and publishing director of Cassava Republic Press, a Nigerian company that published Avenues by Train as well as works by other award-winning authors such as Teju Cole and Chigozie Obioma. Bibi founded Cassava Republic Press in 2006, three years after the commercial and global fame he enjoyed Purple hibiscus. Enthusiastic about her experiences at the University of Nigeria, Bibi explains in an interview with Semafor Africa that she was “surprised by the limited selection of books available and the lack of diversity among the authors on the shelves of the homes and libraries I visited. Many of the books were business and religious titles and commercial fiction by Western authors such as Dan Brown and Stephen King.”
Determined to change the industry, Bibi set out to create a publishing company that would serve as a platform for African writers to tell their own stories, and Cassava Republic Press went from strength to strength. His novels now enjoy international fame and recognition, particularly in the UK and USA.
“Readers are interested in authentic novels about real-life experiences, which is what our publications provide,” he says.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the popularity of African novels with a global readership has grown alongside the rise of the Internet in the 2000s and 2010s. In particular, the rise of social media and online platforms has been instrumental in enhancing voice of African writers and in connecting them with readers worldwide.
Ayobami Adebayo rose to fame with the publication of her debut novel Stay With Me in 2017. It became a viral sensation among the TikTok literary community, dubbed BookTok. Videos of readers from around the world discussing and recommending Adebayo’s work have been shared and liked millions of times. Authors such as Adichie, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o and Teju Cole have won thousands of new readers through compelling presences on social media platforms such as YouTube, Instagram and TikTok, where they regularly engage with readers, share information about their novels and participate in global literary discussions.
Pushback against colonial literature
Unlike earlier Western novels written about the continent, including Joseph Conrad’s 1899 novel Heart of Darkness and the “exotic” novels of H. Rider Haggard, African novels in the late twentieth and into the 21st century marked the beginning of African writers reclaiming the narratives of African literature from the cultural monopoly of the West. The process included the publication of works by the likes of Chinua Achebe Things fall apart (1958) and by Ben Okri The Famished Road (1991).
Talking to you The democracyFarai Mudzingwa explained that Avenues by Train was inspired by his desire to rewrite colonial texts, stating that “Ancestral spirituality, creative expression [and] social practices were marginalized and at times outlawed by the settlers. I wanted to explore how cultures with disturbed spirituality and culture come to terms with modernity.”
Taiye Selasi, author of Ghana must go (2013) believes, however, that the popularity of writers from the African continent has not yet reached the heights it truly deserves, compared to the success and fame of Western writers. Speaking to the Guardian, Selas argues that “the popularity of around 50 writers on a continent of over a billion people represents a drop of success more than a wave”.
He laments the fact that due to lack of education, financial security and opportunity, many great African writers will never be discovered. The successes enjoyed by writers from the continent are still few and far between, although the canon of world literature would be very different without novels such as The Famished Road and Purple hibiscus.
In an age fueled by the Internet, social media provides African writers with a platform like none before – to connect with readers, share their stories and voices, and shout about their successes, as well as showcase the enormous and ever-growing global appeal of African fiction. This will continue to inspire the next generation of African writers to firmly stake the continent’s place as a force in the literary world.