Okri, Ben

(born March 15, 1959, Minna, Nigeria) Nigerian author who uses magic realism to convey the social and political chaos in his country.

Okri attended Urhobo College in Warri, Nigeria, and the University of Essex in Colchester, England. His first novels, Flowers and Shadows (1980) and The Landscapes Within (1981), employ surrealistic images to depict the corruption and lunacy of a politically scarred country. His two volumes of short stories, Incidents at the Shrine (1986) and Stars of the New Curfew (1988), portray the essential link in Nigerian culture between the physical world and the world of the spirits. Okri won the Booker Prize for his novel The Famished Road (1991), the story of Azaro, an abiku (“spirit child”), and his quest for identity. Okri's first book of poetry, An African Elegy (1992), urges Africans to overcome the forces of chaos within their countries, and the novel Songs of Enchantment (1993) continues the themes of The Famished Road, relating stories of dangerous quests and the struggle for equanimity in an unstable land. Okri's later works include the novels Astonishing the Gods (1995) and Dangerous Love (1996), about “star-crossed” lovers in postcolonial Nigeria, and a collection of essays, A Way of Being Free (1997). Although not overtly political, Okri's works nevertheless convey clear and urgent messages about the need for Africans to reforge their identities.