Richard Ali, a lawyer, was born in Kano, Nigeria and grew up in the resort town of Jos. He holds an LL.B from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria and was called to the Nigerian Bar in 2010. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the Sentinel Nigeria Magazine and was a runner-up at the 2008 John la Rose Short Story Competition. In 2008, he was part of the British Council’s Radiophonics Workshop. He lives in Jos where he practices law and runs an IT-company. City of Memories is his first novel.
A touching story of the memories of a hideously burned man, Ladislaus d’Almasy, and one about identity, one also about how war and nationalism rends the fabric of the world he lived in—the last great desert explorers. It is the story of his love affair with the married Katherine Clifton. It is a powerfully engaging novel told in what can only be described as “preciously beautiful writing”.
This immensely intriguing book on the 1986 Nobel Laureate’s incarceration in the course of the Civil War stretches the very limits just how much power words can be made to pack and deliver. It sides with the indomitable human spirit, and regardless of whether one agrees with Soyinka’s actions, “The Man Died” contains some of the most beautiful sentences in Nigerian writing and one of the most resolute indictments of tyranny ever.
Written by American philosopher, Ayn Rand, this story of architect Howard Roark - who has a unique aesthetic and philosophical vision - is an American classic. Roark stands against a society that demands conformity out of fear, and against the mindset of the “second-hander”. He affirms a positive Egoism, of neither living for others nor living through others. It is a book of great instruction, especially for the creative thinker, writer or artist.
In this brilliant novel, Coetzee foreshadows the tragedy of academic David Lurie, in the works of Milton and in the life of Byron—both of whom the soon-to-be-disgraced professor teaches his students. And, just when he thinks he will retire to the indifference of the countryside, a rape of his daughter shows how impossible it is to escape the human incidence of our individual freedoms. A complex, elegant story on many levels—deserves to be read time and time again.
Perhaps one of the best realised of Achebe’s characters is Ezeulu, he is positively heroic and even when he is crushed and broken at the end of the story, we feel a part of his story, and his loss of dignity is an indictment on us. We are involved. For when Ezeulu stands resolutely against his umunna, in line with his priestly principles, he embodies the artist-in-society. And so what if he loses? The story of all that is all his.
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