Wole Soyinka in Conversation – Live Stream

Tuesday 28 September 2021

The Nobel Prize-winning writer introduces Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth, his first novel in 48 years, in a live-streamed conversation.

Following engineer and Yoruba royal Duyole Pitan-Payne, Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth is a dazzlingly brutal look at the nature of greed, power and the soul of a nation.

The novel is described by Publishers Weekly as ‘a biting satire . . . and an intriguing and droll whodunnit’.

Born into a Yoruba family in Abeokuta, Nigeria, Wole Soyinka published his debut novel in 1964.

During the same decade, he became an outspoken political activist and a critic of the Nigerian government, leading to the first of two sentences as a political prisoner.

Since then, Soyinka has remained an enduring critic of successive Nigerian governments, and the nature of corruption at large, even evading a death sentence in absentia.

In 1986, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Presented in partnership with Guardian Live

Age recommendation/restriction

For ages 16+

Time: 7.30pm