Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o Tribute | 2025-2026 Readings and Talks

On Tuesday, November 18th, the Lannan Center hosted a special tribute evening honoring Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, featuring writers Nukoma wa Ngugi, Novuyo Rosa Tshuma, and Helon Habila. Moderated by Lannan Visiting Lecturer Tope Folarin.Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (1938–2025) was an award-winning novelist, playwright, and essayist from Kenya whose novels have been translated into more than thirty languages. Born in 1938, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s early work was written in English under the name of James Ngugi. Novels such as The River Between (1965), A Grain of Wheat (1967), and Petals of Blood (1977) established his reputation as the foremost writer in post-Independence Kenya. In the 1970s, he abandoned English for Gikuyu and Swahili, writing his critical apologia on this subject in Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature (1986).Music: Quantum Jazz — "Orbiting A Distant Planet" — Provided by Jamendo.