In an intellectual climate dominated by formalistic theoretical concerns, biographical criticism may seem an unfashionable mode of academic discourse, but it is sorely needed when writers and readers hail from different cultures. In this work Bernth Linfors, Professor of English and African Literatures at the University of Texas, examines the lives and works of a range of African writers including Chinua Achebe, Dennis Brutus, Ngugi wa Thiong'o and Wole Soyinka.
