Cambridge Scholars Publishing Critical Engagements on African Literature: An Offering to Professor Isidore Diala

Beyond the critical examination of Isidore Diala’s award-winning poetry and drama, the essays in this collection offer fresh insights on the complex methodological and theoretical patterns underlying the readings of African literary landscapes. This is the first book to devote considerable attention to the study of Diala’s creative works The Pyre (drama) and The Lure of Ash (poetry). The majority of the contributors here are selected from among the finest of Diala’s former teachers, colleagues and students who know him very closely. The collection addresses fertile areas of African literary expression, such as the relationship between literature and national history, African ritual aesthetics; affirmation, denial and ambivalence as products of social constructions; and exile, migration and home-coming. Contributions also explore poetry and poetic truths; semiotics; anticolonial revolutions and postcolonial implosions; oil politics; discontent and militancy; and feminism and gender politics. The book stands out among its peers, and offers great insights to scholars, researchers and teachers working in the fields of African literature, cultures and aesthetics. About the Author Dr Abba A. Abba is a DAAD Research Fellow at the Institute for Asian and African Studies of Humboldt University, Berlin. He has been the Head of Department of English and University Orator at Edwin Clark University, Kiagbodo, Nigeria, since 2015, having previously served as the Acting Dean of the Faculty of Humanities. He received his BA degree in English and Literary Studies from Imo State University, Nigeria, and his MA and PhD in the same discipline from the University of Nigeria Nsukka. He has published extensively in a number of peer-reviewed journals, including the Journal of Commonwealth Literature, Matatu, the Journal of Language, Literature and Culture, Okike: An African Journal of New Writing and the Nigerian Journal of Folklore Research. He is the author of the award-winning novel The Ugly Queen and the play A Lunatic on the Throne. His latest play, The Blood Price, was published in 2018. Benedictus C. Nwachukwu is a Lecturer in the Department of Humanities at the Federal Polytechnic, Nekede, Nigeria. He received his BA and MA degrees in English and Literary Studies at Imo State University, Nigeria, and the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, respectively. His poems have been published in both national and international journals.