Kenyan Author Ngugi wa Thiong'o to Speak at Manhattanville College in Harrison

The following announcement is from Manhattanville College:

Celebrated Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong’o, heralded as a possible winner of the Nobel prize in literature this year by The Guardian, will be featured in a one-day symposium at Manhattanville College on Friday, September 26, 2014, as part of the College’s Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Program annual Fall Writers’ Weekend. Ngugi will give a keynote reading from his works beginning at 7:00 p.m.

The symposium, free of charge and open to the public, will begin at 3:30 p.m. with a panel on Ngugi’s life and work. Featured presenters include John M. Mugane, Professor of the Practice of African Languages and Cultures and Director of the African Language Program at Harvard University, Hunter College Professor Jeremy Glick, and Manhattanville College Visiting Assistant Professor Fatin Abbas. Both the panel and the reading will be held in the West Room of Reid Castle.

Ngugi wa Thiong’o is one of the world’s most distinguished authors as well as one of its most dynamically cross-genre writers. His volumes of critical essays include the classic volumes Decolonizing the Mind and Barrel of a Pen: Resistance to Repression in Neocolonial Kenya as well as recent collections such as Globalectics: Theory and the Politics of Knowing and In the Name of My Mother: Reflections on Writers and Empire.

“This visit continues and expands upon our MFA program’s mission of bringing the country’s – and the world’s – most important artists to the Hudson River Valley,” MFA program director Mark Nowak said. “From Pulitzer Prize winners like Tracie Smith to our dearly missed friend Pete Seeger, Manhattanville’s MFA program seeks to expose our students – and our community – to the artistic change-makers of yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Ngugi’s memoirs and autobiographies include Detained: A Writer’s Prison Diary as well as two recent volumes, Dreams in a Time of War and In the House of the Interpreter (a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award). His widely celebrated novels include A Grain of Wheat, Petals of Blood, and Wizard of the Crow.

For more on Ngugi and the 2014 Nobel Prize, please see “Ngugi wa Thiong’o Tipped for 2014 Nobel prize in Literature” You can also watch Ngugi’s recent appearance on the BBC, “English is not an African language.” For more information about the symposium, please visit the MFA program on the web at http://mville.edu/mfa or contact Mark Nowak, Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing, 914.323.7157, mark.nowak@mville.edu

About Manhattanville College:

Manhattanville College (www.manhattanville.edu) is an independent, co-educational liberal arts institution dedicated to academic excellence and social and civic action. Manhattanville prepares students to be ethical and socially responsible leaders in a global community. Located just 30 minutes from New York City, Manhattanville serves 1,700 undergraduate students and 1,000 graduate students from more than 50 countries and 30 states. Founded in 1841, the College offers more than 50 undergraduate areas of study in the arts and sciences, and graduate programs in Education, Business, Creative Writing, as well as Continuing and Executive Education programs.

Photo: Ngugi wa Thiong’o