When the British came to Ibo land, for instance, at the beginning of the 20th century, and defeated the men in pitched battles in different places, and set up their administrations, the men surrendered. And it was the women who led the first revolt.

I don't praise my people. I am their greatest critic.

The women are, of course, the biggest single group of oppressed people in the world and, if we are to believe the Book of Genesis, the very oldest.

You do not know me,’ said Tortoise. ‘I am a changed man. I have learned that a man who makes trouble for others makes trouble for himself.

My parents were early converts to Christianity in my part of Nigeria. They were not just converts; my father was an evangelist, a religious teacher. He and my mother traveled for thirty-five years to different parts of Igboland, spreading the gospel.

Naming is like putting a stamp on something and fixing it. A kind of formaldehyde sort of fixation, but it becomes dead, sitting there forever, frozen. So, I'm not a great one for these modernist, post modernist, post colonial labels. I think they serve certain purpose. You do need some kind of sign post here and there, but it can also become an end in itself.

I'm amazed when I think about students today. They know from day one what they are going to be. We didn't. We just coasted. We just knew that things would work out.