Several years ago, as a beginner in the high school, one of the stories that affected me so much and helped in shaping my life afterwards was that told of Akin, the Drummer Boy in one of Cyprain Ekwensi's novels.
It helped in bringing out the reality in a society made up of different people with different needs and capabilities or incapacitations as the case may be. It, more importantly, helped me understand how people, when they are disable, feel about their disability and how they often feel threatened and would rather isolate themselves. Growing up, I experienced this on a number of occasions with handicapped persons.
Recently I was with a couple, friends of mine who told me of their son's disability and how out of frustration he sometimes explodes and would prefer to be on his own almost all the time. My mind went back to Cyprain Ekwensi's novel and I recommended that they read it.
I ran into Pa Ekwensi a few years back in Abuja, where he told of his daughters care for him, which has kept them quite close to him, and choosing to remain in their father's home rather than getting married. This way, he said they argued they could give him the best of child's love to parent, as a compensation.
I wonder how they feel today without him. It must be a very painful loss, not only to them but to Nigeria as a whole. We shall miss a great mind in Cyprain Ekwensi. Adieu.
Cyprian Ekwensi dies at 86
One of the nation’s greatest literary writers, Chief Cyprian Odiatu Duaka Ekwensi, has died at the age of 86. Ekwensi died on Sunday November 4 at the Niger Foundation in Enugu where he underwent an operation for an undisclosed ailment, his son, Georges Chiedu Ekwensi, said in a statement yesterday.
Ekwensi was born in Minna, Niger State in 1921. He attended Government College, Ibadan and Achimota College, Ghana. He later studied Pharmacy at the Yaba Technical Institute, Lagos. He read Forestry at the School of Forestry, Ibadan and worked for two years as a forestry officer. He also taught for a couple of years at Igbobi College, Lagos. He graduated from the Chelsea School of Pharmacy, UK in 1956. Ekwensi later went into the literary world where he stood as an outstanding Nigerian novelist.
He wrote his first novel, "When Love Whispers" in 1948. He followed up with "An African Night’s Entertainment" in the same year.
Other works were The Boa Suitor (1949), People of the City (1954), Passport of Mallam Iliya (written in 1948 but published in 1960), The Drummer Boy (1960), Jagua Nana (1961), Burning Grass (1962), Iska (1966) and many more titles in a writing career that spanned about six decades.
He has also authored hundreds of short stories and radio and television scripts. He was a columnist with DRUM magazine and later MONTHLY LIFE magazine.
He was Nigeria’s first indigenous Director of Information at independence. In 1968 he won the Dag Hammarskjold International Prize for Literary Merit. Ekwensi was honoured with the chieftaincy title of Osi Baarohin of Ibadanland in 1996 and was inducted Fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Letters in 2006. He was also a recipient of the Nigerian National Honour of Member of the Order of the Federal Republic, MFR.
(http://dailytrust.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=4253&Itemid=45)
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