The Modern Novel

Biography

Daniachew Worku was born in the village of Wiha-Teggeb in 1936. His father had lived in France for many years, even fighting for the French in World War I, before returning to Ethiopia. Worku had a good education and trained to be a teacher. He started writing early, first poems and then plays and articles for the press. In 1969, he won a scholarship to the Writers’ Workshop in Iowa, and obtained a Master in Fine arts, as well as writing several stories in English. On return to Ethiopia, he taught at the University of Addis Ababa for a year and then started work on his first novel, Adefris. This was self-published but was fairly successful. He wrote his second novel – The Thirteenth Sun – in English. After that he continued to write and teach, though nothing further has been published in English. He died of food poisoning in 1994, leaving behind a long manuscript.

Other links

His Facebook page
Daniachew Worku
Daniachew Worku – His motives to write and his contributions to Ethiopian Literature