The Modern Novel

Biography

Buchi Emecheta was born in Lagos in 1944, though her family was from Ibuza in the South-Eastern part of Nigeria. She grew up in a mixed Christian-traditional culture and was exposed to the more traditional beliefs particularly when she returned to Ibuza, which she did frequently. Even as a child she felt that she was an outsider, both as an Igbo in Yoruba Lagos and also because Igbo culture places far more value on boys than girls. She married at age sixteen and, two years later, accompanied her husband to London for his studies, with their two children. They had three more children and this contributed to their dire financial situation, requiring Emecheta to seek work. She separated from her husband and was left to bring up her five children, continue her own studies (she got a degree in sociology in 1974) and work. She started writing short stories (collected in In the Ditch) but soon graduated to novels. Most of the novels she has written come from her own experience. She continued to live and write in London. She died in 2017.

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Buchi Emecheta
Buchi Emecheta
Buchi Emecheta
Buchi Emecheta
Buchi Emecheta
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