Soyinka founded another theatre group

[munnaf642349]

Soyinka was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986, becoming the first African laureate. He was described as one “who in a broad cultural perspective and with poetic nuances shapes the drama of existence.” Reed Way Dasenbrock writes that the award of the Nobel Prize for Literature to Soyinka is “likely to prove quite controversial and deserved.” He also notes that “it is the first Nobel Prize awarded to an African writer or to any writer of the “new literatures” in English that have emerged in the former colonies of the British Empire. His Nobel Prize acceptance speech, “This Past Must Address Its Present,” was dedicated to the South African freedom fighter Nelson Mandela. Soyinka’s speech was an outspoken criticism of apartheid and the policy of racial segregation imposed on the majority by the nationalist South African government. In 1986, he was awarded the Agip Prize for Literature.

In 1988, his collection of poems Mandela's Earth, and Other Poems was published, while in Nigeria another collection of essays entitled Art, Dialogue and Outrage: Essays on Literature and Culture appeared. In the same year, Soyinka accepted the position of Professor of African Studies and Drama at Cornell University. In 1990, a third novel, inspired by slovakia email list his father's intellectual circle, Isara: A Voyage Around Essay, appeared. In July 1991, the BBC African Service broadcast his radio play A Scourge of Hyacinths, and the following year (1992) in Siena, Italy, his play From Zia with Love had its premiere. Both plays are bitter political parodies, based on events that took place in Nigeria in the 1980s. In 1993, Soyinka received an honorary doctorate from Harvard University. The following year another part of his autobiography appeared: Ibadan: The Penkelemes Years (A Memoir: 1946-1965). The following year his work The Beatification of Area Boy was published. In October 1994, he was appointed UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for the Promotion of African Culture, Human Rights, Freedom of Expression, Media and Communication.

In November 1994, Soyinka fled Nigeria across the border into Benin and then to the United States. In 1996 his book The Open Sore of a Continent: A Personal Narrative of the Nigerian Crisis was first published. In 1997 he was charged with treason by the government of General Sani Abacha. The International Parliament of Writers (IPW) was established in 1993 to provide support to writers who were victims of persecution.