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158-784: The Palm-Wine Drinkard (subtitled "and His Dead Palm-Wine Tapster in the Dead's Town") is a novel published in 1952 by the Nigerian author Amos Tutuola . The first African novel published in English outside of Africa, this quest tale based on Yoruba folktales is written in a modified English or Pidgin English. In it, a man follows his brewer into the land of the dead, encountering many spirits and adventures. The novel has always been controversial, inspiring both admiration and contempt among Western and Nigerian critics, but has emerged as one of
316-549: A megacity like Lagos and other major Nigerian cities which are linked with economic development, population growth and the inability of municipal councils to manage the resulting rise in industrial and domestic waste. This waste management problem is also attributable to unsustainable environmental management lifestyles of Kubwa community in the Federal Capital Territory, where there are habits of indiscriminate disposal of waste, dumping of waste along or into
474-693: A 2016 article that Kafka may have had borderline personality disorder with co-occurring psychophysiological insomnia . Joan Lachkar interpreted Die Verwandlung as "a vivid depiction of the borderline personality" and described the story as "model for Kafka's own abandonment fears, anxiety, depression, and parasitic dependency needs. Kafka illuminated the borderline's general confusion of normal and healthy desires, wishes, and needs with something ugly and disdainful". Though Kafka never married, he held marriage and children in high esteem. He had several girlfriends and lovers during his life. He may have suffered from an eating disorder. Doctor Manfred M. Fichter of
632-525: A 2019 Forest Landscape Integrity Index mean score of 6.2/10, ranking it 82nd globally out of 172 countries. In the year 2010, thousands of people were inadvertently exposed to lead-containing soil from informal gold mining within the northern state of Zamfara. While estimates vary, it is thought that upwards of 400 children died of acute lead poisoning , making this perhaps the largest lead poisoning fatality outbreak ever encountered. Franz Kafka Franz Kafka (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924)
790-546: A central role in his life and literary work, and those who deny the connection altogether or dismiss its importance, are both wrong. The truth lies in some very elusive place between these two simplistic poles." Kafka considered moving to Palestine with Felice Bauer, and later with Dora Diamant. He studied Hebrew while living in Berlin, hiring a friend of Brod's from Palestine, Pua Bat-Tovim, to tutor him and attending Rabbi Julius Grünthal and Rabbi Julius Guttmann 's classes in
948-471: A civilian government but not before appointing Ernest Shonekan head of an interim national government . Babangida's regime has been considered the most corrupt and responsible for creating a culture of corruption in Nigeria. Shonekan's interim government, the shortest in the political history of the country, was overthrown in a coup d'état of 1993 led by General Sani Abacha , who used military force on
1106-424: A creative outburst on the night of 22 September 1912, Kafka wrote the story "Das Urteil" ("The Judgment", literally: "The Verdict") and dedicated it to Felice Bauer. Brod noted the similarity in names of the main character and his fictional fiancée, Georg Bendemann and Frieda Brandenfeld, to Franz Kafka and Felice Bauer. The story is often considered Kafka's breakthrough work. It deals with the troubled relationship of
1264-516: A formally independent federation on 1 October 1960. It experienced a civil war from 1967 to 1970, followed by a succession of military dictatorships and democratically elected civilian governments until achieving a stable government in the 1999 Nigerian presidential election , with the election of Olusegun Obasanjo of the Peoples Democratic Party . However, the country frequently experiences electoral fraud , and corruption
1422-474: A friend of hers, Margarethe "Grete" Bloch, a Jewish woman from Berlin. Brod says that Bloch gave birth to Kafka's son, although Kafka never knew about the child. The boy, whose name is not known, was born in 1914 or 1915 and died in Munich in 1921. However, Kafka's biographer Peter-André Alt says that, while Bloch had a son, Kafka was not the father, as the pair were never intimate. Stach points out that there
1580-419: A grand scale, of course with all the defects and weaknesses that go with all these advantages and into which your temperament and sometimes your hot temper drive you". On business days, both parents were absent from the home, with Julie Kafka working as many as 12 hours each day helping to manage the family business. Consequently, Kafka's childhood was somewhat lonely, and the children were reared largely by
1738-923: A quality of exaltation bordering on transcendental metaphysical contemplation. An illustrious example is Franz Kafka". Towards the end of his life Kafka sent a postcard to his friend Hugo Bergmann in Tel Aviv, announcing his intention to emigrate to Palestine. Bergmann refused to host Kafka because he had young children and was afraid that Kafka would infect them with tuberculosis. Kafka's laryngeal tuberculosis worsened and in March 1924 he returned from Berlin to Prague, where members of his family, principally his sister Ottla and Dora Diamant, took care of him. He went to Hugo Hoffmann's sanatorium in Kierling just outside Vienna for treatment on 10 April, and died there on 3 June 1924. The cause of death seemed to be starvation:
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#17327937906231896-454: A range of career possibilities, which pleased his father. In addition, law required a longer course of study, giving Kafka time to take classes in German studies and art history. He also joined a student club, Lese- und Redehalle der Deutschen Studenten (Reading and Lecture Hall of the German students), which organised literary events, readings and other activities. Among Kafka's friends were
2054-405: A risk category, which cost them more in insurance premiums. He would compile and compose the annual report on the insurance institute for the several years he worked there. The reports were well received by his superiors. Kafka usually got off work at 2 p.m., so that he had time to spend on his literary work, to which he was committed. Kafka's father also expected him to help out at and take over
2212-432: A river system. The river system of the northeast is also a major river system. In addition, Nigeria has numerous coastal rivers. Over the last million years, Lake Chad in the far north-east of Nigeria has dried up several times for a few thousand years and just as often growing to many times its current size. In recent decades its surface area has been reduced considerably, which may also be due to humans taking water from
2370-485: A sense of humour; they also found him handsome, although of austere appearance. Kafka was thought to be "very self-analytic". Brod compared Kafka to Heinrich von Kleist , noting that both writers had the ability to describe a situation realistically with precise details. Brod thought Kafka was one of the most entertaining people he had met; Kafka enjoyed sharing his humour with his friends but also helped them in difficult situations with good advice. According to Brod, he
2528-445: A series of governesses and servants. Kafka's troubled relationship with his father is evident in his Brief an den Vater ( Letter to His Father ) of more than 100 pages, in which he complains of being profoundly affected by his father's authoritarian and demanding character; his mother, in contrast, was quiet and shy. The dominating figure of Kafka's father had a significant influence on Kafka's writing. The Kafka family had
2686-536: A servant girl living with them in a cramped apartment. Franz's room was often cold. In November 1913, the family moved into a bigger apartment, although Ellie and Valli had married and moved out of the first apartment. In early August 1914, just after World War I began, the sisters did not know where their husbands were in the military and moved back in with the family in this larger apartment. Both Ellie and Valli also had children. Franz at age 31 moved into Valli's former apartment, quiet by contrast, and lived by himself for
2844-410: A socialist, I became a Zionist in 1898. The synthesis of Zionism and socialism did not yet exist." Bergmann claims that Kafka wore a red carnation to school to show his support for socialism . In one diary entry, Kafka made reference to the influential anarchist philosopher Peter Kropotkin : "Don't forget Kropotkin!" During the communist era, the legacy of Kafka's work for Eastern Bloc socialism
3002-466: A son, Felix (1911–1940), and two daughters, Gertrude (Gerti) Kaufmann (1912–1972), and Hanna Seidner (1920–1941). After her marriage to Hermann, she became closer to her brother, whose letters showed an active interest in the upbringing and education of her children. He accompanied her on a 1915 trip to Hungary to visit Hermann, who was stationed there, and spent a summer with her and her children in Müritz
3160-559: A successful jihad against the Hausa Kingdoms , founding the centralised Sokoto Caliphate . This empire, with Arabic as its official language, grew rapidly under his rule and that of his descendants , who sent out invading armies in every direction. The vast landlocked empire connected the east with the western Sudan region and made inroads down south conquering parts of the Oyo Empire (modern-day Kwara ), and advanced towards
3318-572: A triumvirate of three brigadier generals whose decisions could be vetoed by a Supreme Military Council . For this triumvirate, they convinced General Murtala Muhammed to become military head of state, with General Olusegun Obasanjo as his second-in-command, and General Theophilus Danjuma as the third. Together, the triumvirate introduced austerity measures to stem inflation, established a Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau, replaced all military governors with new officers, and launched "Operation Deadwood" through which they fired 11,000 officials from
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#17327937906233476-706: A wide scale to suppress the continuing civilian unrest. In 1995, the government hanged environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa on trumped-up charges in the deaths of four Ogoni elders, which caused Nigerian's suspension from the Commonwealth . Lawsuits under the American Alien Tort Statute against Royal Dutch Shell and Brian Anderson, the head of Shell's Nigerian operation, settled out of court with Shell continuing to deny liability. Several hundred million dollars in accounts traced to Abacha were discovered in 1999. The regime came to an end in 1998 when
3634-442: A writer with a richer literary inheritance". In The Spectator , Kingsley Amis called the book an "unfathomable African myth" but credited it with a "unique grotesque humour" that is a "severe test" for the reader. Given these Western reviews, it is not surprising that African intellectuals of the time saw the book as bad for Africa, believing that the story showed Nigerians as illiterate and superstitious drunks. They worried that
3792-429: Is English , chosen to facilitate linguistic unity at the national level. Nigeria's constitution ensures de jure freedom of religion , and it is home to some of the world's largest Muslim and Christian populations. Nigeria is divided roughly in half between Muslims , who live mostly in the north part of the country, and Christians , who live mostly in the south; indigenous religions , such as those native to
3950-516: Is (symbolically) arrested by a German (Rabensteiner), a Czech (Kullich), and a Jew (Kaminer). He stands for the 'guiltless guilt' that imbues the Jew in the modern world, although there is no evidence that he himself is a Jew". In his essay Sadness in Palestine?! , Dan Miron explores Kafka's connection to Zionism: "It seems that those who claim that there was such a connection and that Zionism played
4108-961: Is a great deal of contradictory evidence around the claim that Kafka was the father. Kafka was diagnosed with tuberculosis in August 1917 and moved for a few months to the Bohemian village of Zürau (Siřem in Czech), where his sister Ottla worked on the farm of her brother-in-law Karl Hermann. He felt comfortable there and later described this time as perhaps the best period of his life, probably because he had no responsibilities. He kept diaries and made notes in exercise books ( Oktavhefte ). From those notes, Kafka extracted 109 numbered pieces of text on single pieces of paper ( Zettel ); these were later published as Die Zürauer Aphorismen oder Betrachtungen über Sünde, Hoffnung, Leid und den wahren Weg (The Zürau Aphorisms or Reflections on Sin, Hope, Suffering, and
4266-423: Is assumed she did not survive the war. Ottilie was Kafka's favourite sister. Hermann is described by Kafka scholar and translator Stanley Corngold as a "huge, selfish, overbearing businessman" and by Franz Kafka as "a true Kafka in strength, health, appetite, loudness of voice, eloquence, self-satisfaction, worldly dominance, endurance, presence of mind, knowledge of human nature, a certain way of doing things on
4424-551: Is considered to be the foundation of Igbo culture . Nri and Aguleri , where the Igbo creation myth originates, are in the territory of the Umeuri clan. Members of the clan trace their lineages back to the patriarchal king-figure Eri . In West Africa, the oldest bronzes made using the lost wax process were from Igbo-Ukwu , a city under Nri influence. The Yoruba kingdoms of Ife and Oyo in southwestern Nigeria became prominent in
4582-564: Is plains of tall grass interrupted by trees. Sudan savannah is similar but with shorter grasses and shorter trees. Sahel savannah consists of patches of grass and sand, found in the northeast. Nigeria is divided into two main catchment areas - that of Lake Chad and that of the Niger. The Niger catchment area covers about 63% of the country. The main tributary of the Niger is the Benue, whose tributaries extend beyond Cameroon into Cameroon into Chad and
4740-462: Is rampant in various levels of Nigerian politics. Nigeria is a multinational state inhabited by more than 250 ethnic groups speaking 500 distinct languages , all identifying with a wide variety of cultures. The three largest ethnic groups are the Hausa in the north , Yoruba in the west , and Igbo in the east , together constituting over 60% of the total population. The official language
4898-502: The Bight of Benin , and Bonny Island on the Bight of Biafra. The majority of those taken to these ports were captured in raids and wars. Usually, the captives were taken back to the conquerors' territory as forced labour ; they were sometimes gradually acculturated and absorbed into the conquerors' society. Slave routes were established throughout Nigeria linking the hinterland areas with
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5056-798: The Bornu Empire gave rise to the British-controlled Borno Emirate which established Abubakar Garbai of Borno as ruler. In 1903, the British victory in the Battle of Kano gave them a logistical edge in pacifying the heartland of the Sokoto Caliphate and parts of the former Bornu Empire. On 13 March 1903, at the grand market square of Sokoto, the last vizier of the caliphate officially conceded to British rule. The British appointed Muhammadu Attahiru II as
5214-666: The Eastern Region . In May 1967, Governor of the Eastern Region Lt. Colonel Emeka Ojukwu declared the region independent from the federation as a state called the Republic of Biafra , as a result of the continuous and systematically planned attacks against Igbos and those of Eastern extraction popularly known as 1966 pogroms . This declaration precipitated the Nigerian Civil War , which began as
5372-760: The Federal Republic of Nigeria , is a country in West Africa . It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of Guinea to the south in the Atlantic Ocean . It covers an area of 923,769 square kilometres (356,669 sq mi). With a population of more than 230 million, it is the most populous country in Africa , and the world's sixth-most populous country . Nigeria borders Niger in
5530-582: The Igbo and Yoruba ethnicities, are in the minority. Nigeria is a regional power in Africa and a middle power in international affairs. Nigeria's economy is the fourth-largest in Africa , the 53rd-largest in the world by nominal GDP , and 27th-largest by PPP . Nigeria is often referred to as the Giant of Africa owing to its large population and economy , and is considered to be an emerging market by
5688-669: The Lagos Treaty of Cession . British missionaries expanded their operations and travelled further inland. In 1864, Samuel Ajayi Crowther became the first African bishop of the Anglican Church . In 1885, British claims to a West African sphere of influence received recognition from other European nations at the Berlin Conference . The following year, it chartered the Royal Niger Company under
5846-571: The Muslim world . There are early historical references by medieval Arab and Muslim historians and geographers which refer to the Kanem–Bornu Empire as the region's major centre for Islamic civilization. The Kingdom of Nri of the Igbo people consolidated in the 10th century and continued until it lost its sovereignty to the British in 1911. Nri was ruled by the Eze Nri , and the city of Nri
6004-585: The New Jewish Cemetery in Prague-Žižkov . Kafka was virtually unknown during his own lifetime, but he did not consider fame important. He rose to fame rapidly after his death, particularly after World War II. The Kafka tombstone was designed by architect Leopold Ehrmann . All of Kafka's published works, except some letters he wrote in Czech to Milena Jesenská, were written in German. What little
6162-589: The Niger River running through the country. This name was coined on 8 January 1897, by the British journalist Flora Shaw . The neighboring Republic of Niger takes its name from the same river. The origin of the name Niger , which originally applied to only the middle reaches of the Niger River, is uncertain. The word is likely an alteration of the Tuareg name egerew n-iger ewen used by inhabitants along
6320-564: The Nigerian Political Bureau which made recommendations for the transition to the Third Nigerian Republic. In 1989, Babangida started making plans for the transition to the Third Nigerian Republic. Babangida survived the 1990 Nigerian coup d'état attempt , then postponed a promised return to democracy to 1992. Babangida legalized the formation of political parties and formed the two-party system with
6478-602: The Northern Nigeria Protectorate into the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria . Administratively, Nigeria remained divided into the Northern and Southern Protectorates and Lagos Colony . Inhabitants of the southern region sustained more interaction, economic and cultural, with the British and other Europeans owing to the coastal economy. Christian missions established Western educational institutions in
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6636-560: The Social Democratic Party and National Republican Convention ahead of the 1992 general elections . He urged all Nigerians to join either of the parties, which Chief Bola Ige referred to as "two leper hands". The 1993 presidential election held on 12 June was the first since the military coup of 1983. The results, though not officially declared by the National Electoral Commission, showed
6794-800: The World Bank . Nigeria is a founding member of the African Union and a member of many international organizations, including the United Nations , the Commonwealth of Nations , NAM , the Economic Community of West African States , Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and OPEC . It is also a member of the informal MINT group of countries and is one of the Next Eleven economies. The name Nigeria derives from
6952-525: The Yoruba heartland of Ibadan , to reach the Atlantic Ocean. The territory controlled by the empire included much of modern-day northern and central Nigeria. The sultan sent out emirs to establish suzerainty over the conquered territories and promote Islamic civilization; the emirs in turn became increasingly rich and powerful through trade and slavery. By the 1890s, the largest slave population in
7110-576: The 10th century. With the spread of Islam from the 7th century AD, the area became known as Sudan or as Bilad Al Sudan (English: Land of the Blacks). Since the populations were partially affiliated with the Arab Muslim culture of North Africa , they began trans-Saharan trade and were referred to by the Arabic speakers as Al-Sudan (meaning "The Blacks") as they were considered an extended part of
7268-467: The 12th and 14th centuries, respectively. The oldest signs of human settlement at Ife's current site date back to the 9th century, and its material culture includes terracotta and bronze figures. In the 16th century, Portuguese explorers were the first Europeans to begin important, direct trade with the peoples of southern Nigeria, at the port they named Lagos (formerly Eko) and in Calabar along
7426-586: The 2007 general elections, Umaru Yar'Adua of the People's Democratic Party came to power. The international community, which had observed the Nigerian elections to promote a free and fair process, condemned these elections as seriously flawed. Yar'Adua died on 5 May 2010, and Vice President Goodluck Jonathan had been sworn in by the Senate three months earlier as acting president to succeed Yar'Adua. Jonathan won
7584-449: The 2011 presidential election; the polls went smoothly and with relatively little violence or electoral fraud. Jonathan's tenure saw an economic recovery that made Nigeria the leading economic power in Africa. The Jonathan administration also saw an increase in unparalleled corruption, with as many as 20 billion US dollars said to have been lost to the Nigerian state through the national oil company. Above all, however, Jonathan's tenure saw
7742-463: The Africanist literary critic Bernth Lindfors produced an anthology of all the reviews of Tutuola's work published to date. The first review was an enthusiastic one from Dylan Thomas , who felt it was "simply and carefully described" in "young English"; his lyrical 500-word review drew attention to Tutuola's work and set the tone for succeeding criticism. The early reviewers after Thomas described
7900-543: The Berlin Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums (College for the Study of Judaism), where he also studied Talmud . Livia Rothkirchen calls Kafka the "symbolic figure of his era". His contemporaries included numerous Jewish, Czech, and German writers who were sensitive to Jewish, Czech, and German culture. According to Rothkirchen, "This situation lent their writings a broad cosmopolitan outlook and
8058-467: The British government moved Nigeria toward self-government on a representative and increasingly federal basis. By the eve of independence in 1960, regional differences in modern educational access were marked. The legacy, though less pronounced, continues to the present day. The balance between north and south was also expressed in Nigeria's political life. For instance, northern Nigeria did not outlaw slavery until 1936 whilst in other parts of Nigeria, slavery
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#17327937906238216-763: The Chad Basin, where the course of the El Beid River forms the border with Cameroon, from the Mandara Mountains to Lake Chad. The Komadugu Yobe river system gives rise to the internationally important Hadejia-Nguru wetlands and Ox-bow lakes around Lake Nguru in the rainy season. Other rivers of the northeast include the Ngadda and the Yedseram, both of which flow through the Sambisa swamps, thus forming
8374-575: The Holocaust of the Second World War . Ottilie was Kafka's favourite sister. Gabriele was Kafka's eldest sister. She was known as Elli or Ellie; her married name is variously rendered as Hermann or Hermannová. She attended a German girls' school in Prague's Řeznická Street and later a private girls' secondary school. She married Karl Hermann (1883–1939), a salesman, in 1910. The couple had
8532-611: The Jewish male into his own self-image and writing". Kafka considered suicide at least once, in late 1912. Before World War I, Kafka attended several meetings of the Klub mladých , a Czech anarchist, anti-militarist , and anti-clerical organization. Hugo Bergmann , who attended the same elementary and high schools as Kafka, fell out with Kafka during their last academic year (1900–1901) because "[Kafka's] socialism and my Zionism were much too strident". Bergmann said: "Franz became
8690-783: The Kafka family to Prague. After working as a travelling sales representative, he eventually became a fashion retailer who employed up to 15 people and used the image of a jackdaw ( kavka in Czech, pronounced and colloquially written as kafka ) as his business logo. Kafka's mother, Julie (1856–1934), was the daughter of Jakob Löwy, a prosperous retail merchant in Poděbrady , and was better educated than her husband. Kafka's parents, from traditional Jewish society, spoke German replete with influences from their native Yiddish ; their children, raised in an acculturated environment, spoke Standard German . Hermann and Julie had six children, of whom Franz
8848-581: The Kingdom of Bohemia and its successor under the Czechoslovak Republic, rising to the position of chief legal secretary. Being employed full-time forced Kafka to relegate writing to his spare time. Over the course of his life, Kafka wrote hundreds of letters to family and close friends, including his father, with whom he had a strained and formal relationship. He became engaged to several women but never married. He died in obscurity in 1924 at
9006-472: The Kwankwassiya of Rabiu Kwankwaso , former governor of Kano State in the Northwest. Bola Tinubu , of the ruling party, won the disputed election with 36.61% of the vote, but both runners-up claimed victory and litigation is ongoing in an election tribunal. Bola Tinubu's inauguration was held on 29 May 2023. Problems with widespread kidnapping in Nigeria continued. On 29 May 2024, Tinubu signed into law an act readopting Nigeria, We Hail Thee , which
9164-540: The Niger and the Cross Rivers has lost most of its forest because of development and harvesting by increased population and has been replaced by grassland . Everything in between the far south and the far north is savannah (insignificant tree cover, with grasses and flowers located between trees). Rainfall is more limited to between 500 and 1,500 millimetres (20 and 60 in) per year. The savannah zone's three categories are Guinean forest-savanna mosaic , Sudan savannah, and Sahel savannah. Guinean forest-savanna mosaic
9322-420: The Nigerian government, with Nigeria utilizing air support from Egyptian pilots provided by Gamal Abdel Nasser , while France and Israel aided the Biafrans. The Congolese government, under President Joseph-Désiré Mobutu , took an early stand on the Biafran secession, voicing strong support for the Nigerian federal government and deploying thousands of troops to fight against the secessionists . Following
9480-471: The Psychiatric Clinic, University of Munich , presented "evidence for the hypothesis that the writer Franz Kafka had suffered from an atypical anorexia nervosa ", and that Kafka was not just lonely and depressed but also "occasionally suicidal". In his 1995 book Franz Kafka, the Jewish Patient , Sander Gilman investigated "why a Jew might have been considered ' hypochondriacal ' or 'homosexual' and how Kafka incorporates aspects of these ways of understanding
9638-512: The Sharie catchment area. In the Sahel region, rain is less than 500 millimetres (20 in) per year, and the Sahara Desert is encroaching. In the dry northeast corner of the country lies Lake Chad , on a shared water boundary delimitation with Niger, Chad and Cameroon. The Chad Basin is fed from the north-eastern quarter of Nigeria. The Bauchi Plateau forms the watershed between the Niger/Benue and Komadugu Yobe river systems. The flat plains of north-eastern Nigeria are geographically part of
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#17327937906239796-464: The True Way). In 1920, Kafka began an intense relationship with Milena Jesenská , a Czech journalist and writer who was non-Jewish and who was married, but when she met Kafka, her marriage was a "sham". His letters to her were later published as Briefe an Milena . During a vacation in July 1923 to Graal-Müritz on the Baltic Sea , Kafka met Dora Diamant , a 25-year-old kindergarten teacher from an orthodox Jewish family. Kafka, hoping to escape
9954-975: The age of 40 from tuberculosis . Kafka was a prolific writer, spending most of his free time writing, often late into the night. He burned an estimated 90 percent of his total work due to his persistent struggles with self-doubt. Much of the remaining 10 percent is lost or otherwise unpublished. Few of Kafka's works were published during his lifetime; although the story collections Contemplation and A Country Doctor , and individual stories, such as his novella The Metamorphosis , were published in literary magazines, they received little attention. In his will, Kafka instructed his close friend and literary executor Max Brod to destroy his unfinished works, including his novels The Trial , The Castle , and Amerika , but Brod ignored these instructions and had much of his work published. Kafka's writings became famous in German-speaking countries after World War II, influencing German literature , and its influence spread elsewhere in
10112-439: The author's intentions". The New Yorker took this criticism to its logical ends, stating that Tutuola was "being taken a great deal too seriously" as he is just a "natural storyteller" with a "lack of inhibition" and an "uncorrupted innocence" whose text was not new to anyone who had been raised on "old-fashioned nursery literature". The reviewer concluded that American authors should not imitate Tutuola, as "it would be fatal for
10270-433: The book as "primitive", "primeval", "naïve", "un-willed", "lazy", and "barbaric" or "barbarous". The New York Times Book Review was typical in describing Tutuola as "a true primitive" whose world had "no connection at all with the European rational and Christian traditions," adding that Tutuola was "not a revolutionist of the word, …not a surrealist" but an author with an "un-willed style" whose text had "nothing to do with
10428-423: The border with Cameroon , where the montane land is part of the Bamenda Highlands of Cameroon. The far south is defined by its tropical rainforest climate , where annual rainfall is 1,500 to 2,000 millimetres (60 to 80 in) per year. In the southeast stands the Obudu Plateau . Coastal plains are found in both the southwest and the southeast. Mangrove swamps are found along the coast. The area near
10586-469: The border with Cameroon close to the coast is rich rainforest and part of the Cross-Sanaga-Bioko coastal forests ecoregion , an important centre for biodiversity . It is a habitat for the drill primate , which is found in the wild only in this area and across the border in Cameroon. The areas surrounding Calabar , Cross River State, also in this forest, are believed to contain the world's largest diversity of butterflies. The area of southern Nigeria between
10744-440: The business, but he later resented the encroachment of this work on his writing time. During that period, he also found interest and entertainment in the performances of Yiddish theatre . After seeing a Yiddish theatre troupe perform in October 1911, for the next six months Kafka "immersed himself in Yiddish language and in Yiddish literature". This interest also served as a starting point for his growing exploration of Judaism. It
10902-405: The caliphate and the central Sokoto administration to prevent any defence as he worked towards the capital. As the British approached the city of Sokoto , Sultan Muhammadu Attahiru I organized a quick defence of the city and fought the advancing British-led forces. The British force quickly won, sending Attahiru I and thousands of followers on a Mahdist hijra . In the northeast, the decline of
11060-477: The canals, sewerage systems that are channels for water flows, and the like. Haphazard industrial planning, increased urbanisation, poverty and lack of competence of the municipal government are seen as the major reasons for high levels of waste pollution in major cities of the country. Some of the solutions have been disastrous to the environment, resulting in untreated waste being dumped in places where it can pollute waterways and groundwater . In 2005, Nigeria had
11218-446: The capital of the Czech Republic , also known as Czechia). He trained as a lawyer, and after completing his legal education was employed full-time, for a year handling cases for the indigent in the city's Provincial and Criminal Courts by an insurance company, then working for nine months for an Italian insurance company, and finally, starting in 1908, spending 14 years with the Austrian Imperial and Royal Workmen's Accident Institute for
11376-565: The civil service. Colonel Buka Suka Dimka launched a February 1976 coup attempt , during which General Murtala Muhammed was assassinated. Dimka lacked widespread support among the military, and his coup failed, forcing him to flee. After the coup attempt, General Olusegun Obasanjo was appointed military head of state. Obasanjo vowed to continue Murtala's policies. Aware of the danger of alienating northern Nigerians, Obasanjo brought General Shehu Yar'Adua as his replacement and second-in-command as Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters completing
11534-406: The condition of Kafka's throat made eating too painful for him, and since parenteral nutrition had not yet been developed, there was no way to feed him. Kafka was editing " A Hunger Artist " on his deathbed, a story whose composition he had begun before his throat closed to the point that he could not take any nourishment. His body was brought back to Prague where he was buried on 11 June 1924, in
11692-462: The criticism, Tutuola has stated that he had no regrets, "Probably if I had more education, that might change my writing or improve it or change it to another thing people would not admire. Well, I cannot say. Perhaps with higher education, I might not be as popular a writer. I might not write folktales. I might not take it as anything important. I would take it as superstition and not write in that line". He also added "I wrote The Palm-Wine Drinkard for
11850-490: The cultural and political differences were sharp among Nigeria's dominant ethnic groups: the Hausa in the north, Igbo in the east and Yoruba in the west. The Westminster system of government was retained, and thus the President 's powers were generally ceremonial. The parliamentary system of government had Abubakar Tafawa Balewa as Prime Minister and Nnamdi Azikiwe as the ceremonial president. The founding government
12008-570: The dictator died in the villa. He looted money to offshore accounts in Western European banks and defeated coup plots by arresting and bribing generals and politicians. His successor, General Abdulsalami Abubakar , adopted a new constitution on 5 May 1999, which provided for multiparty elections. On 29 May 1999, Abubakar handed over power to the winner of the 1999 presidential election, former military ruler General Olusegun Obasanjo , as President of Nigeria. Obasanjo had been in prison under
12166-516: The dictatorship of Abacha. Obasanjo's inauguration heralded the beginning of the Fourth Nigerian Republic, ending a 39-year period of short-lived democracies, civil war and military dictatorship. Although the elections that brought Obasanjo to power and allowed him to run for a second term in the 2003 presidential elections were condemned as unfree and unfair, Nigeria made significant progress in democratization under Obasanjo. In
12324-622: The direct control of the British government and established the Southern Nigeria Protectorate as a British protectorate and part of the British Empire . By 1902, the British had begun plans to move north into the Sokoto Caliphate. British General Lord Frederick Lugard was tasked by the Colonial Office to implement the agenda. Lugard used rivalries between many of the emirs in the southern reach of
12482-561: The duo of Moshood Abiola and Baba Gana Kingibe of the Social Democratic Party defeated Bashir Tofa and Sylvester Ugoh of the National Republican Convention by over 2.3 million votes. However, Babangida annulled the elections, leading to massive civilian protests that effectively shut down the country for weeks. In August 1993, Babangida finally kept his promise to relinquish power to
12640-723: The earliest known sculptures in sub-Saharan Africa and smelted iron by about 550 BC and possibly a few centuries earlier. Evidence of iron smelting has also been excavated at sites in the Nsukka region of southeast Nigeria: dating to 2000 BC at the site of Lejja and to 750 BC and at the site of Opi . The Kano Chronicle highlights an ancient history dating to around 999 AD of the Hausa Sahelian city-state of Kano , with other major Hausa cities (or Hausa Bakwai ) of Daura , Hadeija , Kano , Katsina , Zazzau , Rano , and Gobir all having recorded histories dating back to
12798-542: The eightieth anniversary of his birth, reassessed the importance of Kafka's portrayal of bureaucracy. Whether Kafka was a political writer is still an issue of debate. Kafka grew up in Prague as a German-speaking Jew. He was deeply fascinated by the Jews of Eastern Europe , who he thought possessed an intensity of spiritual life that was absent from Jews in the West. His diary contains many references to Yiddish writers . Yet he
12956-792: The emergence of a wave of terror by the Boko Haram insurgency , such as the Gwoza massacre and Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping in 2014. Ahead of the general election of 2015 , a merger of the biggest opposition parties in Nigeria – the Action Congress of Nigeria , the Congress for Progressive Change , the All Nigeria Peoples Party , a faction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance and
13114-430: The family fancy goods store. In his later years, Kafka's illness often prevented him from working at the insurance bureau and at his writing. In late 1911, Elli's husband Karl Hermann and Kafka became partners in the first asbestos factory in Prague, known as Prager Asbestwerke Hermann & Co., having used dowry money from Hermann Kafka. Kafka showed a positive attitude at first, dedicating much of his free time to
13272-408: The first issue of the literary journal Hyperion under the title Betrachtung ( Contemplation ). He wrote the story " Beschreibung eines Kampfes " ("Description of a Struggle") in 1904; in 1905 he showed it to Brod, who advised him to continue writing and convinced him to submit it to Hyperion . Kafka published a fragment in 1908 and two sections in the spring of 1909, all in Munich. In
13430-522: The first time since the return of democracy, no former military ruler ran for president, marking a strengthening of democracy and faith in the multiparty constitution . The election also saw the rise of metonymic supporters of the new candidates, the Obidient movement of Peter Obi , previously governor of Anambra State, widely appealed to young, urban voters and has his core base in the Southeast; and
13588-453: The first time. From 1889 to 1893, Kafka attended the German boys' elementary school at the Masný trh/Fleischmarkt (meat market), now known as Masná Street. His Jewish education ended with his bar mitzvah celebration at the age of 13. Kafka never enjoyed attending the synagogue and went with his father only on four high holidays each year. After leaving elementary school in 1893, Kafka
13746-416: The forest zone's most southerly portion, especially around the Niger River and Cross River deltas, is mangrove swamp . North of this is a freshwater swamp, containing different vegetation from the saltwater mangrove swamps, and north of that is a rainforest. The savannah zone's three categories are divided into Guinean forest-savanna mosaic , made up of plains of tall grass which are interrupted by trees,
13904-804: The group of writers, which included Kafka, Felix Weltsch and Brod himself. Brod soon noticed that, although Kafka was shy and seldom spoke, what he said was usually profound. Kafka was an avid reader throughout his life; together he and Brod read Plato's Protagoras in the original Greek , on Brod's initiative, and Flaubert 's L'éducation sentimentale and La Tentation de St. Antoine ( The Temptation of Saint Anthony ) in French, at his own suggestion. Kafka considered Fyodor Dostoevsky , Gustave Flaubert, Nikolai Gogol , Franz Grillparzer , and Heinrich von Kleist to be his "true blood brothers ". Besides these, he took an interest in Czech literature and
14062-528: The highest rate of deforestation in the world, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations . That year, 12.2%, the equivalent of 11,089,000 hectares, had been forested in the country. Between 1990 and 2000, Nigeria lost an average of 409,700 hectares of forest every year equal to an average annual deforestation rate of 2.4%. Between 1990 and 2005, in total Nigeria lost 35.7% of its forest cover or around 6,145,000 hectares. Nigeria had
14220-740: The influence of his family to concentrate on his writing, moved briefly to Berlin (September 1923-March 1924) and lived with Diamant. She became his lover and sparked his interest in the Talmud . He worked on four stories, including Ein Hungerkünstler ( A Hunger Artist ), which were published shortly after his death. Kafka's parents had six children; Franz was the eldest. His two brothers, Georg and Heinrich, died in infancy; his three sisters, Gabriele ("Elli") (September 22, 1889 – fall of 1942), Valerie ("Valli") (1890–1942) and Ottilie ("Ottla") (1892–1943), are believed to have been murdered in
14378-463: The inlets to irrigate agricultural land. Nigeria is covered by three types of vegetation: forests (where there is significant tree cover), savannahs (insignificant tree cover, with grasses and flowers located between trees), and montane land (least common and mainly found in the mountains near the Cameroon border). Both the forest zone and the savannah zone are divided into three parts. Some of
14536-423: The journalist Felix Weltsch , who studied philosophy, the actor Yitzchak Lowy who came from an orthodox Hasidic Warsaw family, and the writers Ludwig Winder , Oskar Baum and Franz Werfel . At the end of his first year of studies, Kafka met Max Brod , a fellow law student who became a close friend for life. Years later, Brod coined the term Der enge Prager Kreis ("The Close Prague Circle") to describe
14694-494: The language, though he spoke German with a Czech accent. He completed his Matura exams in 1901. Kafka was admitted to the Deutsche Karl-Ferdinands-Universität of Prague in 1901. He was originally admitted for philosophy, and he had additionally signed up for chemistry. Kafka began studying chemistry but switched to law after two weeks. Although this field did not excite him, it offered
14852-477: The leadership of Sir George Taubman Goldie . By the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the company had vastly succeeded in subjugating the independent southern kingdoms along the Niger River , the British conquered Benin in 1897, and, in the Anglo-Aro War (1901–1902), defeated other opponents. The defeat of these states opened up the Niger area to British rule. In 1900, the company's territory came under
15010-476: The location of a large area of Central African mangroves . Nigeria's most expansive topographical region is that of the valleys of the Niger and Benue river valleys (which merge and form a Y-shape). To the southwest of the Niger is a "rugged" highland . To the southeast of the Benue are hills and mountains, which form the Mambilla Plateau , the highest plateau in Nigeria. This plateau extends through
15168-676: The major coastal ports. Some of the more prolific slave-trading kingdoms who participated in the Atlantic slave trade were linked with the Edo's Benin Empire in the south, Oyo Empire in the southwest, and the Aro Confederacy in the southeast. Benin's power lasted between the 15th and 19th centuries. Oyo, at its territorial zenith in the late 17th to early 18th centuries, extended its influence from western Nigeria to modern-day Togo . In
15326-414: The marriage never took place. During this time, Kafka began a draft of Letter to His Father . Before the date of the intended marriage, he took up with yet another woman. While he needed women and sex in his life, he had low self-confidence, felt sex was dirty, and was cripplingly shy—especially about his body. Stach and Brod state that during the time that Kafka knew Felice Bauer, he had an affair with
15484-461: The middle reaches of the river around Timbuktu before 19th-century European colonialism . Before Flora Shaw suggested the name Nigeria , other proposed names included Royal Niger Company Territories , Central Sudan , Niger Empire , Niger Sudan , and Hausa Territories . Kainji Dam excavations showed ironworking by the 2nd century BC. The transition from Neolithic times to the Iron Age
15642-418: The military triumvirate, with Obasanjo as head of state and General Theophilus Danjuma as Chief of Army Staff , the three went on to re-establish control over the military regime and organized the military's transfer of power programme: states creation and national delimitation , local government reforms and the constitutional drafting committee for a new republic. The military carefully planned
15800-403: The most common across the country; Sudan savannah, with short grasses and short trees; and Sahel savannah patches of grass and sand, found in the northeast. Waste management including sewage treatment , the linked processes of deforestation and soil degradation , and climate change or global warming are the major environmental problems in Nigeria. Waste management presents problems in
15958-485: The most important texts in the African literary canon, translated into more than a dozen languages. The Palm-Wine Drinkard, told in the first person, is about an unnamed man who is addicted to palm wine , which is made from the fermented sap of the palm tree and used in ceremonies all over West Africa. The son of a rich man, the narrator can afford his own tapster (a man who taps the palm tree for sap and then prepares
16116-413: The narrator's "cosmopolitanism" enables him "to move freely through the rigidly partitioned world of the traditional folk-tale". In contrast to the works of an author like Kafka , he added, in which human beings are the impotent victims of inexorable fate, the narrator of The Palm Wine Drinkard "is the proud possessor of great magical powers with which he defies even Fate itself". The lack of resolution in
16274-539: The new PDP (a faction of serving governors of the ruling People's Democratic Party) – formed the All Progressives Congress led by current president Bola Ahmed Tinubu. At the time, it was the most expensive election ever to be held on the African continent (being surpassed only by the elections of 2019 and 2023 ). The new mega-opposition party chose as their candidate for the election former military dictator Muhammadu Buhari. Buhari's campaign in 2015
16432-434: The new caliph. Lugard abolished the caliphate but retained the title sultan as a symbolic position in the newly organized Northern Nigeria Protectorate . This remnant became known as " Sokoto Sultanate Council ". In June 1903, the British defeated the remaining northern forces of Attahiru. By 1906, all resistance to British rule had ended. On 1 January 1914, the British formally united the Southern Nigeria Protectorate and
16590-479: The next five years, met occasionally, and were engaged twice. Kafka's extant letters to Bauer were published as Briefe an Felice ( Letters to Felice ); her letters did not survive. After he had written to Bauer's father asking to marry her, Kafka wrote in his diary: My job is unbearable to me because it conflicts with my only desire and my only calling, which is literature.... I am nothing but literature and can and want to be nothing else ... Nervous states of
16748-514: The north , Chad in the northeast , Cameroon in the east , and Benin in the west . Nigeria is a federal republic comprising 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory , where its capital, Abuja , is located. The largest city in Nigeria is Lagos , one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world and the largest in Africa . Nigeria has been home to several indigenous pre-colonial states and kingdoms since
16906-579: The north, the incessant fighting amongst the Hausa city-states and the decline of the Bornu Empire allowed the Fulani people to gain headway into the region. Until this point, the Fulani, a nomadic ethnic group, primarily traversed the semi-desert Sahelian region north of Sudan with cattle and avoided trade and intermingling with the Sudanic peoples. At the beginning of the 19th century, Usman dan Fodio led
17064-451: The novel confirmed Europeans' racist "fantastic" concepts of Africa, "a continent of which they are profoundly ignorant". Some criticized the novel as unoriginal, labeling it as little more than a retelling of Yoruba tales heard in the village square and Tutuola as "merely" a story teller who embellished stories for a given audience. Some insisted that Tutuola's "strange lingo" was related to neither Yoruba nor West African Pidgin English . It
17222-433: The novel was also seen as more authentic, meant to enable group discussion in the same way that African riddles , proverbs and folktales did. Tutuola was no more ungrammatical than James Joyce or Mark Twain , whose use of dialect was more violent, others argued. The Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe also defended Tutuola's work, stating that it could be read as a moral commentary on Western consumerism . Well aware of
17380-596: The novella The Metamorphosis and the novels The Trial and The Castle . The term Kafkaesque has entered English to describe absurd situations like those depicted in his writing. Kafka was born into a middle-class German- and Yiddish -speaking Czech Jewish family in Prague, the capital of the Kingdom of Bohemia , which belonged to the Austrian part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (today
17538-516: The official Nigerian government side attacked Biafra on 6 July 1967, at Garkem. The 30-month war, with a long blockade of Biafra and its isolation from trade and international relief, ended in January 1970. Estimates of the number of dead in the former Eastern Region during the 30-month civil war range from one to three million. Britain and the Soviet Union were the main military backers of
17696-715: The people of the other countries to read the Yoruba folklores. ... My purpose of writing is to make other people to understand more about Yoruba people and in fact they have already understood more than ever before". The Palm-Wine Drinkard was included on the " Big Jubilee Read " list of 70 books selected by a panel of experts, and announced by the BBC and The Reading Agency in April 2022, to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II 's platinum jubilee in June 2022. Nigeria Nigeria , officially
17854-516: The plotters struggled to form a central government. Senate President Nwafor Orizu handed over government control to the Army , under the command of another Igbo officer, Major General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi . Later, the counter-coup of 1966, supported primarily by Northern military officers, facilitated the rise of Yakubu Gowon as military head of state. Tension rose between north and south; Igbos in northern cities suffered persecution and many fled to
18012-495: The protectorates. Under Britain's policy of indirect rule and validation of Islamic legitimist tradition, the Crown did not encourage the operation of Christian missions in the northern, Islamic part of the country. By the mid-20th century following World War II , a wave for independence was sweeping across Africa, in response to the growth of Nigerian nationalism and demands for independence, successive constitutions legislated by
18170-573: The region Slave Coast . Europeans traded goods with peoples at the coast; coastal trade with Europeans also marked the beginnings of the Atlantic slave trade . The port of Calabar on the historical Bight of Biafra (now commonly referred to as the Bight of Bonny) became one of the largest slave-trading posts in West Africa in this era. Other major slaving ports were located in Badagry , Lagos on
18328-674: The resettlement of slaves freed by Britain in North America after the American Revolutionary War . Britain intervened in the Lagos kingship power struggle by bombarding Lagos in 1851, deposing the slave-trade-friendly Oba Kosoko , helping to install the amenable Oba Akitoye and signing the Treaty between Great Britain and Lagos on 1 January 1852. Britain annexed Lagos as a crown colony in August 1861 with
18486-536: The return to civilian rule putting in place measures to ensure that political parties had broader support than witnessed during the first republic. In 1979, five political parties competed in a series of elections in which Alhaji Shehu Shagari of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) was elected president. All five parties won representation in the National Assembly. On 1 October 1979, Shehu Shagari
18644-528: The second millennium BC, with the Nok civilization in the 15th century BC marking the first internal unification. The modern state originated with British colonialization in the 19th century, taking its present territorial shape with the merging of the Southern Nigeria Protectorate and the Northern Nigeria Protectorate in 1914. The British set up administrative and legal structures while practicing indirect rule through traditional chiefdoms . Nigeria became
18802-587: The separatist Ambazonia ) 1,690 km or 1,050 mi. Its coastline is at least 853 km (530 mi). Nigeria lies between latitudes 4° and 14°N , and longitudes 2° and 15°E . The highest point in Nigeria is Chappal Waddi at 2,419 m (7,936 ft). The main rivers are the Niger and the Benue , which converge and empty into the Niger Delta . This is one of the world's largest river deltas and
18960-524: The spring of 1942. She was probably killed in the Kulmhof extermination camp in the fall of 1942. Of Elli's three children, only her daughter Gerti survived the Second World War . A memorial plaque commemorates the three sisters at the family grave in the New Jewish Cemetery in Prague. Kafka had a lifelong suspicion that people found him mentally and physically repulsive. However, many of those who met him found him to possess obvious intelligence and
19118-454: The threshold of power in the country. As oil production and revenue rose, the Nigerian government became increasingly dependent on oil revenues and international commodity markets for budgetary and economic concerns. The coup in July 1975 , led by Generals Shehu Musa Yar'Adua and Joseph Garba , ousted Gowon, who fled to Britain. The coup plotters wanted to replace Gowon's autocratic rule with
19276-559: The time. It was especially true of factories fitted with machine lathes , drills , planing machines and rotary saws , which were rarely fitted with safety guards. His father often referred to his son's job as an insurance officer as a Brotberuf , literally "bread job", a job done only to pay the bills; Kafka often claimed to despise it. Kafka was rapidly promoted and his duties included processing and investigating compensation claims, writing reports, and handling appeals from businessmen who thought their firms had been placed in too high
19434-413: The war, Nigeria enjoyed an oil boom in the 1970s, during which the country joined OPEC and received huge oil revenues. Despite these revenues, the military government did little to improve the standard of living , help small and medium businesses, or invest in infrastructure. As oil revenues fueled the rise of federal subsidies to states, the federal government became the centre of political struggle and
19592-551: The waters of this country". In August 1983, Shagari and the NPN were returned to power in a landslide victory, with a majority of seats in the National Assembly and control of 12 state governments. But the elections were marred by violence, and allegations of widespread vote-rigging and electoral malfeasance led to legal battles over the results. There were also uncertainties, such as in the first republic, that political leaders may be unable to govern properly. The 1983 military coup d'état
19750-475: The widespread cultivation of agricultural products, such as the palm, for use in European industry. The slave trade continued after the ban, as illegal smugglers purchased slaves along the coast from native slavers. Britain's West Africa Squadron sought to intercept the smugglers at sea. The rescued slaves were taken to Freetown , a colony in West Africa originally established by Lieutenant John Clarkson for
19908-462: The wine). When the tapster dies, cutting off his supply, the desperate narrator sets off for Dead's Town to try to bring the tapster back. He travels through a world of magic and supernatural beings, surviving various tests and finally gains a magic egg with never-ending palm wine. The Palm-Wine Drinkard was widely reviewed in Western publications when it was published by Faber and Faber . In 1975,
20066-615: The work of Hans Blüher on male bonding. Saul Friedländer argues that this mental struggle may have informed the themes of alienation and psychological brutality in his writing. Although Kafka showed little interest in exercise as a child, he later developed a passion for games and physical activity and was an accomplished rider, swimmer, and rower. On weekends, he and his friends embarked on long hikes, often planned by Kafka himself. His other interests included alternative medicine , modern education systems such as Montessori , and technological novelties such as airplanes and film. Writing
20224-599: The world in the 1960s. It has also influenced artists, composers, and philosophers. Kafka was born near the Old Town Square in Prague, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire . His family were German-speaking middle-class Ashkenazi Jews . His father, Hermann Kafka (1854–1931), was the fourth child of Jakob Kafka, a shochet or ritual slaughterer in Osek , a Czech village with a large Jewish population located near Strakonice in southern Bohemia. Hermann brought
20382-558: The world, about two million, was concentrated in the territories of the Sokoto Caliphate . The use of slave labour was extensive, especially in agriculture. By the time of its break-up in 1903 into various European colonies, the Sokoto Caliphate was one of the largest pre-colonial African states. A changing legal imperative (the outlawing of the Atlantic slave trade in 1807) and economic imperative (a desire for political and social stability) led most European powers to support
20540-403: The worst sort control me without pause ... A marriage could not change me, just as my job cannot change me. According to the biographers Stach and James Hawes , Kafka became engaged a third time around 1920, to Julie Wohryzek, a poor and uneducated hotel chambermaid. Kafka's father objected to Julie because of her Zionist beliefs. Although Kafka and Julie rented a flat and set a wedding date,
20698-552: The year before he died. With the outbreak of the Great Depression in 1929, the Hermann family business experienced financial difficulties and eventually went bankrupt. Karl Hermann died February 27, 1939, and Elli was supported financially by her sisters. On October 21, 1941, she was deported together with her daughter Hanna to the Łódź Ghetto , where she lived temporarily with her sister Valli and Valli's husband in
20856-529: Was a coalition of conservative parties: the Northern People's Congress led by Sir Ahmadu Bello , a party dominated by Muslim northerners, and the Igbo and Christian-dominated National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons led by Nnamdi Azikiwe . The opposition consisted of the comparatively liberal Action Group , which was largely dominated by the Yoruba and led by Obafemi Awolowo . An imbalance
21014-589: Was a passionate reciter, able to phrase his speech as though it were music. Brod felt that two of Kafka's most distinguishing traits were "absolute truthfulness" ( absolute Wahrhaftigkeit ) and "precise conscientiousness" ( präzise Gewissenhaftigkeit ). He explored inconspicuous details in depth and with such precision and love that unforeseen things surfaced that seemed strange but absolutely true ( nichts als wahr ). Kafka's letters and unexpurgated diaries reveal repressed homoerotic desires, including an infatuation with novelist Franz Werfel and fascination with
21172-657: Was abolished soon after colonialism. Nigeria gained a degree of self-rule in 1954, and full independence from the United Kingdom on 1 October 1960, as the Federation of Nigeria with Abubakar Tafawa Balewa as its Prime Minister , while retaining the British monarch , Elizabeth II , as nominal head of state and Queen of Nigeria . Azikiwe replaced the colonial governor-general in November 1960. At independence,
21330-686: Was accomplished without intermediate bronze production. Some have suggested the technology moved west from the Nile Valley . But the Iron Age in the Niger River valley and the forest region appears to predate the introduction of metallurgy in the upper savanna by more than 800 years, as well as predating it in the Nile Valley. More recent research suggests that iron metallurgy was developed independently in sub-Saharan Africa . The Nok civilization thrived between 1,500 BC and AD 200. It produced life-sized terracotta figures that are some of
21488-495: Was admitted to the rigorous classics-oriented state gymnasium , Altstädter Deutsches Gymnasium , an academic secondary school at Old Town Square, located within Kinský Palace . German was the language of instruction, but Kafka also spoke and wrote in Czech. He studied the latter at the gymnasium for eight years, achieving good grades. Although Kafka received compliments for his Czech, he never considered himself fluent in
21646-474: Was also very fond of the works of Goethe . Kafka was awarded the degree of Doctor of Law on 18 June 1906 and performed an obligatory year of unpaid service as a law clerk for the civil and criminal courts. On 1 November 1907, Kafka was employed at the Assicurazioni Generali , an insurance company, where he worked for nearly a year. His correspondence during that period indicates that he
21804-484: Was an Austrian-Czech novelist and writer from Prague . He is widely regarded as a major figure of 20th-century literature ; he wrote in German. His work fuses elements of realism and the fantastic . It typically features isolated protagonists facing bizarre or surrealistic predicaments and incomprehensible socio- bureaucratic powers. It has been interpreted as exploring themes of alienation , existential anxiety , guilt , and absurdity . His best known works include
21962-472: Was at about this time that Kafka became a vegetarian. Around 1915, Kafka received his draft notice for military service in World War I, but his employers at the insurance institute arranged for a deferment because his work was considered essential government service. He later attempted to join the military but was prevented from doing so by medical problems associated with tuberculosis , with which he
22120-407: Was at times alienated from Judaism and Jewish life. On 8 January 1914, he wrote in his diary: In his adolescent years, Kafka declared himself an atheist . Hawes suggests that Kafka, though very aware of his own Jewishness , did not incorporate it into his work, which, according to Hawes, lacks Jewish characters, scenes or themes. In the opinion of literary critic Harold Bloom , although Kafka
22278-403: Was coordinated by key officers of the Nigerian military and led to the overthrow of the government and the installation of Major General Muhammadu Buhari as head of state. The military coup of Muhammadu Buhari shortly after the regime's re-election in 1984 was generally viewed as a positive development. In 1985, Ibrahim Babangida overthrew Buhari in a coup d'état. In 1986, Babangida established
22436-412: Was created in the polity as the result of the 1961 plebiscite . Southern Cameroons opted to join the Republic of Cameroon while Northern Cameroons chose to join Nigeria. The northern part of the country became larger than the southern part. The disequilibrium and perceived corruption of the electoral and political process led to two military coups in 1966. The first coup was in January 1966 and
22594-460: Was diagnosed in 1917. In 1918, the Worker's Accident Insurance Institute put Kafka on a pension due to his illness, for which there was no cure at the time, and he spent most of the rest of his life in sanatoriums . Kafka never married. According to Brod, Kafka was "tortured" by sexual desire, and Kafka's biographer Reiner Stach states that his life was full of "incessant womanising" and that he
22752-469: Was filled with a fear of "sexual failure". Kafka visited brothels for most of his adult life and was interested in pornography. In addition, he had close relationships with several women during his lifetime. On 13 August 1912, Kafka met Felice Bauer , a relative of Brod's, who worked in Berlin as a representative of a dictaphone company. A week after the meeting at Brod's home, Kafka wrote in his diary: Miss FB. When I arrived at Brod's on 13 August, she
22910-507: Was hotly debated. Opinions ranged from the notion that he satirised the bureaucratic bungling of a crumbling Austro-Hungarian Empire , to the belief that he embodied the rise of socialism. A further key point was Marx's theory of alienation . While the orthodox position was that Kafka's depictions of alienation were no longer relevant for a society that had supposedly eliminated alienation, a 1963 conference held in Liblice , Czechoslovakia, on
23068-583: Was led mostly by soldiers under Majors Emmanuel Ifeajuna (of the Igbo tribe), Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu ( Northerner of Eastern extraction) and Adewale Ademoyega (a Yoruba from the West). The coup plotters succeeded in assassinating Sir Ahmadu Bello and Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa alongside prominent leaders of the Northern Region and Premier Samuel Akintola of the Western Region , but
23226-403: Was only later that the novel began to rise in the general estimation. Critics began to value Tutuola's literary style as a unique exploration of the possibilities of African folklore instead of the more typical realist imitation of European novels in African novels. One of the contributions Tutuola made was to "kill forever any idea that Africans are copyists of the cultures of other races". Tutuola
23384-418: Was popular and built around his image as a staunch anti-corruption fighter—he won the election by over two million votes. Observers generally praised the election as being fair. The election marked the first time an incumbent president had lost re-election in Nigeria. In the 2019 presidential election , Buhari was re-elected. Four candidates vied for the presidency in the 2023 presidential election . For
23542-681: Was published during his lifetime attracted scant public attention. Kafka finished none of his full-length novels and burned around 90 percent of his work, much of it during the period he lived in Berlin with Diamant, who helped him burn the drafts. In his early years as a writer he was influenced by von Kleist, whose work he described in a letter to Bauer as frightening and whom he considered closer than his own family. Kafka drew and sketched extensively. Until May 2021, only about 40 of his drawings were known. In 2022, Yale University Press published Franz Kafka: The Drawings . Kafka's earliest published works were eight stories that appeared in 1908 in
23700-483: Was seen as a "pioneer of a new literary form, based on an ancient verbal style". Rather than seeing the book as mere pastiche, critics began to note that Tutuola had done a great deal "to impose an extraordinary unity upon his apparently random collection of traditional material" and that what may have started as "fragments of folklore, ritual and belief" had "all passed through the transmuting fire of an individual imagination". The Nigerian critic E. N. Obiechina argued that
23858-435: Was sitting at the table. I was not at all curious about who she was, but rather took her for granted at once. Bony, empty face that wore its emptiness openly. Bare throat. A blouse thrown on. Looked very domestic in her dress although, as it turned out, she by no means was. (I alienate myself from her a little by inspecting her so closely ...) Almost broken nose. Blonde, somewhat straight, unattractive hair, strong chin. As I
24016-507: Was sworn in as the first President and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Obasanjo peacefully transferred power to Shagari, becoming the first head of state in Nigerian history to willingly step down. The Shagari government became viewed as corrupt by virtually all sectors of Nigerian society. In 1983, the inspectors of the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation began to notice "the slow poisoning of
24174-431: Was taking my seat I looked at her closely for the first time, by the time I was seated I already had an unshakeable opinion. Shortly after this meeting, Kafka wrote the story " Das Urteil " ("The Judgment") in only one night and in a productive period worked on Der Verschollene ( The Man Who Disappeared ) and Die Verwandlung ( The Metamorphosis ). Kafka and Felice Bauer communicated mostly through letters over
24332-501: Was the country's national anthem from 1960 to 1978, as its national anthem, replacing Arise, O Compatriots . Nigeria is located in western Africa on the Gulf of Guinea and has a total area of 923,768 km (356,669 sq mi), making it the world's 32nd-largest country . Its borders span 4,047 kilometres (2,515 mi), and it shares borders with Benin (773 km or 480 mi), Niger (1,497 km or 930 mi), Chad (87 km or 54 mi), and Cameroon (including
24490-401: Was the eldest. Franz's two brothers, Georg and Heinrich, died in infancy before Franz was seven; his three sisters were Gabriele ("Elli") (1889–1942), Valerie ("Valli") (1890–1942) and Ottilie ("Ottla") (1892–1943). All three were murdered in the Holocaust of World War II . Valli was deported to the Łódź Ghetto in occupied Poland in 1942, but that is the last documentation of her; it
24648-400: Was uneasy with his Jewish heritage, he was the quintessential Jewish writer. Lothar Kahn is likewise unequivocal: "The presence of Jewishness in Kafka's oeuvre is no longer subject to doubt". Pavel Eisner , one of Kafka's first translators, interprets Der Process ( The Trial ) as the embodiment of the "triple dimension of Jewish existence in Prague ... his protagonist Josef K.
24806-595: Was unhappy with a work schedule—from 08:00 until 18:00 —that made it extremely difficult to concentrate on writing, which was assuming increasing importance to him. On 15 July 1908, he resigned. Two weeks later, he found employment more amenable to writing when he joined the Worker's Accident Insurance Institute for the Kingdom of Bohemia ( Úrazová pojišťovna dělnická pro Čechy v Praze ). The job involved investigating and assessing compensation for personal injury to industrial workers; accidents such as lost fingers or limbs were commonplace, owing to poor work safety policies at
24964-849: Was vitally important to Kafka; he considered it a "form of prayer". He was highly sensitive to noise and preferred absolute quiet when writing. Kafka was also a vegetarian and did not drink alcohol. Pérez-Álvarez has claimed that Kafka had symptomatology consistent with schizoid personality disorder . His style, it is claimed, not only in Die Verwandlung ( The Metamorphosis ) but in other writings, appears to show low- to medium-level schizoid traits, which Pérez-Álvarez claims to have influenced much of his work. His anguish can be seen in this diary entry from 21 June 1913: and in Zürau Aphorism number 50: Italian medical researchers Alessia Coralli and Antonio Perciaccante have posited in
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