Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Great Regulars: Chinua Achebe has declined the

Nigerian government's attempt to name him a Commander of the Federal Republic.

This is the second time the Nigerian author has rejected the Nigerian national honour, after he initially refused it in 2004. Achebe issued a statement to Nigerian press to say that he was turning down the award because "the reasons for rejecting the offer when it was first made have not been addressed let alone solved. It is inappropriate to offer it again to me".

from Alison Flood: The Guardian: Chinua Achebe refuses Nigerian national honour

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1. Who wrote "We are the Dead. Short days ago/We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,/Loved and were loved, and now we lie/In Flanders fields"?

from Alison Flood: The Guardian: Quiz: First world war poetry

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"It surprised me because we always had this idea that Sassoon, when he went out to France, would have changed instantly from his heroic ideal of war to an anger that burst over into his poetry," she [Dr. Jean Moorcroft Wilson] told the BBC. "So when he gets there you're not surprised to find him talking about the trenches. But when I found this trench diary, after the angry war poems I found there were poems that were full of the glory of war and the idea that war is a heroic venture."

from Alison Flood: The Guardian: Unseen Siegfried Sassoon poems reveal 'heroic' view of war

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