A Survey of African Poetry in the London Times, Sunday Times, Financial Times, the Times Literary Supplement 1865-1985

"The Power of Print, II: What Do African Intellectuals Read?", The Times Literary Supplement, 12 May 1972, p. 547 The Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive,, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/EX1200380792/GDCS?u=linc74325&sid=GDCS&xid=44744a9a. Accessed 17 Dec 2019

[Excerpt]: "...Surely, the African intellectual reads Newsweek and TIme magazine, and one or two local papers as well. And it is conceivable that he might find time once in a while to dip into that decoratie set of encyclopedias one sees more and more these days adorning the sitting-rooms of the intellectual elite and their emulators...It was clear that the Africans who went to the library did not go in to search of literary pleasure. They were concerned mostly with one or other of the many external examinations of London University or the City and Guilds... When I was a boy things were rather different. Books were rare indeed. I remember the very strong impression made on me by the rows and rows of books in my school library when I first got there in 1944. I was, of course, most fortunate in gaining admission to a government college, one of those rare schools which the colonial administration built and endowed lavishly, for obscure reasons of its own. Cricket was played zealously and, in one of them at least, Eton Fives. But their most valuable asset was books. It is no doubt significant that, besides myself, almost all of the first generation of Nigerian writers had gone to one of the four or five government colleges; T. M. Aluko, Cyprian Ekwensi, Gabriel Okara, Wole Soyinka, J. P. Clark, Christopher Okigbo, V. C. Ike, Nkem Nwankwo, Elechi Amadi..."