Chinua Achebe

Chinua Achebe, the Nigerian writer who was one of Africa’s most widely read novelists and one of the continent’s towering men of letters, died on Thursday in Boston. He was 82.

His death was confirmed by his agent in London.

Besides novels, Mr. Achebe’s works included powerful essays and poignant short stories and poems rooted in the countryside and cities of his native Nigeria, before and after independence from British colonial rule. His most memorable fictional characters were buffeted and bewildered by the conflicting pulls of traditional African culture and invasive Western values.

Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe has published a much-anticipated memoir of the Biafran war.

Achebe's new book, "There Was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra," recounts the 1967-1970 war when Biafra tried to secede from Nigeria.

Achebe, 81, is one of the Africa's most famous authors, best known for his debut novel "Things Fall Apart" published in 1958. He is often called the father of modern African literature, Agence France-Presse said.