The news of African literary icon Chinua Achebe winning the 2010 Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize is the buzz of the moment as Nigerians glow in the excitement of the 50th Independence Anniversary of the nation. The lionized writer’s celebrated novel Things Fall Apart was published in 1958, two years before the independence of Nigeria on October 1, 1960. And afterwards things really fell apart in the most populous country in Africa as incessant political crises plunged Nigeria into a catastrophic civil war after two horrifying coups. But Nigeria survived the civil war and other terrifying coups and barbaric religious and political conflicts and deserves the celebration of her Golden Jubilee this weekend.

Nigeria is famous for being the country of highly gifted writers like Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, the first African winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, Cyprian Ekwensi, T.M. Aluko, Flora Nwapa, Nkem Nwankwo, Christopher Okigbo, Gabriel Okara, John Pepper Clark and others who wrote great books before and after 1960. A new generation of young literary geniuses have emerged since 1960 to date. Festus Iyayi, Isidore Okpewo, Ken Saro-wiwa, Ben Okri , Chris Abani, Biyi Bandele-Thomas, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Helon Habila, Helen Oyeyemi, Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani and others have won coveted prizes for their novels and this month Chibundu Onuzo, who is only 19, has become the youngest woman authior to sign a two-novel deal with the British publisher Faber.

The $300,000 award with a silver medallion will be given to Achebe on October 27 in New York City, USA.

Sometimes I think Orikinla deserves a long ban. As old as he is on NL he still posts the right things in the wrong sections.