Okri's father, then a railway station clerk, soon left for England to study law. The rest of the family joined him shortly afterwards. Despite young Ben's protestations, the Okris returned to Lagos in 1965, where Silver Okri set up a law practice.
Okri began writing articles and fiction in 1976, after failing to get a place at university. His first novel, written when he was still living in Nigeria, was published by Longman in 1980. Entitled Flowers and Shadows, the narrative centers on a young man’s disillusionment with corruption in postcolonial Nigerian society.
He wrote a play and a novel while working in a paint company, and then moved to England, first to study comparative literature at the University of Essex, then to continue writing in London.
In 1983, Okri became the poetry editor for the weekly magazine West Africa, in which "In the Shadow of War" was first published during that same year. By the mid-eighties, Okri's talent began to be recognized, and he continued to publish.
In 2009, he invented a newform called the Stoku, which is a cross between a short story and a haiku. This was first displayed in his book 'Tales of Freedom’, now re-titled The Comic Destiny.
Ben Okri has published many books, including The Famished Road, which won the Booker Prize in 1991, & Songs of Enchantment, Astonishing the Gods and Dangerous Love.
Ben Okri’s books have won several awards, including the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Africa, the Paris Review Aga Khan Prize for Fiction, the Chianti Rufino-Antico Fattore International Literary Prize and the Premio Grinanze Cavour.
In addition, he has been awarded Honorary Doctorates by the University of Westminster and the University of Essex. In 1998, he was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and in 2000 he served as the chairman of the judges for the Caine Prize for African Fiction.
Ben Okri: Nigerian-British author
