Ikhide R. Ikheloa

"Interestingly enough, in my mind, in their works, Achebe and Ngugi proved that one could take the English Language and appropriate it for oneself and write with it as if one was writing in one's indigenous language. Read Achebe's books, especially Things Fall Apart, Arrow of God, No Longer at Ease and A Man of the People; the beauty of Achebe's novels is in how he took the English Language and fooled the reader into thinking that the characters are speaking Igbo. Reading Things Fall Apart especially, the reader would be forgiven for thinking that Achebe was writing in Igbo. The man was a genius. Achebe's approach was brilliant on many levels; economically, trying to sell a novel in the language of my ancestors would be a huge challenge. Not many people would buy it because many of my people speak the language but can neither read nor write it. Besides, there is not much of a market for works of fiction written in my language. That is the least of our challenges. Achebe and his generation of writers brilliantly sidestepped that challenge by being creative with the use of the English language. They appropriated the English language and made it uniquely their own. That is how it should be." - Ikhide R Ikheloa Yes. Chinua Achebe took the English Language and fooled readers into thinking that the characters in his books are speaking Igbo. Reading Things Fall Apart, the reader would be forgiven for thinking that Achebe was writing in Igbo. The man was a genius. READ “Of African literature and the language and the politics of the stories” by Ikhide R. Ikheloa jaladaafrica.org/2015/09/15/of-…

"If at eighty you’re not a cripple or an invalid, if you have your health, if you still enjoy a good walk, a good meal (with all the trimmings), if you can sleep without first taking a pill, if birds and flowers, mountains and sea still inspire you, you are a most fortunate individual and you should get down on your knees morning and night and thank the good Lord for his savin’ and keepin’ power. If you are young in years but already weary in spirit, already on the way to becoming an automaton, it may do you good to say to your boss — under your breath, of course — “Fuck you, Jack! You don’t own me!” … If you can fall in love again and again, if you can forgive your parents for the crime of bringing you into the world, if you are content to get nowhere, just take each day as it comes, if you can forgive as well as forget, if you can keep from growing sour, surly, bitter and cynical, man you’ve got it half licked." - Henry Miller themarginalian.org/2026/03/18/hen…

@ChukwuderaEdozi I loved No Longer at Ease. And A Man of the People, because my dad loved those two books. He loved them more than Things Fall Apart, imagine that!

Chinua Achebe wrote five great novels and unfortunately “No Longer at Ease” is swallowed under the canon and we don’t even give it half the attention it deserves. I am always in my feelings when I take another peek into the world of Obi Okonkwo.

My father had a cupboard of books. It was probably our most prized possession, even as he was "transferred" by the Nigerian police from Nigeria's nook to cranny, he and I always made sure that the cupboard of books had an exalted place in the "transfer" lorry. In that cupboard, Professor Chinua Achebe's books were exalted guests. I traveled the world through the books in that cupboard. My father's cupboard was magical, no matter how many times I visited it, there was always a book I had never read. In Ruskin Bond's Room on the Roof, I traveled to India, in Richmal Crompton's Williams series, I saw little boys that looked like me in far away Britain. About my father, I am not sure my dad ever read Achebe's Things Fall Apart. He read No Longer at Ease and A Man of the People. In those days, we had one of those standing mirrors that were in every Nigerian "parlour." My father, who had secretly dreamt of going "overseas" to get "the golden fleece", would stand before the mirror, twirl his Honda motorcycle keys around his fingers and go, "How's the car behaving?" a way of greeting by the new African elites in Achebe’s book, No Longer at Ease, those mimic-white folks who came back home in those huge ships. My dad envied them, no end and he never tired of telling me that he would have been one of them if I had not come along. My dad loved A Man of the People and on some evenings over a glass of beer, he would yell, 'Chief Nanga, MP!" and he and I would practically fall on the ground laughing at the antics of that corrupt politician. There were other books that my father loved, I remember pretty much all the books of the African Writers Series that Achebe helped to birth. My father loved TM Aluko's books, especially One Man One Wife, a book my dad liked to quote loudly within earshot of our mother. He chafed at monogamy and he endured it, with a few missteps. His pet name for our mother Izuma was Ailegwale, that is, the only course, no appetizer, no dessert! I will always remember Chinua Achebe because his books were one reason I bonded with my dad, a complex but loving man. I inherited my dad’s passions, a lot of them demons, his love for beautiful people, good music, words, a good bottle, and books. Achebe saved my dad and me with the power of words. He was a giant, powerful eagle perched at the head of a pack of thinkers and doers who insisted on telling us our stories, at a time when that was what you had to do to entertain children and their parents. I lost a father in Achebe, this man who made my father play with me.

What's one book that changed how you see the world? Fiction, philosophy, self-help. Does not matter.

We've done this to ourselves, America. The 4-hour lines at the airport. The surging gas prices, and other rising prices to follow. The $200 billion and counting tab for our latest Middle Eastern adventure, piled on to of the $39 trillion in debt. Amazing national self-sabotage.

@mydearenomfon I read it - almost 20 years ago, lol. I liked it. Wrote a review. 😎africanwriter.com/book-review-i-…

Who has read this? I just started reading it.

The F-35 was supposed to be unkillable. That was the whole point. Lockheed Martin spent thirty years and four hundred billion dollars, the most expensive weapons programme in human history, building an aircraft that the enemy simply could not see. Not on radar. Not on infrared. Not on anything. The F-35 was not just a fighter jet. It was a theological statement. America’s way of saying: we have moved beyond the reach of your missiles, your sensors, and your prayers. Iran apparently didn’t get the memo. Somewhere over Iranian airspace on March 19, 2026, an IRST system, infrared search and track, the kind of sensor your grandmother could probably explain, looked up, found the F-35, and locked on. Not because Iranian engineers are geniuses. Because the F-35, it turns out, is extremely hot. All that engine. All that thrust. All that carefully sculpted stealth geometry, and the bloody thing glows like a kettle. The heat signature data Iran now holds is not just embarrassing. It is a gift that keeps giving. To Moscow. To Beijing. To every procurement ministry on the planet that has been quietly wondering whether to spend the money on systems designed to kill this aircraft. The answer, as of this week, is yes. And here is the bit that should really worry the Pentagon. You can patch software. You can redesign coatings. You cannot reprogramme a pilot’s brain. Every F-35 driver who takes off from here on knows, actually knows, that someone down there might be able to see them. That changes everything about how they fly. Caution replaces aggression. Hesitation replaces instinct. Four hundred billion dollars. And in the end, it was done in by a heat sensor. Tremendous. Gandalv / @Microinteracti1

No need to pay for books in 2026 The internet is a free library if you know where to look Here are 12 sites where you can download PDF books for free:

"The Nigerian literary industry at home has dwindled—though ceremonial announcements of book publications appear like a band aid to the underlying unattended malaise—as the cost of promoting literature in an increasingly economic hardship, or funding its lifestyle, isn’t commensurate with the gain. What is happening is that the production of literature and its diffusion into society are not as organic as they should be, or that it revolves within a microcosm. Simply put: it is thriving within a thin, restricted, privileged system.  If Nigerian literature is currently thriving anyhow, it is within an elite circle. And those outside this circle—accessible by being middleclass or proximate to—are distanced from partaking in it or enjoying its benefits. It is a projectile that has been in motion for a while, only becoming visibly disturbing now; the culture of reading and literary engagement keep moving away from society, instead of being a member of it in performing the function of freedom.  This disappearing function pronounces an underlying problem. Surely, a growing philistinism within the country contributes to the populace’s apathy towards literature. But it worsens when this literature itself can no longer be found in spaces where it is needed. Exposure to Nigerian literature today, for Nigerians within the country, is highly dependent on privilege. And while there’s the privilege of class, there’s also the privilege of position, to be exposed to it in the first place, as it moves away from ordinary society. This is where the elitism creeps in. The Nigerian novel today, every day, keeps climbing to a pedestal of becoming a rare object, or an endangered one, accessible to a few; perhaps even, almost as a collectible. This greatly affects the number of novels one wishes to read in a year; thus, the seemingly harmless inability to afford books translates to disinterest, to resignation, to apparent absence." "The world is quietly succumbing to the coup of digital media overtaking print. It is cliché to weep over technological transitions; as we already know, every age decries the lessening of authenticity with each leap, yet somehow, we always turn out fine. But it’d be foolhardy to dismiss the clear evidence that there’s been no time we have had it worse than today, especially with brain rot and reduced levels of critical mindedness—what Herbert Marcuse feared would result in the one-dimensional man. Literature, in my view, seems to be the last refuge for any hope at all. But with its middleclass situation in Nigeria, it is far from affecting the lives of those outside its reach; firstly, is the economic distance, and secondly, as all things middleclass or bourgeois, it distances itself from the common man." Carl Terver @carlterver READ: The Middleclass Problem of Nigerian Writing by Carl Terver afapinen.com/2026/03/19/mid…

Probably nothing or committing an Oris. I have been thinking about this for a while now, meaning a few years ago. I finally put my thoughts together here. Kindly engage. afapinen.com/2026/03/19/mid…

"do watch the 'God-debate' exchange with Steven Pinker. interesting stuff, but Pinker often makes so many easy blunders that I wonder if he simply isn't on his A game. his statement here collapses a ton of variables—history, institutions, geography, colonialism, resource curses, governance quality, and socioculture—into one, while strongly implying causation where the evidence mostly points the other way (or is bidirectional at best). It's giving 2012 Facebook atheist vibes: religion is the big bad wolf and is the reason why the world is in flames. globally, the world's most religious countries (much of sub-Saharan Africa , parts of Asia and the Middle East) overlap heavily with low Human Development Index (HDI), high conflict, and poor outcomes. the most irreligious ones (the Nordics, Japan, parts of Western Europe, etc.) overlap with the highest HDI, safety, and life satisfaction. it's a consistent cross-national pattern documented in multiple studies. but the causation isn't simply the level of religiosity. correlation is not causation. In poor, unstable, high-risk environments (like diseases, famine, war, weak/absent government), people turn to religion for comfort, meaning, and moral order. It's a coping mechanism when institutions fail to do what they are meant to do. Nigeria is a prime example. we pray before heading out because the roads are bad. we pray for security to be better because the armed forces are overwhelmed. we pray for our folks who are about to go into surgery because Oxygen may abruptly finish, or the overworked surgeon may forget a tool in their diaphragm. we pray for electricity to blink on around midnight so that we can iron our work clothes for tomorrow. I could go on and on... but you get the gist. now, examine the contrast with developed societies: as societies get richer, safer, and more secure (industrial economy, better healthcare, education, welfare), religiosity naturally declines because people no longer need it as intensely. Secular institutions handle the existential needs—and this, in part, prompted Nietzsche as far back as the 1880s to proclaim that God is dead. Underdevelopment and instability drive high religiosity more than the reverse. Pinker has it backward in the causal arrow. beside, one could bring up counterfactuals to this. The US is anomalously religious and rich; the Gulf States literally have Shariah embedded in their constitutions, yet they have a high GDP per capita; Israel mixes (increasing) religiosity with top-tier innovation. people don't flee Congo or japa from Nigeria because it's religious; they flee because it's unstable, and religion is what remains as a psychological anchor. the actual story is messier than how Pinker puts it." Ridwan Badamasi on Facebook: facebook.com/share/p/17a8mZ…

This is unhinged. The President of the United States went on a late-night rant, making clear he believes the Supreme Court justices he appointed owe him their loyalty and should always rule in his favor. The President of the United States is openly attacking the independence of the judiciary, the very institution that stands between every American and unchecked executive power. Courts don’t work for the President. They work for the Constitution. And a president attacking the judiciary for doing its job is telling you he believes he is above the law.

Trump is a president of peace! Ha!

🚨🚨🚨 ISRAEL JUST MADE THE SINGLE MOST DANGEROUS MILITARY DECISION OF THE ENTIRE WAR. AND NOBODY UNDERSTANDS WHAT THEY JUST TRIGGERED. 🚨🚨🚨 Israel and the U.S. struck South Pars — the LARGEST gas field on the planet. But here's what they either didn't know or didn't care about: South Pars is jointly managed by Iran AND Qatar. They didn't just attack Iran. They attacked the energy backbone of their OWN Gulf allies. Let that sink in. 💀 The IRGC just declared ALL major energy facilities across the entire GCC as "direct and legitimate targets" — and warned strikes are coming in the "COMING HOURS." 💀 Listed targets: Qatar's LNG complex, Saudi Aramco facilities, UAE oil terminals — EVERYTHING. 💀 Saudi Aramco has already EVACUATED workers from the SAMREF refinery in Yanbu. They're not waiting. They KNOW what's coming. 💀 Iranian hackers have ALREADY hit Aramco's digital systems — posting images and issuing threats to PARALYZE their infrastructure. 💀 Multiple EXPLOSIONS just heard in Riyadh — confirmed by Reuters, AFP, and AP. Sirens sounding in the Saudi capital. Do you understand the scale of what's happening? ⚠️ Qatar's LNG complex is the LARGEST on Earth. It supplies 30% of the world's liquefied natural gas. If Iran hits it — Europe's heating supply DISAPPEARS overnight. Not in months. OVERNIGHT. ⚠️ Saudi Aramco is the most valuable company on the PLANET — worth $1,800,000,000,000. Its refineries process 12 MILLION barrels per day. One successful strike takes 10% of the world's oil OFFLINE. ⚠️ In 2019, a SINGLE drone attack on Saudi Aramco's Abqaiq facility knocked out 5.7 million barrels per day and sent oil up 15% in ONE session. Iran now has 10x the motivation and NOTHING left to lose. They're showing you "precision strikes on Iranian targets." They're NOT showing you that those strikes just gave Iran the JUSTIFICATION to destroy every oil facility from Qatar to Saudi Arabia to the UAE. Here's the logic — follow it carefully: → You bomb a gas field that's JOINTLY OWNED with Qatar → Qatar — your own Gulf ally — publicly condemns you → Iran uses the attack as justification to target ALL Gulf energy → IRGC formally declares Gulf facilities as "legitimate targets" → Aramco starts EVACUATING refineries → Explosions hit RIYADH → You didn't weaken Iran. You gave them the excuse to burn down the ENTIRE Gulf's economy. If this was a "strategic victory," why is Aramco evacuating workers RIGHT NOW? If Iran's military is "degraded," why are 6 Gulf nations scrambling to protect their oil fields from an attack they believe is IMMINENT? Complete silence. You don't evacuate the world's most valuable company unless you KNOW what's coming. The IRGC said "coming hours." Not days. Not weeks. HOURS. And every Gulf state just went from spectator to TARGET. This is no longer a war between the U.S. and Iran. This is a war that's about to ERASE the Gulf's entire energy infrastructure — the infrastructure that powers HALF the planet. Prepare accordingly. 🚨🚨🚨 They don't want you seeing this. Follow + RT to beat the algorithm. 🚨

name a writer that changed you forever

I cannot stop thinking of what my dad said to me in 2022-- while he was battling his health decline. "You don't belong to me or anyone else. You just came through us (him and my mom). Nobody owns you. You belong to the universe. You are going to be okay."

Netanyahu died on March 8th, 2026. Yair, his son who posts 24/7, took an exact 7 day break on X from 3/8 to 3/15. That lines up precisely with the Jewish Shiva mourning period. President Trump looked visibly shaken on 3/8. Now they are striking oil fields and hitting civilian infrastructure in response. They wouldn’t do that unless something serious happened, like a major assassination. That also lines up with the strange military council absences and event cancellations. Every video you are seeing of him after 3/8 is AI assisted.

This guy has made over 30 videos covering different topics since the war began. He has been 100% accurate in each and every video. Watch him in his latest video explaining how he knows without a doubt Netanyahu is dead

BOMBSHELL: Iran offered to give away ALL of its enriched uranium during peace talks in Geneva. The British thought it was a credible offer. Hours later, Trump started bombing Iran anyway. The US didn't want peace, they wanted war.