Ama Ata Aidoo (formerly Christina Ama Aidee) Biography

Ghanaian playwright, novelist, poet, and short-story writer, born in Ghana, educated at the University of Ghana in Legon, and Stanford University. She has taught at various African universities. Her plays are much concerned with the position of women in African society, and with constructively firm criticism of Ghanaian society. Formally, her work is greatly inspired by oral sources and story-telling traditions. Published plays include The Dilemma of a Ghost (1965), about the problems faced by a black American girl who marries into a Ghanaian family, and Anowa (1969), a play which reworks an old Ghanaian legend. Other works include No Sweetness Here (1971), a collection of short stories; Out Sister Killjoy (1977), a novel about a Ghanaian student's critical reactions to European society, and her subsequent reassessment of African society when she returns from her studies in West Germany and London; and Changes (1991), a love story. She has also published two collections of poems, Someone Talking to Sometime (1985) and An Angry Letter in January (1992), which explore her cultural and political concerns for the present state of Africa.