GUN VIOLENCE IN AMERICA: FOR WHO THE BELL TOLLS NEXT.

Just five people shy of Sandy Hook elementary school mass shooting incident that claimed 26 lives, the Uvalde Texas Robb elementary school mass shooting at 21 victims, now ranks among the highest grossing gun carnage in America. It is sad that such frequent blood spilling has tragically become part of our culture as a society. May the souls of the killed now rest.

25th AMENDMENT: ITS NOW ALL CRICKET.

Madam Speaker Nancy Pelosi once questioned former President Donald John Trump's fitness to remain in office due to what she claimed was his declining mental capacity. Does anyone know what Madam Speaker presently thinks about the incontrovertible case which America is now saddled with? Just curious!

WHO WILL REBUILD UKRAINE?

The West should convert frozen Russian assets, both state's and oligarchs' owned, into a full seizure and set them aside for the future rebuilding of Ukraine. Like the Marshal Plan, call it the Putin Plan.

A HERO IS BORN.

I am staying put. I will not run away and abandon my people. The fight is here in Ukraine. What I need are weapons and ammunitions, not a ride out of town like former Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani - President Volodymyr Zelensky.

IT IS WHAT IT IS.

"There is too much hate in America because there is too much anger in America." - Trevor Noah.

WORD!

A life without challenges is not a life lived at all. A life lived is a life that has problems, confronts problems, solves problems and then learns from problems. - Tunde Fashola.

NOW, YOU KNOW.

When fishing for love, bait with your heart and not your brain, because you cannot rationalize love. - Mark Twain.

JUST THE FACT.

In our country, you can shoot and kill a nigger, but you better not hurt a gay person’s feelings - Dave Chappelle

DO YOU?.

“What you believe in can only be defined by what you’re willing to risk for it." - Stuart Scheller.

HEDGE YOUR CRISIS.

Never get in bed with a woman whose problems are worse than yours. - Chicago PD.

PROBLEM SOLVED.

'The best way to keep peace is to be ready to destroy evil. If you Pearl Harbor me, I Nagasaki you.' - Ted Nugent.

OUR SHARED HUMANITY.

Empathy is at the heart of who we are as human beings. - Cardinal Matthew Kukah.

WORDS ON MARBLE.

"Birth is agony. Life is hard. Death is cruel." - Japanese pithy.

REPENT OR PERISH - POPE.

Homosexuality is a sin. It is not ordained by God, therefore same sex marriage cannot be blessed by the church - Pope Francis.

CANCEL CULTURE IS CORROSIVE.


FOR SAKE OF COUNTRY.


MAGA LIVES ON: NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER!

TWITTER IS BORING WITHOUT HIS TWEETS. #RestorePresidentTrump'sTwitterHandle.


WORD.

"If you cannot speak the truth when it matters, then nothing else you says matters.” - Tucker Carlson.

#MeToo MOVEMENT: A BAD NEWS GONE CRAZY.

"To all the women who testified, we may have different truth, but I have a great remorse for all of you. I have great remorse for all of the men and women going through this crisis right now in our country. You know, the movement started basically with me, and I think what happened, you know, I was the first example, and now there are thousands of men who are being accused and a regeneration of things that I think none of us understood. I’m not going to say these aren’t great people. I had wonderful times with these people. I’m just genuinely confused. Men are confused about this issue. We are going through this #MeToo movement crisis right now in this country." - Harvey Weinstein.


RON DELLUMS: UNAPOLOGETICALLY RADICAL.

"If it’s radical to oppose the insanity and cruelty of the Vietnam War, if it’s radical to oppose racism and sexism and all other forms of oppression, if it’s radical to want to alleviate poverty, hunger, disease, homelessness, and other forms of human misery, then I’m proud to be called a radical.” - Ron Vernie Dellums.


WHAT REALLY MATTERS IN LIFE - STEVE JOBS

“I reached the pinnacle of success in the business world. In others’ eyes, my life is an epitome of success. However, aside from work, I have little joy. Non-stop pursuing of wealth will only turn a person into a twisted being, just like me. God gave us the senses to let us feel the love in everyone’s heart, not the illusions brought about by wealth. Memories precipitated by love is the only true riches which will follow you, accompany you, giving you strength and light to go on. The most expensive bed in the world is the sick bed. You can employ someone to drive the car for you, make money for you but you cannot have someone to bear sickness for you. Material things lost can be found. But there is one thing that can never be found when it is lost – Life. Treasure Love for your family, love for your spouse, love for your friends. Treat yourself well. Cherish others.” - SJ

EVIL CANNOT BE TRULY DESTROYED.

"The threat of evil is ever present. We can contain it as long as we stay vigilant, but it can never truly be destroyed. - Lorraine Warren (Annabelle, the movie)


ONLY THE POOR WISH THEY HAD STUFF?

“I’m not that interested in material things. As long as I find a good bed that I can sleep in, that’s enough.” - Nicolas Berggruem, the homeless billionaire.

Tuesday, October 12, 2010

CHINUA ACHEBE, HAUNTED BY AN EVER ELUSIVE NOBEL PRIZE FOR LITERATURE!

At 80 plus years old and still counting, with several literary works of fiction, including one world-famous and globally read classics of all times, 'Things Fall Apart', to his credit, Professor Chinua Achebe of Nigeria is still hopeful; waiting anxiously for the ever elusive Nobel Prize for Literature award. Regrettably, Stockholm has not dialed his number just yet and the 2010 opportunity came but also eluded him and for the umpteenth time. Unfortunately, Professor Chinua Achebe is watching his dream of winning the coveted Nobel Prize for Literature gradually evaporate before his own eyes and in his lifetime; and this must surely make him one less of a happy and fulfilled man.
Year after year, it is with great expectation, excitement and anticipation laced with melancholy, of what have become a purposeful neglect of his literary prowess and accomplishment, that his family and friends world-over, had hoped that at last his moment had come. That finally the world through Stockholm will recognize his many works and accordingly honor him with that cherished Nobel Prize for Literature. But as each year passed by, with it went millions of dashed hopes of admirers waiting to see their literary hero rightfully honored.
For inexplicable and unfathomable reasons/excuses, Professor Chinua Achebe is always red-flagged and denied the privilege of this award. In this fog of no-reason or lack of any meaningful one whatsoever, justifying the refusal and/or denial to honor Achebe with a Nobel Prize,
Icheoku had figured out what the root cause might be - the associated politics of the selection process of the Nobel Prize Committee in Stockholm Denmark. Icheoku says, it is because Chinua Achebe's writing is considered politically too hot to handle and somewhat very radioactive that he has not been accorded that singular honor and time is no longer on his side. However, the army of Chinua Achebe's friends and family will take particular exception with the Nobel Prize Committee in the future event they ever posthumously award the honor to Achebe long after he passes away. Icheoku hereby call on the 'wise-men and women' of Stockholm Nobel Academy to stop forthwith the playing of politics with honoring Chinua Achebe with a Nobel Prize for Literature. Achebe has earned and rightfully merited to be so honored; his literary exploits speaks volume as to the preeminence qualification of this literally giant and son of Africa for this award and Icheoku calls on the Nobel Academy to make Chinua Achebe one happy recipient now while he is still alive. Enough of the politics, Nobel Prize Committee.

Icheoku is taking umbrage with the Nobel Prize committee for not recognizing Chinua Achebe so many years since his Nigeria contemporary Professor Wole Soyinka was rightly honored in 1986. Two decades plus later, it is still just hopes that someday Achebe's time will come and Icheoku asks when would the time of an 80 year old come if not now; except they would rather honor him posthumously? It is 2010 and a Peruvian writer Mario Varga Llosa is the year's winner and Icheoku asks the people of Stockholm Nobel Academy, when will Nigeria's Albert Chinualumogu Achebe receive his own Nobel Prize for Literature, especially for his 'Things Fall Apart?" Or is it a case of the Falcon which still is unable to hear the Falconer, that the Nobel Prize Committee is playing deaf to this great expectation and clarion call for them to honor a man whose time has since come to be so honored as a Nobel Laurette.
Icheoku is talking about Nigeria's Chinua Achebe and states that he has earned the privilege of becoming a Nobel Laurette for Literature for his works, particularly Things Fall Apart. Further, Icheoku says, except there are some other mundane and sentimental/subjective considerations other than pure meritocracy, which is beclouding the sense of judgment of the Nobel Academy selection committee, there is no reason why Chinua Achebe should not have been honored with a Nobel Prize for Literature. In his Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe wrote a parity about the colonial Europe and their religion, with which they forayed into Africa and caused so much friction; and drove a knife through the body-fabric of a society that was previously homogeneously water-tight. The question no one has attempted to answer is whether Europe liked this their being put on the spot and being held responsible for fractious Africa by Achebe's 'Things Fall Apart'. Icheoku does not think that Europeans are happy campers and we strongly believe this is one of the reasons why Chinua Achebe has not been recognized by the Nobel Academy. Like Nelson Mandela who refused to be silenced and suffered greatly for his people, Chinua Achebe is suffering because his work cast aspersion on the European colonial masters; the same people tele-guiding who received or does not receive the award.
Further it would appear also that Chinua Achebe does not have enough lobbyists working the Nobel Academy committee on his behalf; but hey if the Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo
could win the Nobel Prize sitting in a prison, who then needs a lobbyist? But not when you are an African, whose works are perceived in certain quarters as somewhat "antagonistic" of the European colonial adventurism in Africa; and it is the same Europeans who decides who receives what prize. So the greatest lobbyist known to man could not have been able to make any difference in the matter of Chinua Achebe and the elusive Nobel Prize for Literature. Also does Chinua Achebe command a huge profile which the Nobel Prize Committee would want to tap into and harness; the jury is possibly still out on that issue but Icheoku strongly believes that he may need to do more to keep the media-light flashing either through interviews or press statements or even becoming somewhat more radicalized and outspoken or even controversial. Also his current affiliation with the David and Marianna Fisher University as Professor as well as Professor of African Studies at Brown University in Providence Rhode Island should be an added profile booster; assuming the Swedes are magnanimous enough to get-over the underlying militating political considerations and induct Chinua Achebe into the hall of Nobel Prize Laureates. So the Swedish Nobel Prize Academy that will like to know the mileage they can get out of an Achebe' Nobel Prize, now have it.
Like Peru's president Alan Garcia said of Vargas Llosa Nobel Prize, Icheoku says the same of Chinua Achebe, 'that the award of Nobel Prize for Literature to Chinua Achebe of Nigeria is long overdue' and hereby implore the Nobel Prize committee not to miss the next opportunity in 2011, since youth is no longer on the side of the Nigerian literary giant who is now 80 plus old. It will be a thing of great honor to right the wrong now of many years of neglect of a man whose work has been translated into over 158 languages and read throughout the world. It is a cry for remedy and Icheoku hopes the Nobel Prize Academy is not tone-deaf. Chinua Achebe is a story-teller of no mean repute and Icheoku challenges the Nobel Prize committee to tell the world how many other literary works ever, have taken man into the insides of humanity as did 'Things Fall Apart'? So what then is the grudge which they hold against Chinua Achebe not to bestow on him an honor and recognition which is since long due? Borrowing from the praise poured on Vargas Llosa by one of the committee members, Icheoku says of Chinua Achebe, "He has a number of masterpieces in narration because essentially he's a narrator, he's a storyteller. My goodness, what a storyteller Chinua Achebe is!"

With so many works to his credit including Things Fall Apart, No Longer at Ease, Arrow of God, A Man of the People, The Sacrificial Egg, Antihills of the Savannah and The Problem with Nigeria, Icheoku does not see why this writing genius has not been deemed a fit and proper person to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature; except the Swedes resent his political activism and anti-racism crusading. Icheoku remembers vividly the controversial lecture Chinua Achebe delivered in 1975 titled "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness" wherein he criticized Joseph Conrad as a bloody racist; and queries whether such outspokenness may be the albatross hounding his being considered for this recognition by the Conrads of this world at Stockholm's Nobel Prize Academy. Our plea, let Professor Albert Chinuanulumogu Achebe receive his Nobel Prize for Literature now, 2011 that is; so that he can celebrate while he is still alive since an 80 year old man does not have much time any longer but merely lives on borrowed times. It is the right thing to do, the correct thing to do and to deny him this award is wrong and unjust.

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