The Latin American and Caribbean Notebook, I [signed] [first edition]

Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, Inc., (1992). (1992). Fine. INSCRIBED AND SIGNED BY KOFI AWOONOR - Octavo, softcover bound in pictorial wrappers. vi, 87 & [1] pages printed in blue ink. pictorial half- title & title & 1 full-page illustration in blue & white. The cover & the 3 illustrations are by Carles J. Juzang. Near fine. First edition of this volume of Awoonor's poetry.Inscribed by the author "For Yvette / Best wishes / Kofi Awoonor ".Kofi Awoonor [1935-2013] was killed in the Westgate shopping mall attack in Kenya in September 2013. With his death, Ghana lost a much loved and respected poet, literary critic and elder statesman. Awoonor was the author of novels, poems, plays, political essays and literary criticism. In the early 1970s, he served as Chairman of the Department of Comparative Literature at SUNY Stonybrook, returning to Ghana in 1975 to teach at the University College of Cape Coast. As a poet, he was noted for his linguistic versatility, drawing on his knowledge of several languages and cultural traditions--Ewe, Akan, English, Portuguese and Spanish.Awoonor grew up in the newly independent Ghana. His outspoken political views, his close friendship with its first president Kwame Nkrumah, and his fierce loyalty to the Ewe traditions of his grandmother, made him a controversial figure and under the military rulers who held power in the 1970s, he was arrested and jailed for ten months for allegedly being involved in a 1975 coup plot. In the last two decades, Awoonor contributed to the development of Ghana's democracy, both as a oounselor to the head of state and as Ghana's ambassador to the United Nations from 1990 to 1994.