Kobena Eyi Acquah

Kobena Eyi Acquah (born 1952) is a Ghanaian lawyer and poet.[1] His debut collection, The Man Who Died (1984), won the 1985 British Airways Commonwealth Prize for Poetry.[2] The dramatized performance of his Music for a Dream Dance "remains one of the most memorable events in the recent history of the poetic scene in Ghana".[3]

Life

Kobena Eyi Acquah was born in Winneba in Ghana's Central Region. He studied at the University of Ghana, Legon and studied law at the Ghana Law School. He has worked as a lawyer and investment counselor at the same time as pursuing his writing career. He has served on he Ghana Book Development Council and the Ghana Copyright Board,[1] and in 1993 was president of the Ghana Association of Writers.[4]

Acquah was influenced by Atukwei Okai, whom he first met in 1971. He has emphasised the importance of public poetic performance of poetry, which he sees as continuing folk traditions of musical performance.[4] With a drama group known as The Living Echoes, he has directed several dramatic performances of his poetry. An early production was a dramatization of selections from The Man Who Died. On 27 January 1988 the group performed Birth and Rebirth at the W. E. B. Du Bois Memorial Centre for Pan African Culture. On 29 July 1988 the group performed a public premiere, billed as an 'outdooring', of Music for a Dream Dance at the DuBois Centre.[3]

Works

The Man Who Died: Poems 1974-1979, 1984
Music for a Dream Dance, 1989
Rivers Must Flow
No Time for a Masterpiece: Poems, 1995

References

Oyekan Owomoyela (2008). The Columbia Guide to West African Literature in English Since 1945. Columbia University Press. p. 57. ISBN 978-0-231-51215-2.
Hein Willemse, 'An Interview with Kobena Eyi Acquah', English in Africa, Vol. 14, No. 2 (October 1987)
Kofi Anyidoho (1992). "Poetry as Dramatic Performance: The Ghana Experience". In Gordon Collier (ed.). Us/them: Translation, Transcription and Identity in Post-colonial Literary Cultures. Rodopi. pp. 267–9. ISBN 90-5183-394-6.
Pietro Deandrea (2002). Fertile Crossings: Metamorphoses of Genre in Anglophone West African Literature. Rodopi. pp. 152–62. ISBN 90-420-1468-7.

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[Owomoyela2008-1] Oyekan Owomoyela (2008). The Columbia Guide to West African Literature in English Since 1945. Columbia University Press. p. 57. ISBN 978-0-231-51215-2.

[Willemse-2] Hein Willemse, 'An Interview with Kobena Eyi Acquah', English in Africa, Vol. 14, No. 2 (October 1987)

[Collier1992-3] Kofi Anyidoho (1992). "Poetry as Dramatic Performance: The Ghana Experience". In Gordon Collier (ed.). Us/them: Translation, Transcription and Identity in Post-colonial Literary Cultures. Rodopi. pp. 267–9. ISBN 90-5183-394-6.

[Deandrea2002-4] Pietro Deandrea (2002). Fertile Crossings: Metamorphoses of Genre in Anglophone West African Literature. Rodopi. pp. 152–62. ISBN 90-420-1468-7.