John Nkemngong Nkengasong

• Name — John Nkemngong Nkengasong • Birthplace — Lewoh, British Cameroon • Occupation — Writer, professor • Education — Seat of Wisdom College Fontem, University of Yaounde 1 • Genre — Novels, Plays, Poetry and non-fiction • Spouse — Efuet Awung Walburga • Children — Marion Nkengasong Nkengasong and Etienndem Njilife Nkengasong • Awards — “Honorary Fellow in Writing”, University of Iowa 2008 "EkoPrize for Literature" 2013 "Knight of the Cameroon Order of Valour" 2016

Nkengasong spent part of his early childhood in his native Lewoh, a polity within the larger Nweh tribe of the Lebialem Division of the Southwest Region of Cameroon. The countryside's craggy and verdant scenery and its splendid culture are richly represented in his writing. In 1971 he completed primary school and enrolled in Our Lady Seat of Wisdom College Fontem. At that formative age, he became conscious of the centrality of literary creativity in human experience and he began writing poems some of which were published in the college magazine. After graduating from High School, he read English at the then University of Yaounde, specializing in English Literature while taking elective courses in Theatre Arts. Between 1979 and 1982, the years of his undergraduate studies, he wrote poems some of which were published in The Mould, a journal of creative writing founded by Bole Butake and in The New Horizons, another journal of creative and critical writing founded by Tala Kashim Ibrahim. With a Bachelor of Arts degree in English obtained in 1982, he registered in the second cycle of the Higher Teacher Training College, University of Yaounde, graduating in 1984 as a High School teacher. While he taught in High School, he pursued graduate studies, earning a “Maitrise” in 1985 and in 1993, a “Doctorat de Troisième Cycle” degree from the University of Yaounde. He was recruited as an Assistant Lecturer at the University of Yaounde 1 in 2000, and in 2004 he obtained a PhD in English Literary Studies. The university offered him fertile grounds to explore his burgeoning creative talents, leading to the publication of several plays, prose works, poetry and essays which have sought for him national as well as international acclaim. Before his demise, he was a professor of Literature and Cultural Studies at the University of Yaounde 1 and also the Head Of Department ¨HOD¨ in the University Of Buea in the South West region of Cameroon. Apart from his creative works, he published extensively on African Literature and Culture, British and Postcolonial Literatures and Cameroonian Pidgin. Nkengasong died on 11 June 2023, at the age of 64.

• God was African. Langaa RPCIG, 2015. • Achakasara. NMI Education, 2011. • The Widow's Might. Editions CLE, 2006. • Across the Mongolo. Spectrum Books Limited, 2004. • “Kakamba” in The Spirit Machine and other Stories. CCC Press, 20

• A Madding Generation. Miraclaire Publishing, 2012. • Njogobi Festival Miraclaire Publishing, 2011. • Ancestral Earth. Langaa RPCIG, 2010. • The Call of Blood. Langaa RPCIG, 2010. • Black Caps and Red Feathers. Patron Publishing House, 2001.

• Letters to Marion (And the Coming Generations) Langaa RPCIG, 2009. • "Ghost Towns" and other poems in Journal of New Poetry 4. The International Research Confederacy of African Literature and Culture, Lulu inc., 2007.

• John Nkemngong Nkengasong: The Naked Muse: Echoes from a Writer's Soul. International Writing Program Archive of Resident's Work, 17 October 2008