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The Forest of a Thousand Daemons

byD.O. Fagunwa, Wole Soyinka (Translator)

A Hunter's Saga

Published in Nigeria in 1939, The Forest of a Thousand Daemons is the first novel be written in Yoruba. The narrative unfolds in a landscape where, true to Yoruba cosmology, human, natural and supernatural beings are compellingly and wonderfully alive at once: a world of warriors, sages and kings; magical trees and snake people; spirits, Ghommids and bog-trolls. Here are the adventures of Akara-ogun — son of a brave warrior and wicked witch — as he journeys into the forest, encountering and dealing with all-too-real unforeseen forces, engaging in dynamic spiritual and moral relationships with personifications of his fate, projections of the terrors that haunt man.

A deep tale of the spirit; a classic of the African imagination

Ben Okri, Booker Prize-winning author of The Famished Road

About D.O. Fagunwa

D.O. Fagunwa MBE (1903 -1963) was a Nigerian author who pioneered the Yoruba-language novel. He was born in Oke-Igbo, Ondo State. An Oloye of the Yoruba people, Fagunwa studied at St. Luke's School, Oke-Igbo, and St. Andrew's College, Oyo, before becoming a teacher himself. Fagunwa was the author of several novels, most of which was translated into English by the Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka. In 1955, Fagunwa was awarded the Maragaret Wong Prize and in 1959, he was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire. He died in 1963 in Nigeria.
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