Africa's Tarnished Name

He needed to hear Africa speak for itself after a lifetime of hearing Africa spoken about by others.

Electrifying essays on the history, complexity, diversity of a continent, from the father of modern African literature.

Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson.

There are essays radical and inspiring; poems moving and disturbing; stories surreal and fabulous; taking us from the deep South to modern Japan, New York's underground scene to the farthest reaches of outer space.

View the full Penguin Modern series