YORUBA BOY RUNNING

''A true artist. A brilliant writer. An original thinker'' Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Yoruba Boy Running charts Samuel Ajayi Crowther''s miraculous journey from slave to liberator, boy to man, running to resisting

''Run, Ajayi, run!''

The day the Malian slave traders invaded the Nigerian town of Osogun, thirteen-year-old Ajayi''s life was split in two.

Before, there was his childhood, surrounded by friends and family, watched over by the ancient Yoruba gods of forest and water, earth and sky. After: capture, slavery - and release, into the service of a new god, his own culture left far behind. So Ajayi becomes Samuel Crowther - missionary, linguist, minister - and abolitionist: driven to negotiate against his own people to end the miserable trade in human beings which destroyed his family.

Drawing on the prolific writings of Samuel Ajayi Crowther, Biyi Bandele has created a many-voiced, kaleidoscopic portrait of an extraordinary man. From theheart-stopping drama of Ajayi''s last day of freedom to the farcical intrigue of the Osogun court; from a meeting with Queen Victoria; to his consecration as the first African Bishop of the Anglican Church, his journey, like all great odysseys, circles back to where he began. By turns witty, moving and quietly political, Biyi Bandele''s reimagining of Crowther''s life is a brilliant tour de force.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION FROM WOLE SOYINKA