What a country needs to do is be fair to all its citizens - whether people are of a different ethnicity or gender.

Each of my books is different. Deliberately... I wanted to create my society, my people, in their fullness.

People from different parts of the world can respond to the same story if it says something to them about their own history and their own experience.

Presidents do not go off on leave without telling the country.

When the British came to Ibo land, for instance, at the beginning of the 20th century, and defeated the men in pitched battles in different places, and set up their administrations, the men surrendered. And it was the women who led the first revolt.

My parents were early converts to Christianity in my part of Nigeria. They were not just converts; my father was an evangelist, a religious teacher. He and my mother traveled for thirty-five years to different parts of Igboland, spreading the gospel.