Nigeria, March 29 -- I met Ngugi wa Thiong'o at Bard College in upstate New York during Chinua Achebe's 70th birthday. Every literature star from across the globe was there. Here are some of those present: KA Appiah, John Ashbery, Don Burness, Chinweizu, Johnetta Cole, Jayne Cortez, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Joseph Duffey, Michael Eric Dyson, Nuruddin Farah, Henry Louis Gates Jr, Nadine Gordimer, Michael Harper, CL Innes, Bernth Lindfors, Norman Manea, Ali Mazrui, Toni Morrison, Micere Mugo, Gil Noble, Emmanuel Obiechina, Charles Ogletree, Sonia Sanchez, Ruth Simmons, Richard Sklar, Wole Soyinka, Ekwueme Michael Thelwell, Ngugi wa Thiong'o, and John Edgar Wideman.

Of all of them, it was Ngugi who I wanted to meet. And I did meet him, surrounde...