Bernard Binlin Dadié (10 January 1916 – 9 March 2019) was an Ivorian novelist, playwright, poet, and administrator. Among many other senior positions, starting in 1957, he held the post of Minister of Culture in the government of Côte d'Ivoire from 1977 to 1986.

Biography

Dadié was born in Assinie, Côte d'Ivoire, and attended the local Catholic school in

Grand Bassam Grand-Bassam () is a town in southeastern Ivory Coast, lying east of Abidjan. It is a sub-prefecture of and the seat of Grand-Bassam Department; it is also a commune. During the late 19th century, Grand-Bassam was briefly the French colonial ...

and then the Ecole William Ponty. He worked for the French government in

Dakar, Senegal Dakar ( ; ; wo, Ndakaaru) (from :wo:daqaar, daqaar ''tamarind''), is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Senegal, largest city of Senegal. The city of Dakar proper has a population of 1,030,594, whereas the population of the Dakar ...

, at the Institut français d’Afrique noire, then returned to his homeland in 1947. He became part of its movement for independence. Before Côte d'Ivoire's independence in 1960, he was detained for sixteen months for taking part in demonstrations that opposed the French colonial government. In his writing, influenced by his experiences of

colonialism Colonialism is a practice or policy of control by one people or power over other people or areas, often by establishing colony, colonies and generally with the aim of economic dominance. In the process of colonisation, colonisers may impose the ...

as a child, Dadié attempts to connect the messages of traditional African folktales with the contemporary world. With Germain Coffi Gadeau and F. J. Amon d'Aby, he founded the Cercle Culturel et Folklorique de la Côte d'Ivoire (CCFCI) in 1953.Wangar Wa Nyateũ-Waigwa, in

Simon Gikandi Simon may refer to: People * Simon (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters with the given name Simon * Simon (surname), including a list of people with the surname Simon * Eugène Simon, French naturalist and the genu ...

, ed., ''Encyclopedia of African Literature''. Routledge; 2002; In 1955, he published a collection called '' The Black Cloth: A Collection of African Folktales'' (in French). Dadié was rediscovered with the release of Steven Spielberg's 1997 movie '' Amistad'' which features the music by American composer John Williams. The choral text of Dadié's poem, "Dry Your Tears, Afrika" (“Sèche Tes Pleurs“) is used for a song of the same name. Published in 1967, the poem is about coming home to Africa. Dadié was the brother of politician Hortense Aka-Anghui. He turned 100 in January 2016 and died in

Abidjan Abidjan ( , ; N’ko: ߊߓߌߖߊ߲߬) is the economic capital of the Ivory Coast. As of the 2021 census, Abidjan's population was 6.3 million, which is 21.5 percent of overall population of the country, making it the sixth most populous city p ...

in March 2019 at the age of 103.

Awards

Dadié received several awards in recognition of his literary career, with one of the last being the ''Grand Prix des Mécènes'' of the GPLA in 2016.

Main works

*''Afrique debout'' (1950) *''Légendes africaines'' (1954) *''Le pagne noir'' (1955) *''La ronde des jours'' (1956) *''Climbié'' (1956) *''Un Nègre à Paris'' (1959) *''Patron de New York'' (1964) *''Hommes de tous les continents'' (1967) *''La ville où nul ne meurt'' (1969) *''Monsieur Thôgô-Gnini'' (1970) *''Les voix dans le vent'' (1970) *''Béatrice du Congo'' (1970) *''Îles de tempête'' (1973) *''Papassidi maître-escroc'' (1975) *''Mhoi cheul'' (1979) *''Opinions d'un nègre'' (1979) *''Les belles histoires de Kacou Ananzè'' *''Commandant Taureault et ses nègres'' (1980) *''Les jambes du fils de Dieu'' (1980) *''Carnets de prison'' (1981) – details his time in prison *''Les contes de Koutou-as-Samala'' (1982) *''Escale dans le temps : le combat pour la dignité de l'Afrique'' (2017)

References

External links

Les Lignes de nos mains/The Lines of our hands by Bernard Dadie
translated by Dr. Y., Afrolegends.com and cited from ''La Ronde des Jours'' edition Pierre Seghers, 1956.

* ttp://www.unc.edu/~ottotwo/dadie.html Reviews of ''One Way: Bernard Dadie Observes America'', and ''An African in Paris'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Dadie, Bernard 1916 births 2019 deaths 20th-century dramatists and playwrights 20th-century novelists 20th-century poets 20th-century male writers Government ministers of Ivory Coast Ivorian centenarians Ivorian dramatists and playwrights Ivorian male writers Ivorian novelists Ivorian poets Male dramatists and playwrights Male novelists Male poets People from Comoé District People of French West Africa Men centenarians