Noo Saro-Wiwa is a

British-Nigerian British Nigerians are British people of Nigerians, Nigerian descent or Nigerians of British descent. This article is about residents and citizens of Nigerian descent living in Britain. Many Nigerians and their British-born descendants in Britain ...

author, noted for her travel writing. She is the daughter of

Nigerian Nigerians or the Nigerian people are citizens of Nigeria or people with ancestry from Nigeria. The name Nigeria was taken from the Niger River running through the country. This name was allegedly coined in the late 19th century by British jour ...

activist

Ken Saro-Wiwa Kenule Beeson "Ken" Saro-Wiwa (10 October 1941 – 10 November 1995) was a Nigerian writer, television producer, and environmental activist. Ken Saro-Wiwa was a member of the Ogoni people, an ethnic minority in Nigeria whose homeland, Ogonilan ...

Education

Noo Saro-Wiwa was born in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, and grew up in

Ewell Ewell ( , ) is a suburban area with a village centre in the borough of Epsom and Ewell in Surrey, approximately south of central London and northeast of Epsom. In the 2011 Census, the settlement had a population of 34,872, a majority of wh ...

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

in England. She attended

Roedean School Roedean School is an independent day and boarding school founded in 1885 in Roedean Village on the outskirts of Brighton, East Sussex, England, and governed by Royal Charter. It is for girls aged 11 to 18. The campus is situated near the Sus ...

King's College London King's College London (informally King's or KCL) is a public research university located in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of King George IV and the Duke of Wellington. In 1836, King's ...

and

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, New York, and currently lives in London.

Writing

Saro-Wiwa's first book was ''Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria'' (

Granta Books ''Granta'' is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centres on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and m ...

, 2012). It was nominated for the

Dolman Best Travel Book Award The Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards celebrate the best travel writing and travel writers in the world. The awards include the Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year and the Edward Stanford Award for Outstanding Contribution to Travel Writing ...

, and was named the ''

Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...

'' Travel Book of the Year in 2012. It was selected as

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...

's ''

Book of the Week ''Book of the Week'' is a BBC Radio 4 series that is broadcast daily on week days. Each week, extracts from the selected book, usually a non-fiction work, are read over five episodes; each fifteen-minute episode is broadcast in the morning (9:45a ...

'' in 2012, and was nominated by the ''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nik ...

'' as one of the best travel books of 2012. ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' newspaper also included it among its 10 Best Contemporary Books on Africa in 2012. It has been translated into French and Italian. In 2016 it won th
Albatros Travel Literature Prize
in Italy. In 2016, she contributed to the anthology ''An Unreliable Guide to London'' (

Influx Press Influx Press is an independent British publishing company, based in north London, founded in 2012 by Gary Budden and Kit Caless. They are known for publishing "innovative and challenging fiction, poetry and creative non-fiction from across the UK ...

), as well as ''A Country of Refuge'' (Unbound), an anthology of writing on asylum seekers. Another of her stories also featured in ''La Felicità Degli Uomini Semplici'' (66th and 2nd), an Italian-language anthology based around football. She has contributed book reviews, travel, analysis and opinion articles for ''The Guardian'', ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'', ''

The Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nikk ...

'', ''

The Times Literary Supplement ''The Times Literary Supplement'' (''TLS'') is a weekly literary review published in London by News UK, a subsidiary of News Corp. History The ''TLS'' first appeared in 1902 as a supplement to ''The Times'' but became a separate publication i ...

'', ''

City AM ''City A.M.'' is a free business-focused newspaper distributed in and around London, England, with an accompanying website. Its certified distribution was 85,738 copies a day in February 2020, according to statistics compiled by the ABC, and ha ...

'', ''

La Repubblica ''la Repubblica'' (; the Republic) is an Italian daily general-interest newspaper. It was founded in 1976 in Rome by Gruppo Editoriale L'Espresso (now known as GEDI Gruppo Editoriale) and led by Eugenio Scalfari, Carlo Caracciolo and Arnoldo ...

'', '' Prospect'' and ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''. ''

Condé Nast Traveller ''Condé Nast Traveller'' is published by Condé Nast Publications Ltd, from Vogue House in Hanover Square, Mayfair, London. It is a luxury travel magazine aimed at the upmarket, independent traveller. It can be differentiated from the America ...

'' magazine named Saro-Wiwa as one of the
30 Most Influential Female Travellers
in 2018.Michelle Jana Chan
"The World's Most Influential Women Travellers"
''Condé Nast Traveller'', 19 December 2018. She is a contributor to the 2019 anthology ''

New Daughters of Africa ''Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Words and Writings by Women of African Descent from the Ancient Egyptian to the Present'' is a compilation of orature and literature by more than 200 women from Africa and the African diaspora, ...

'', edited by

Margaret Busby Margaret Yvonne Busby, , Hon. FRSL (born 1944), also known as Nana Akua Ackon, is a Ghanaian-born publisher, editor, writer and broadcaster, resident in the UK. She was Britain's youngest and first black female book publisherJazzmine Breary"Let' ...

. She narrated the BBC documentary
Silence Would Be Treason
', broadcast 15 January 2022. The documentary includes letters sent by

to the Irish nun, Sister Majella McCarron.

Personal life

Noo Saro-Wiwa is the daughter of the Nigerian poet and environmental activist

, and her twin sister is video artist and filmmaker Zina Saro-Wiwa.

Bibliography

* ''Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria'' (

, 2012).

Selected articles

"The unexpected consequence of gorilla conservation in Uganda"
''City A.M.'', 11 December 2019.
"Phoebe Waller-Bridge on the creation of Fleabag"

"Swimming With Sharks: Hillary and Chelsea Clinton discuss their new book, Gutsy Women"

"Working-class heroine: Noo Saro-Wiwa shares insights and advice from Michelle Obama"
''TLS'', 6 December 2018.
"A land of conquest, casinos and copious wine, Georgia"
''City A.M.'', 5 July 2018.
"What's in a name? Well, the right letters would help"
''The Guardian'', 12 February 2015. * "Boko Haram: Why selfies won't 'bring back our girls'", ''Prospect'', 20 May 2014. *
Bombastic, monochrome and simplistic – and yet still I love Top Gun
, ''The Guardian'', 16 May 2016.Noo Saro-Wiwa
"Bombastic, monochrome and simplistic – and yet still I love Top Gun"
''The Guardian'', 16 May 2016.

References

External links

* *
Noo Saro-Wiwa at ''The Guardian''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saro-Wiwa, Noo 1976 births 21st-century British women writers 21st-century British writers 21st-century Nigerian women writers 21st-century Nigerian writers British travel writers British women travel writers Journalists from Rivers State Living people Nigerian emigrants to the United Kingdom Nigerian twins Ogoni people Wiwa family Writers from Port Harcourt

Education

Writing

Personal life

Bibliography

Selected articles

See Also

References

External links