Manuscript of Things Fall Apart, which later became the first published novel of the late Professor Chinua Achebe could have been lost forever but for the benevolence of a British broadcaster who eventually rescued it in London. And had he lost the manuscript, Achebe himself said that his writing career, which later launched him into global reckoning, would have equally been ended as far back as 1956.
In his last and most controversial book, There Was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra, Achebe had dispelled rumours that he allegedly lost the manuscript to a Camerounian researcher who later moved it to his home country in Africa. According to Achebe, shortly after completing the novel in 1956, he naively sent the raw (hand-written manuscript) to some typists in England to transform it into an acceptable manuscript for publishing. But that after paying for the service, the typists refused to contact him even after writing several letters to them.
He almost
lost hope when one of his former colleagues at the then Nigeria Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) offered to assist him. Said Achebe in the book: ‘What I did next, in retrospect, was quite naïve, even foolish. I put my handwritten documents together, went to the post office, and had them parcel the only copy of the manuscript I had to the London address of the higly recommended typing agency that was in the business of manuscript preparation. A letter came from this agency after a few weeks.
They confirmed that they had received my document and wrote that the next thing I should do was to send them 32 pounds, which was the cost of producing my manuscript. Now, 32 pounds was a lot of money in 1956, and a significant slice of my salary, but I was encouraged by the fact that I had received this information, this feedback, and that the people sounded as if they were going to be of great value to me. So I sent off the payment as instructed.’’ But after sending the money, Achebe was faced with disappointment as he never heard any information from England again. His words ‘What happened next was a near catastrophe.
The typing agency, obviously having received the money I sent, went silent. One week passed, then two, three, four, five, six weeks, and I began to panic. I wrote two letters inquiring about the status of the manuscript preparation and I got no answer.’ Meanwhile, Achebe had no choice but to complain to one of his colleagues, a Briton, who was about to travel to England then. He recollected how Ms Angela Beattie, a former BBC Talks producer, was seconded to NBC as head of Talks, which he (Achebe) produced. Beattie later asked for the name and address of the agency and while on her vacation in London, she visited them and requested for Achebe’s manuscript. Explained Achebe ‘She (Beattie) arrived at the offices of the typing agency and asked to speak with the manager, who showed up swiftly.
Angela Beattie asked the manager sternly what she had done with the manuscript that her colleague in Lagos Nigeria had sent. Here, right before them, armed with a threat, was a well-connected woman who could really make trouble for them. The people there were surprised and shaken. ‘Now, Iam going back to Nigeria in three weeks,’’ Angela Beattie said as she left the agency’s office, ‘And when I get there, let us hope that the manuscript you took money to prepare has been received by its owner, or else you will hear more about it.’ A few weeks later I received the handsome package in the mail. It was my manuscript. I look back now at those events and state categorically that had the manuscript been lost I most certainly would have been irreversibly discouraged from continuing my writing career.’’
However, another version of the possible loss of the manuscript had it that the legendary writer was never in possession of the manuscript of the novel before dying. In a recent interview with Professor Remi Raji-Oyelade, Dean of the Faculty of Arts, University of Ibadan, it was learnt that Achebe had allegedly lost the manuscript of Things Fall Apart to a Cameroonian researcher many years ago in America, and that the researcher who was Achebe’s student never returned the script to the owner. According to Raji-Oyelade who claimed that he learnt about the loss of the manuscript five years ago in America, the story had it that Achebe, out of his generosity and willingness to assist younger scholars and researchers, innocently released the manuscript of Things Fall Apart to his student who hailed from Cameroon.
The latter promised to return it but he never did and that he (the student) has since moved the manuscript to Cameroon. Said Raji-Oyelade ‘There is need for us Nigerian writers and maybe the Achebe’s family to find out where the original script of Achebe’s Things Fall Apart is. This issue made a row at a conference that I attended in the United States a few years back. The story was that a graduate Cameroonian student who was working on archival materials came to Achebe to collect the manuscript and that out of his generosity, Achebe gave him the script but he never returned it.
The story went on that the script has been moved from the United States to Cameroon. I’ve heard that story five years ago, and perhaps the best person to ask now is Achebe’’s son, Ike’’
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