Adewale Maja-Pearce

Adewale Maja-Pearce (born 1953) is an Anglo-Nigerian writer, journalist and literary critic, who is best known for his documentary essays. He is the author of several books, including the memoirs In My Father's Country and The House My Father Built (2014), several other non-fiction titles and a collection of short stories entitled Loyalties and Other Stories (1986).

Early years and education Adewale Maja-Pearce was born in London, England, to British and Yoruba parents. He grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, attending St. Gregory's College, Obalende (1965–69), and returned to Britain for further education at the University College of Wales, Swansea (BA, 1972–75), and at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University (1984–86), where he gained a Master of Arts degree in African studies.

Having returned to Nigeria, he lives in Surulere, Lagos, in a house inherited from his father, which he has written about in his 2014 memoir The House My Father Built. Maja-Pearce runs an editorial services agency called Yemaja, as well as a small publishing company, The New Gong, founded in 2005.

Writing Maja-Pearce has written in various genres, his early published work featuring short stories drawing on his Nigerian background, with his collection Loyalties and Other Stories appearing in 1986.

Most notable, however, as an essayist, he has written several non-fiction books, including the 2005 Remembering Ken Saro-Wiwa and Other Essays, which in the opinion of critic Uzor Uzoatu "affords us the opportunity of dipping into the immense world of Maja-Pearce as he, in twenty-three heartfelt essays and reviews, illuminates the benighted mores of modern Nigeria, the identity question in South Africa ... and engages with seminal minds across the world. ...This book is a treasure, a profound testament." Maja-Pearce was the editor of Christopher Okigbo's Collected Poems (1986), as well as of anthologies such as The Heinemann Book of African Poetry in English (1990) and Who's Afraid of Wole Soyinka?: Essays on Censorship (1991), and also wrote the 1998 and 1999 annual reports on human rights violations in Nigeria.

Maja-Pearce has written journalism, essays and reviews for a range of international publications, among them The New York Times, Granta, The London Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement, The London Magazine, Prospect, and the New Left Review. He became a contributing opinion writer for The International New York Times in 2013.

His 2024 book, This Fiction Called Nigeria: The Struggle for Democracy (Verso Books), which was written against the background of the 2023 elections, examining Nigeria's "crisis of democracy", is characterised by Uzor Maxim Uzoatu in The Lagos Review as "hard-hitting" and "a landmark book".

Personal life Maja-Pearce is married to the artist/activist Juliet Ezenwa.