Gabriel Okara- Timeline

1921 -----> Gabriel Imomotimi Gbaingbain Okara was born on 24 April at Bumoundi in Yenogoa Local Government Area of Rivers State in the Ijio country of the Niger Delta in Nigeria.

1926-

1936 -----> He was educated at St. Peter’s and Proctor’s Memorial School

1935-

1940 -----> Studied at Government College of Umuahia

1941-

1944 -----> Gabriel worked for British Airways

1952 -----> His short story ‘The Iconoclast” won the first prize in the British Council.

1953 -----> He was awarded the silver cup for the best entry in poetry for his work “The Call of the River Nun” at the Nigerian Festival of Arts.

1959 -----> Got a certificate in comparative journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

1964 -----> He became a part-time lecturer in English at the University of Nigeria at Enugu.

1964 -----> The Voice novel was published.

Since

1964 -----> He remained head of the Eastern (primarily Igbo) Region Government Information Office.

1967-

1969 -----> He served as director of the Cultural Affairs Division of the Biafran Ministry of Information.

1970 -----> He became the principal secretary to the governor of Rivers State.

1973-

1975 -----> He was general manager of the Rivers State Broadcasting Corporation and retired.

1977-

1983-----> He was writer-in-residence for the Rivers State Council on Arts and Culture.

1979 -----> He won the Commonwealth Poetry Prize for The Fisherman’s Invocation.

1982 -----> He was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Port Harcourt in Rivers State.

1980 ----> His target audience became the children and teenagers of Nigeria.

1990 ----> He published folktales and myths that have enriched Nigerian and African children’s literature.