The complete poems of Leopold Sedar Senghor, possibly Africa's most famous poet, are offered in translation for the first time in this bilingual edition. The book, representing the culmination of a lifetime of work, includes ""Lost Poems"", a collection of Senghor's earliest work. Senghor's poetry contrasts the lushness and wonder of Africa's past with the alienation and loss associated with assimilation into European culture. Co-founder of the negritude literary movement, Senghor is concerned that ways be provided for African and European cultures to enrich each other while preserving their own cultural identities. His poetry, alive with sensual imagery, reclaims his ancestral heritage and celebrates African culture. He writes with an awareness of his readers, preparing them to receive his culture and its values. With emotional power, he draws the reader deep into his world. In his introduction, translator Melvin Dixon places Senghor's writing in a historical perspective by relating it to his political inolvement. Dixon also elaborates on the ways in which the poems chronicle Senghor's own development as an intellectual, particularly on his struggles with issues of self and cultural identity. Dixon's translation preserves the integrity of Senghor's work by retaining, in the original, words and expressions unique to Senghor's African French, expressions whose meaning would be compromised in translation.

Tales of Kamanda Vol. 1 by Kama Sywor Kamanda; 41 enchanting tales by Africa's greatest story teller.Kama Sywor Kamanda has produced a dozen anthologies of poetry, several hundred stories, four novels and three plays. The imagery in his stories comes from African traditions but mixes the fantastic and the real, conjuring up memorable pictures of sunlight, dark forests, beautiful princess and fearful monsters. Born in the Congo, he published his first collection of stories in 1967 when he was 15. He helped create the Union of Congolese Writers but fled Mobutu's Congo in 1977. He was the founding president of the African Association of Writers of which Leopold Sedar Senghor was the honorary president.His works have been translated into many languages and he has earned many prizes, including the Black Africa Grand Prize for Literature, the Paul Verlaine Prize and the Theophile Gautier prize from the Academie francaise. In 2005, the International Council for Francophone Studies conferred upon him the prestigious Maurice-Cagnon Certificate of Honour, for his unique contribution to world literature in French.B OOKS OF AFRICA is also publishing children's editions of two of his stories, "Amana, the child who was a god" and "Prince Muntu". Published in collaboration with Editions DAGAN, Paris

Leopold Sedar Senghor was not only president of the Republic of Senegal from 1960 to 1981, he is also Africa's most famous poet. A cofounder of the Negritude cultural movement, he is recognized as one of the most significant figures in African literature. This bilingual edition of Senghor's complete poems made his work available for the first time to English-speaking audiences. His poetry, alive with sensual imagery, contrasts the lushness and wonder of Africa's past with the alienation and loss associated with assimilation into European culture. Translator Melvin Dixon places Senghor's writing in historical persepctive by relating it to both his political involvement and his intellectual development.