As a writer, playwright, journalist and lecturer Ngugi wa Thiong'o has been widely regarded as East Africa's most influential writer. His criticism of colonial rule, Christianity and post colonial abuses earned him as much admiration from the public as trouble from Kenya's authorities. Ngugi, as he is usually known, belongs to Kenya's largest ethnic group, the Kikuyu’s.

Ngugi burst onto the literary scene in East Africa with the performance of his first major play, The Black Hermit, at the National Theatre in Kampala, Uganda, in 1962. In a highly productive literary period, Ngugi published and wrote stories, plays, novels, and a Sunday newspaper column. His most famous novels are Weep Not Child (1964), The River Between (1965) the Grain of Wheat (1967) and Petals of Blood (1977).