Her first play was staged when she was a student. Ama Ata Aidoo wrote The Dilemma of a Ghost while at the University of Ghana, and it was performed in 1964 and published in 1965, making her one of the first African women dramatists to be published. She spent the next six decades writing about African women in ways nobody had before.
Abeadzi Kyiakor
Aidoo was born in 1940 at Abeadzi Kyiakor, in Ghana’s Central Region. Her father was a chief, and she grew up in a royal household. Her father believed in education for girls, and she attended Wesley Girls’ High School in Cape Coast before going to the University of Ghana.
The Dilemma of a Ghost
The Dilemma of a Ghost tells the story of a Ghanaian man who returns from America with an African American wife. The clash between her and his family explores race, culture and belonging. It remains widely studied in schools and universities.
Our Sister Killjoy
Her 1977 novel Our Sister Killjoy follows a young Ghanaian woman travelling in Europe. Written in a mix of prose and poetry, it is a sharp critique of colonialism and of African intellectuals seduced by the West.
Changes
Her novel Changes: A Love Story, published in 1991, follows Esi, an educated woman in Accra who leaves her husband and becomes the second wife of another man. It explores marriage, independence and polygamy in modern Ghana. It won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for the best book in the Africa region.
Minister of education
In 1982 Aidoo was appointed Secretary for Education in the PNDC government. She resigned after about eighteen months, frustrated that she could not achieve her goals of making education free and accessible. She later lived for some years in Zimbabwe.
Teacher and mentor
Aidoo taught at universities in Ghana and abroad, including in the United States. She founded the Mbaasem Foundation to support African women writers.
Her death
Ama Ata Aidoo died on 31 May 2023. Tributes came from writers across Africa and beyond. She is remembered as a pioneer of African feminist writing who refused to accept that African women’s lives were a side story.
When she started, African literature was largely written by men about men. Aidoo wrote women who argued, travelled, chose and refused. The shelves of African literature look different because of her.
