By Claire
Armitstead
The title of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s
award-winning novel comes from the flag of Biafra, embodying the breakaway
state’s hopes during the brief three years of its existence in the Nigerian
civil war. As one of her central characters, Olanna, explains to a group of
schoolchildren: “Red was the blood of the siblings massacred in the north,
black was for mourning them, green was for the prosperity Biafra would have,
and, finally, the half of a yellow sun stood for the glorious future.”
