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Flora Nwapa is known as the Mother of modern African literature; she was the first internationally published African woman writer in English and the first African female publisher. Her highly praised novels Efuru (1966) and Idu (1970) were published in the Heinemann African Writers Series, while her later novels Women are Different (1986) and One is Enough (1986) were initially published in Nigeria, later republished through Africa World Press, Inc in the United States. Through Never Again (1975), Flora Nwapa became the first female African writer of war novels, insightful stories of the horrors of civil war. Her last novel The Lake Goddess (2017), posthumously published by Tana Press, is acclaimed as one of Flora Nwapa’s literary masterpieces, bound to become a classic. Talented in many genres, Flora Nwapa also wrote short stories This is Lagos and other Stories (1971), Wives at War and Other Stories (1980), poems Cassava Song and Rice Song (1986) as well as plays Conversations (1993) and The First Lady (1993). Through children’s books, such as Emeka - Driver’s Guard (1972), Mammywater (1979), and Journey to Space and Other Stories (1980), Flora Nwapa also told stories for future generations.

Flora Nwapa was born in 1931 in Oguta, Nigeria. After graduating from University College Ibadan and University of Edinburgh, she taught at Queen’s School Enugu and then University of Lagos, where she was also appointed Assistant Registrar. At the end of the Nigerian Civil War, she served in the Executive Council of Eastern Nigeria until 1975. In 1977 she established a printing and publishing company, Tana Press Ltd. In addition to writing and publishing, she was a visiting professor in creative writing at the University of Maiduguri, and she also spoke at numerous conferences in Africa, Europe and the United States. In 1983, she received the Nigerian national honor of Officer of the Order of the Niger (O.O.N) for literature and in 1992 she received a Medal of Honor from Imo State. Flora Nwapa passed away in 1993 in Enugu and is buried in Oguta. She was survived by her husband and three children.

After fleeing from Enugu, Onitsha, Port Harcourt and Elele, I was thoroughly tired of life. Yet how tenaciously could one hold on to life when death was around the corner! Death was too near for comfort in Biafra. And for us who had known no danger of this kind before, it was hell on earth. I meant to live at all costs. I meant to see the end of the war. Dying was terrible. I wanted to live so that I could tell my friends on the other side what it meant to be at war - a civil war at that, a war that was to end all wars. I wanted to tell them that reading it in books was nothing at all; they just would not understand it. I understood it. I heard the deadly whine of shells. No books taught us this. And no teachers made us hear shells when they taught us about the numerous wars staged in Western Europe and America. But they couldn’t have made us hear shelling. They had not heard it themselves. Their teachers had not heard it either.

When for two weeks in Port Harcourt we heard nothing but the angry booming of our gun-boat amidst a savage orchestra of exploding shell and rockets and the sound of small arms, I knew the game was up. I had told Chudi that Port Harcourt was in great danger, and would fall at any time. This was about two months before it actually fell. He was so upset that he threatened to hand me over to the Civil Defenders or the Militia. But I had never seen him so angry.

I laughed a mirthless laugh. Quietly, I said, ‘Calabar fell ages ago. Calabar is forgotten. Port Harcourt will fall, and when it falls, it will be forgotten as well. This is Biafra. I have heard so much about Biafra. I did not hear so much about Nigeria when I was a Nigerian.’

The door opened after a few minutes and someone came in with my husband. He had not gone to call the Civil Defenders, I thought, almost collapsing. I managed to move forward and saw that it was our good friend Kal. Kal had been very strange of late. He was so pro-Biafra that I began to be scared of him. But he was not the type to take me to the Civil Defenders. He still had good sense in him. He sat down and I gave him something to drink. It was vodka. How strange. That was all I could get from the shop - vodka. Every other thing had gone. Vodka was not popular in this part of the world.

He meant what he said. I was afraid, genuinely afraid. He believed in Biafra. I had believed too. But that was long ago. I remembered the day, Chudi had gone to Port Harcourt for the assignment. I was alone with the children, and Bee had come to see me. She had returned from Lagos and had not found a job yet, so she was threatening to go back to Lagos. The Biafra was declared and she raced back to Lagos, then back to Enugu in confusion. Bee was there, and Kal was there. Kal was running after Bee then, though he was married. That day, long long ago Biafra was declared. We stood and heard our national anthem, and the speech. It was six in the morning. The anthem was inspiring. Everything then was inspiring.

The good news. Our gallant mercenary who was supposed dead was alive. We had just received sophisticated weapons from Europe. The name of the donor was top secret. ‘But that was no news,’ I thought, but controlled myself. I had my children to look after so I didn’t want to be detained. Kal meant every word he said.

On arrival at Ugwuta we told our people we were home for the week-end. We dared not tell them that Port Harcourt was under siege. We would be called saboteurs. That evening Kal came to see us. Kal returned before us? Wonders will never end in Biafra then, anything was possible. I asked my sister in-law when Kal had returned, and was told that he had returned on Thursday. The day my husband threatened to hand me over to the Civil Defenders. The day Kal came to us with the good news.

About five months later, our home was threatened. Ugwuta was threatened. It was not possible. How could that be? If Ugwuta could be threatened, then that was the end not only of the war, but of the world. It was just impossible. Absolutely impossible. The Woman of the Lake would not allow it. She had never allowed the conquest of Ugwuta by water or by land or by air.

To make sure that Ugwuta would not fall, the people, as early as the beginning of the war, had sacrificed a white ram to the Woman of the Lake. I was in Ugwuta then. The Dibia had come from far away. Nobody knew from where. Only the Divisional Officer and the army officer who brought him knew. It was kept top secret. People saw the Dibia on the Lake. That was no secret. He sacrificed in the River Niger and in the creeks of Port Harcourt. These two places had fallen. But Ugwuta will not fall. I was sure of that. I kept on telling myself that Ugwuta will not fall; though I was afraid.

It was September and I was working. There was nothing to do actually. In the morning, when we came to work we went to look for something to eat. It took about two hours. Then we returned and talked of the war. On this occasion a girl civil defender mounted the rostrum. She had good news to tell us and we were very eager to listen. In spite of everything I wanted to hear good news. She was at the S&T that morning, and one of the officers had told her that Lagos and Ibadan were being shelled. Lagos had been shelled from the sea in the early hours of the morning, while Ibadan was being shelled from Lagos. Gowon had protested to one of the embassies, she did not know which one. As a matter of fact Lagos was being evacuated.

Good news indeed. I knew Lagos very well. And I was angry. Why do they keep telling us this kind of story? Before we fled from Port Harcourt we had heard that our boys had made a bomb which could sink Lagos in under twenty-four hours. They had wanted to use it, but out Military Governor, Ojukwu, had begged them not to. The boys could not be restrained any longer. In fact, they were now getting ready to use the bomb.

I returned from work one evening and Chudi said he’d tuned into the BBC. According to the radio station, Lagos was preparing an amphibious attack on Ugwuta, the gateway to the Uli airstrip. I developed diarrhoea immediately. I went to the toilet twice before I sat down to absorb the news quietly and reflect on the implications. I took it very seriously. I called my mother-in-law and told her. She was angry. ‘Are they coming tomorrow?’ she asked.

‘Then please leave me in peace. They will not come. It is just empty talk. They cannot come by water. Never in the history of Ugwuta did an invader come by water and go home alive. So my mother told me. And nothing that my mother told me has yet been proved false. You are children. Trust in God. Trust in the Woman of the Lake. She has never let people down. She is our goddess.’

I was not satisfied with this. To me God did not intervene in the affairs of Nigeria and Biafra. God had nothing at all to do with it. Not long ago in Nigeria we prayed to one God. Now we had two gods: The god of Nigeria and the god of Biafra. So I went to see my own mother. She listened to me and when I finished she told me there was no need to panic. All would be well, I seemed to forget that there was a God.

‘Wait, my daughter. I know we are getting old. But listen to me first. You can do whatever you like to do after. But first of all listen to me. God is alive. God has been protecting us ever since we were born. And He will continue to protect us. We have been praying to Him and He can’t give a deaf ear to our prayers…’

‘But that is exactly what He has done. Please leave God alone. He has nothing to do with this. You said this in Onitsha when I told you that Enugu was threatened. You remained in Onitsha until the last day. You lost everything. What I am telling you, what I have come to tell you is to start making preparations for evacuation. We would like to be together and die together when death comes. If the Vandals meet us at home, none of us will be alive. And even if they are wiped out in under an hour we can never come back here again until the war ends. And when will it end?’

‘I think we should start getting our things together,’ my mother said. ‘Who want to leave his home for the Nigerians? But if we are forced to leave, we shall have no alternative. I am going to start packing myself.’ I could see that she took in what I said to her. I could see that her waist was bulging. She had wrapped her trinkets round her waist. And she was very worried indeed. My mother-in-law kept on saying that nothing would happen. And I was forced to talk.

‘I am not praying that anything should happen. That the Vandals should invade us. Far from it. But if they do come, what are we going to do? You have to prepare yourself. We are all agreed that nobody should remain behind. And woe betide anybody who remains behind. When the time comes to run nobody will tell you. The time has not yet come.’

The next days were dominated by painful uncertainty. Chudi returned one day to say that all able-bodied men had been asked to report at the school hall. And he was going. He did not like meetings, but he said he would go because he did not want to be misunderstood. I said I would go with him. So at the scheduled time we were at the school hall. To our disappointment, it was Kal who had called the meeting. There were a few men and women there as well. They were the old politicians. I did not like them. To my way of thinking they caused the war. And they were now in the forefront again directing the war. The women especially were very active, more active than the men in fact. They made uniforms for the soldiers, they cooked for the soldiers and gave expensive presents to the officers. And they organised the women who prayed every Wednesday for Biafra. In return for these services, they were rewarded with special war reports exclusive to them and them alone.

It was one of the prominent women who addressed the gathering of the men - mostly young men in their twenties and thirties. She was not quite forty years old and had four boys who were below fifteen years of age. Chudi did not like her at all because of a raw deal he had with her before the war. But she was so powerful then that people were very careful not to offend her. In short she was highly respected, feared, and hated. We had no alternative but to listen to her.