15 March — It’s the birthday of Ben Okri, author of The Famished Road, who said, “Literature doesn’t have a country. Shakespeare is an African writer. … The characters of Turgenev are ghetto dwellers. Dickens’ characters are Nigerians. … Literature may come from a specific place, but it always lives in its own unique kingdom.”

He also said, “Beware of the stories you read or tell; subtly, at night, beneath the waters of consciousness, they are altering your world.”