The Revolution Will Be a Poetic ACT: African Culture and Decolonization

This book is a collection of essays and speeches by Mário Pinto de Andrade, the Angolan literary critic, cultural theorist and political activist and one of Africa’s most important 20th century intellectuals. His writings think through the task of intellectual emancipation of colonized people, which he saw as predicated on the necessary project of political decolonization. As anti-colonial movements got underway, Andrade wrote extensively about the urgent necessity for Africans to turn away from European cultural and political models, arguing that communities emerging from colonization should focus on voices from within the designated communities, on self-representation, and on horizontal relationships among Black, African, and decolonizing peoples.

Andrade played a key role in theorizing the international reach of the revolutionary 20th century poetry and literature, Black cultural vindication, and African liberation. In his ethical commitment to moving away from focusing solely on the relationship between the colonial occupier and the colonized, he instead promoted ideas and actions that would construct mutual understanding among decolonizing communities. Andrade’s work offers models to rethink race and nation as analytic categories and is particularly relevant not only to scholars of African decolonization movements but to anyone engaged in contemporary conversations about race, belonging, and political community.

Mário Pinto de Andrade (1928-1990) was an Angolan poet, theorist, critic, and politician who wrote widely about national independence for colonized peoples.
Lanie Millar is Associate Professor of Romance Languages at the University of Oregon.