'She Is An Agbaya' - Akwaeke Emezi Replies Chimamanda Adichie's Three-Part Essay

The three-part essay written by renowned Nigerian writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, addressing alleged attacks on her by two writers, has continued to generate different reactions on social media.

In the essay, Adichie spoke about two unnamed writers who attended her Lagos writing workshop. She spoke about the first writer, stating that she interacted with her because she was young, bright, and had shown interest in feminism.

Chimamanda Adichie

According to Adichie, the unnamed writer would later insult her on social media owing to the comment she made about transgenders in a 2017 interview.

The 'Purple Hibiscus' writer added that if the writer had a problem with her, it was fair enough that the writer should have given her a call owing to the personal relationship they had.

Adichie said that the second unnamed writer took a swipe at her, calling her a murderer for her opinion on the transgender interview.

Although no name was mentioned, it is widely speculated that the first unnamed writer is Akwaeke Emezi, a non-binary transgender who identifies with they/them pronouns.

Akwaeke Emezi | Source: Instagram

Emezi had in 2020, criticized Adichie’s defense of J.K. Rowling’s essay on gender from last summer, in which Rowling doubled down on past transphobic comments. Adichie had called the essay “a perfectly reasonable piece.”

Although Emezi said they will neither read nor give a response to Adichie's ‘IT IS OBSCURE: A TRUE REFLECTION IN THREE PARTS’ essay, but they were later to say that Adichie did not take permission from them before putting their personal Emails on the essay.

They also went further by calling Adichie an 'agbaya'.