Flora Nwapa was born in 1931 and brought up at Oguta in eastern Nigeria. She was educated at Archdeacon Crowther's Memorial Girls School, Port Harcourt, CMS Girls' School, Lagos, University College Ibadan, and Edinburgh University. On her return to Nigeria, she was appointed a Woman Education Officer in Calabar and then went to Queen's School, Enugu to teach English and Geography. She was Assistant Registrar (Public Relations) at the University of Lagos until she returned to the East Central State during the crisis. At the end of the war, she was appointed a member of the East Central State Executive Council and was for a time the Commissioner for Lands, Survey and Urban Development. She was the first woman Nigerian to be published. She is the author of Idu (AWS), This is Lagos (Nwamife) and Efuru (AWS, 1966).