A Mouth Sweeter Than Salt: An African Memoir

Winner of the President’s Distinguished Leadership and Scholarship Award from the Association of Third World Studies and the E.J. Alagoa prize from the West African Oral History Association A Mouth Sweeter Than Salt gathers the stories and reflections of the early years of Toyin Falola, the grand historian of Africa and one of the greatest sons of Ibadan, the notable Yoruba city-state in Nigeria. Redefining the autobiographical genre altogether, Falola miraculously weaves together personal, historical, and communal stories, along with political and cultural developments in the period immediately preceding and following Nigeria’s independence, to give us a unique and enduring picture of the Yoruba in the midtwentieth century. This is truly a literary memoir, told in language rich with proverbs, poetry, song, and humor. Falola’s book is far more than the story of one man’s childhood experiences; rather, he presents us with the riches of an entire culture and community - its history, traditions, pleasures, mysteries, household arrangements, forms of power, struggles, and transformations.