PADMORE AGBEMABIESE

Dr. Padmore Agbemabiese is a Professor of English and African American and African Studies at Tri-C, Metro Campus, USA. In 2003, he was named the Howard Seely Scholar; in 2005, he received the Distinguished Diversity Enhancement Award for Teaching and Research at The Ohio State University, and in 2007, he was named by the African Weekender (a journal on African issues in America) as the recipient of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Award for High Academic Achievement and the Julius Nyerere Award for Community Development. Dr. Padmore Agbemabiese is a poet, a playwright and a scholar. He has published two novels, two anthologies in Ewe language of Ghana, four anthologies of poetry in English and a critical monograph on a comparative study of educational reforms in Ghana. His recent play, "Gathering Footprints Lost in the Sands of Time" was performed at the Ohio University Spring Festival of Arts on April 26, 2008 and has received the play of the year. On March 15, 2008 his new anthology of poetry in English, "The Smell of Exile" was published. "The Smell of Exile" presents insight into the acute sufferings of a people disposed, dispossessed and carnaged for daring to complain away from home. The poems unmask not only his private feelings about living in a foreign country, but also the rapture of the popular spirit of a people caught in strong whiffs of loss. In the poems, we are confronted by the tears and sorrows on our streets and challenged by a new form of poetic composition that demand performance and chanted passages that take their bearing from such art forms found in the words of his Grandmother’s Ewe musical traditions. Prof. Padmore Agbemabiese, the scholar and poet is confident and pliable in his literary craft, and uses words and emotions to expand horizons of our contemporary life. The Smell of Exile is a meticulous work with an ear for what is lively and endearing. The poems are simple stories about people, their hopes, dreams, and their indomitable spirit that clings to something mystical as they struggle to survive in a foreign culture.