Bernard Binlin Dadié

Dadié was born in Assinie, Côte d'Ivoire, and attended the local Catholic school in Grand Bassam and then the Ecole William Ponty.

Before Côte d'Ivoire's independence in 1960, he was detained for sixteen months for taking part in demonstrations that opposed the French colonial government.

[1] In his writing, influenced by his experiences of colonialism as a child, Dadié attempts to connect the messages of traditional African folktales with the contemporary world.

With Germain Coffi Gadeau and F. J. Amon d'Aby, he founded the Cercle Culturel et Folklorique de la Côte d'Ivoire (CCFCI) in 1953.

Dadié was rediscovered with the release of Steven Spielberg's 1997 movie Amistad[4] which features the music by American composer John Williams.