Around 1980, Nigerian writer Ken Saro-Wiwa was photographed at his home in Surrey, United Kingdom, with his twin daughters, Zina Saro-Wiwa and Noo Saro-Wiwa. Zina appears on the left, while Noo stands on the right. The photograph preserves an intimate family moment from a period when the sisters were growing up in Britain, years before they became recognised figures in contemporary art and literature.
Ken Saro-Wiwa would later become internationally known for his writing and campaign for the rights of the Ogoni people in the Niger Delta. His daughters followed different professional paths. Zina became a multidisciplinary artist, filmmaker and curator, while Noo established herself as an author and travel writer. Both have explored questions of Nigerian identity, family history and the country’s relationship with the wider world through their work.
The photograph is therefore more than a record of a father with his children. It offers a glimpse into the family life of a writer whose public career became closely connected to Nigeria’s environmental and human rights history, while introducing two daughters who developed creative identities of their own.
Ken Saro-Wiwa and His Family in Britain
Ken Saro-Wiwa was born on 10 October 1941 in Bori, in present-day Rivers State. He became one of Nigeria’s best-known writers, television producers, businessmen and environmental campaigners. His literary works and public activities brought attention to the experiences of the Ogoni people and the environmental problems affecting their homeland.
Although his public life became closely associated with Nigeria, his family also spent important years in the United Kingdom. His twin daughters, Zina and Noo, were born in 1976 in Port Harcourt and raised largely in England. Their family moved from Nigeria to Ewell, Surrey, when they were very young.
The photograph taken around 1980 belongs to this period of their childhood. It shows Ken with the twins at home, providing a visual record of their family life in Britain.
The sisters later attended Roedean School in Sussex. Their educational experiences in Britain formed part of their upbringing, although both retained connections to Nigeria through their family background and subsequent work.
In an interview with The Guardian Nigeria in 2018, Noo spoke about growing up in England and visiting Nigeria during school holidays. She recalled travelling between the two countries as a child and described how those experiences influenced her understanding of travel and belonging.
Her recollections provide a personal perspective on the childhood represented in the Surrey photograph. They also show how growing up between Nigeria and Britain became an important part of her later writing.
Zina Saro-Wiwa: Artist, Filmmaker and Curator
Zina Saro-Wiwa developed a career in contemporary art, film and cultural research. Her work explores environmentalism, identity, indigeneity and the relationship between people and the places they inhabit.
She studied Economic and Social History at the University of Bristol. Before moving fully into contemporary art, she worked for more than a decade as a freelance BBC producer, presenter and reporter.
Her transition into art began around 2010. She increasingly used video, photography, sound, performance and installation to examine questions connected to her family history and the Niger Delta.
EXPLORE: Nigerian Civil War
Zina’s artistic practice has developed beyond conventional filmmaking. Her projects bring together visual storytelling, research, food, cultural memory and environmental concerns. Through these different approaches, she examines how communities understand their land, traditions and relationship with political and economic power.
Her work has received international attention and has been presented through exhibitions and cultural institutions. She has also developed projects that connect contemporary art with the experiences of communities in the Niger Delta.
Zina’s work is particularly significant because it approaches environmental questions through culture and artistic expression. Rather than treating the Niger Delta only as an area affected by oil pollution, her projects explore its cultural traditions, ecological knowledge and creative possibilities.
The Mangrove Arts Foundation
One of Zina’s major initiatives is the Mangrove Arts Foundation, which she founded to support cultural and environmentally focused projects in the Niger Delta.
The foundation uses art, research, food and storytelling to encourage new ways of engaging with the region. Its work responds to the environmental challenges affecting the Niger Delta while recognising the area’s artistic traditions and cultural resources.
The organisation’s approach reflects Zina’s belief that environmental restoration and cultural development should be considered together. Its projects create opportunities for artists, farmers, cooks, writers, historians and other community members to contribute to conversations about the region’s future.
The foundation also draws inspiration from Ken Saro-Wiwa’s legacy. His campaign for Ogoni rights and environmental protection remains an important reference point for its work.
Through this initiative, Zina has developed a way of connecting her professional interests with the history of her family and the region from which she comes.
Her activities demonstrate that the legacy of a public figure can continue through different forms of cultural work. In her case, artistic practice and environmental engagement provide a means of exploring issues that were central to her father’s activism.
Noo Saro-Wiwa: The Writer Behind Looking for Transwonderland
Noo Saro-Wiwa followed a different creative path. She became an author, journalist and travel writer, developing a career through literary writing and contributions to international publications.
She attended King’s College London and later studied at Columbia University in New York. Her academic and professional experiences helped shape her interest in travel, identity and the relationship between personal memory and national history.
Her first book, Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria, was published by Granta Books in 2012.
The book follows her journey through Nigeria as she revisits the country of her birth and explores its landscapes, cities, people and everyday experiences. It combines travel writing with reflections on family history, belonging, religion, politics and the difficulties of understanding a country through personal experience.
The journey was particularly meaningful because Noo had spent much of her childhood in Britain and had complicated memories of returning to Nigeria during school holidays. Her book examines the distance between the country she remembered and the one she encountered as an adult.
Rather than presenting Nigeria through a single description, she writes about its diversity and contradictions. Her observations move between humour, affection, criticism and personal reflection.
The book received considerable recognition after publication. It was selected as BBC Radio 4’s Book of the Week in 2012 and named The Sunday Times Travel Book of the Year that year. It was also included by The Guardian among its ten best contemporary books on Africa in 2012.
The book was shortlisted for the Authors’ Club Dolman Travel Book of the Year Award in 2013. It was later translated into French and Italian and won Italy’s Albatros Travel Literature Prize in 2016.
These achievements established Noo as an important voice in contemporary travel writing.
Beyond Looking for Transwonderland
Noo continued to develop her writing career after the success of her first book. She contributed travel articles, reviews, opinion pieces and analysis to publications including The Guardian, The Financial Times and The Times Literary Supplement.
Her second book, Black Ghosts: A Journey Into the Lives of Africans in China, was published by Canongate in 2023. It examines the experiences of African communities in China, particularly the lives of people who have travelled there for trade and business.
The book expands her interest in movement, identity and the experiences of people living between different cultures. It also demonstrates her willingness to investigate subjects beyond Nigeria while maintaining an interest in African experiences across the world.
In 2025, Black Ghosts received the Edward Stanford Travel Book of the Year award, adding another significant recognition to her writing career.
Noo has also continued working as a journalist and travel writer. Her professional life shows how the personal curiosity that informed Looking for Transwonderland developed into a broader examination of migration, culture and global relationships.
Her writing remains distinct from her father’s literary and political work, even though both have explored Nigerian society and the experiences of people affected by larger political and economic forces.
The Sisters and Their Father’s Legacy
Zina and Noo have developed different professional identities, but both have addressed aspects of their family history and their relationship with Nigeria.
Their father, Ken Saro-Wiwa, became internationally recognised for his campaign against environmental destruction in Ogoniland. As the leader of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People, he advocated for environmental protection, political recognition and the rights of his community.
His activism brought him into conflict with the military government of General Sani Abacha. Following a controversial trial, he was executed alongside eight other Ogoni men on 10 November 1995. The group became known as the Ogoni Nine.
His death had a lasting effect on his family and became an important part of the sisters’ personal histories. Both have spoken and written about the challenges of growing up with a father whose public life became internationally significant and whose death attracted worldwide attention.
Noo’s writing has explored the relationship between family memory and her experience of Nigeria. Zina has used artistic practice to examine her father’s environmental concerns, her own relationship with the Niger Delta and the wider questions surrounding identity and place.
Their work should not be understood simply as an extension of their father’s activism. Each has established an independent career and developed distinct interests. Nevertheless, their family history remains an important part of the context through which audiences understand some of their creative projects.
Zina’s Continued Cultural Work in the Niger Delta
Zina’s relationship with the Niger Delta has become increasingly central to her work. Her projects have explored the region through artistic research, cultural activities and environmental engagement.
In addition to the Mangrove Arts Foundation, she developed the Illicit Gin Institute, an initiative that uses local spirit-making traditions as a starting point for storytelling, cultural exchange and creative engagement.
Her work draws attention to forms of knowledge and cultural practice that are sometimes overlooked in conventional accounts of the Niger Delta. Through exhibitions, performances and community-based projects, she has explored how local traditions can contribute to wider conversations about environmental and cultural renewal.
In 2025, she opened KSW Rooms in Port Harcourt, a museum dedicated to her father. The project adds another dimension to her efforts to preserve and interpret his memory.
The museum provides a space through which visitors can encounter Ken Saro-Wiwa’s life and legacy. Its establishment also reflects Zina’s continuing interest in connecting family history with public education and cultural preservation.
A Photograph That Preserves a Family Moment
The photograph from Surrey, taken around 1980, captures a different stage in the lives of Ken Saro-Wiwa and his daughters.
At the time, Zina and Noo were children growing up in Britain. Their later achievements in art, filmmaking, journalism and literature were still ahead of them. Ken was already an established writer and broadcaster, although the environmental campaign that would bring him international attention had not yet reached its most prominent stage.
Photographs of public figures often focus on official events, political activities or public appearances. Family photographs offer another perspective by recording people in more private settings.
This image is valuable because it preserves Ken with his daughters during their childhood. It also creates a visual connection between the family life of a Nigerian writer and the later careers of two women who became recognised in their own professional fields.
The photograph cannot explain the full nature of their family relationships or the conversations that took place at home. Its historical value lies in what it visibly records and the context provided by biographical accounts.
When considered alongside the sisters’ later work, it becomes a reminder that the lives of historical figures extend beyond their public achievements. Their families also carry memories, experiences and personal histories that contribute to a fuller understanding of the past.
EXPLORE NOW: Biographies & Cultural Icons of Nigeria
Conclusion
The photograph of Ken Saro-Wiwa with his twin daughters, Zina and Noo, at their home in Surrey around 1980 preserves a family moment from their childhood in Britain.
In later years, Zina established herself as a contemporary artist, filmmaker and curator, founding the Mangrove Arts Foundation and developing projects connected to the cultural and environmental future of the Niger Delta. Noo became an accomplished author and travel writer, gaining recognition for Looking for Transwonderland and her later book, Black Ghosts.
Their father became internationally known for his writing and campaign for Ogoni rights before his execution in 1995. His legacy remains an important part of their family history, but the sisters have also built independent careers through their own creative interests and professional achievements.
The Surrey photograph brings these different stages of their lives together. It preserves Ken Saro-Wiwa as a father with his young daughters and offers an early visual record of a family whose later contributions would reach across literature, art, film and environmental advocacy.
Author’s Note
This family photograph offers a personal glimpse into the lives of Ken Saro-Wiwa, Zina Saro-Wiwa and Noo Saro-Wiwa before their names became widely associated with literature, art and environmental advocacy.
References
Saro-Wiwa, Noo. Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria. Granta Books, 2012.
Saro-Wiwa, Noo. Black Ghosts: A Journey Into the Lives of Africans in China. Canongate, 2023.
Saro-Wiwa, Zina. Official biography and professional website.
Mangrove Arts Foundation. “About the Mangrove Arts Foundation.”
Palmer, Beth. “Noo Saro-Wiwa and Zina Saro-Wiwa.” Surrey Cultural Lives.
Gabi-Williams, Olatoun. “Noo, Just Like Her Father, Ken Saro-Wiwa.” The Guardian Nigeria, 30 September 2018.
Granta Books. “Noo Saro-Wiwa: Contributor Biography.”
