Waking the Warriors: Ben Okri in conversation with Tara Tobler

Sir Ben Okri is coming to the Millennium Gallery on Friday 23 October, where he'll be talking about his book Waking the Warriors. It's a conversation rather than a lecture, and he'll be joined by Tara Tobler, a writer, critic and senior fiction editor at the Sheffield publishers And Other Stories.

If you're not already familiar with him, Okri was born in Minna, Nigeria, and raised between Nigeria and London. He's an acclaimed novelist, essayist, playwright and poet, and his novel The Famished Road won the Booker Prize for Fiction. Marlon James called him 'fiction's master enchanter', and The Guardian has written about the magic he can spin.

Waking the Warriors is a modern fable about tyranny, resistance and what happens when a society loses the will to defend itself. It draws on the ancient legend of sleeping warriors who awaken only when their kingdom faces mortal danger; in Okri's dystopia, the greatest enemy isn't the tyrant himself, but the dark forces draining the people's will to resist. The talk is part of Sheffield's Off the Shelf Festival of Words and also Black History Month, whose 2026 theme, 'Honouring Our Communities', recognises the achievements of inspirational individuals and resilient communities that have shaped the nation's heritage.

It starts at 1:00pm on Friday 23 October at the Millennium Gallery on Arundel Gate, S1 2PP. Tickets are £12, or £10 if you're eligible for the concession.