“The gun of writer is a word”
Many of the Nobel laureates in literature are forgotten by time, although we can there are some notable names that stay in our memory, such as Camus, Sartre, Solzhenitsyn, Pasternak.
The first African who got the Nobel prize in literature was Wole Soyinka. In 1986 he was awarded for his utilization of figurative language in terms of phraseology to dramatic tenses about politics. It was a rightfully deserved award that he earned by representing a whole nation and explicitly stating his opinions on matters surrounding it. His novels break stereotypes about African world. Everything is more difficult, just take one of his book and start to read.
It is impossible to call Wole a quite person who writes his novels at small and humble cabinet. No. He is an intellectual who is often compared with William Shakespeare; he could be described as a dissident who spent his life opposing almost all regimes of Nigeria. He was in a constant state of danger, literally risking his life. During the civil war in Nigeria (1967–1970), he fought for liberty and human rights; this led to the government branding him as a political prisoner, forcing him to go into hiding. He had a friendship with Joseph Brodsky, and he always favors rebels in his works.
In his recent work “Of Africa”, a classic of literature that engages the readers with the question: “May be Africa is only waiting for own discovery?”, highlighting the fact that there are not many people who know its history, literature or culture.
Speaking through a succession of quotes in his writings; literary pieces with their individual plots and settings, such as ‘You Must Set Forth At Dawn.’, ‘Ake’, ‘Of Africa’, ‘Opera Wonyosi’, ‘A dance of the forests’, ‘Harvest Conga’, etc, he created an impact of the masses in Nigeria. This brought about those who followed his work and defended them by educating others on his works that might have been confusing.
Not having read any of his books, I feel like a hypocrite, simply picking up facts from sources here and there. I believe that the basis of any reasonably scripted report should be the evidence derived from at least a skimmed version of their work, followed up with further evidence, proving why, how and what he impacted into the lives of others. But his books are simply not my preferred genre as when novels are involved, I lean more towards fictional fantasy or mystically themed works. Recently, I started gaining interest in the works of the psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Jung. This interest was sparked because of the songs I listen to by BTS (an extremely popular 7 membered South Korean Group) that are centered around quotes and ideologies of PERSONA (book “Jung’s Map Of The Soul” by Murray Stein).
As intriguing as Wole’s work may be, since it is in the category I’d normally not read, I have never read his work. Thus, first-hand judgment cannot be given from my behalf. But here is a series of remarks made by an individual who has read and has been influenced by his craft.
Latifah Oiza: “This was one of his works that I read more than once. I think Brother Jero is more mocking. Like…we’re over dependent on religion. Like the way everything is. We want to give everything a spiritual meaning. That kind of thing. So Brother Jero was mocking that. I haven’t really read any of his pros but I read “Trials of Brother Jero” and it was really nice. There wasn’t much emphasis on the description, but the dialogue flowed.”
Most of his works were based on mythology of his own tribe, however he was also inspired by the likes of the Irish writer, J.M Synge. He incorporated combinations of dance, music and action to create an infusion of the writer’s influence and African culture. Wole adores African culture and he makes awesome work by writing and describing it in paper.
Thanks to his father, young Wole Soyinka enjoyed access to various books, confined not only to Biblical and English literature, but also classical Greek tragedies such as ‘Medea of Euripides’, which shaped his imagination. In order to read Herodotus, he learned the Greek language. As a precocious reader, he soon sensed a link between the Yoruba folklore of his neighbors and the Greek mythology underlying many of the western literature. It provoked me to weigh the odds, and decipher his creative process that lead to pieces that stood out.
The art that is Wole Soyinka is purely infused into his words; they are laid out on the pages for the audience, be it readers or watchers, to grasp and piece together. I believe that could be a reason as to why people take his work as literature. Usually writing is not enough to portray ones motives, but to write and to have others perceive for themselves what you implied is the point of the literature.
Of course, not everything was in his favour, as when you bear fruits, weeds grow alongside and similarly, his own share of criticism was received. From being accused of obscurantism to being too immersed in private myth-making, an arcane metaphysics, at the expense of communicating with a popular audience about issues which directly concern it. At the end of the day, Wole was confronted, but he stood his ground, gave a population of those who came across his works a whole new perspective.
“Writing became a therapy. I was reconstructing my own existence. It was also an act of defiance”, — Wole Soyinka.
text Zeina May Jammal
edited by Afiq Makkana, Roshni Durai, Reshma Durai
