- Miksi te intellektuellit tai miten kutsuttekin itseänne sälytätte meille taakkoja, joita emme lainkaan vaadi omaksemme. Minut on koulutettu tappajaksi. Käytän hankkimaani taitoa yhteiskuntani hyväksi. Miksi sinut on koulutettu? Olen tarkkaillut kaakaokampanjoitasi, olen seuraillut kiertuettasi ja olen tullut siihen tulokseen, että sinun elämäntehtäväsi on todella kasvattaminen. Olenko oikeassa? Sinä lietsot vaarallista tietoisuutta kansaamme – massat ovat vaalipiiri, jonka itse olet itselle määrännyt. Olet itse ottanut elämäntehtävän itsellesi. Mutta olemme puhuneet tästä aikaisemminkin, tiedät mikä minun osani on taistelussa. En voi ampua asioita enkä vartioida niitä fyysisesti. Minun näkökantani on yksinkertainen, mutta se sattuu olemaan kokemusteni summa. Tiedät millaisia ne ovat… Mutta en halua vastata kysymyksiin, jotka eivät kuulu alaani. Älä kysy minulta mitä minä kuvittelen mielessäni. En kuvittele yhtään mitään paitsi niiden miesten eliminointia, joiden tiedän olevan turmiollisen pahoja. Mitä tapahtuu sen jälkeen riippuu sellaisista ihmisistä kuin sinä.\nNäin puhuu salaperäinen Hammaslääkäri Soyinkan romaanin päähenkilölle Ofeyille. Ofeyi on mainos- ja suhdetoimintamies joka muusikkotoverinsa Zaccheuksen ja naisensa, kuvankauniin Iriyisen kanssa oli hoitanut kaakaon markkinointia mutta sittemmin kääntynyt työnantajiaan, kolonialistista suurta rahaa vastaan. Hetken päästä Hammaslääkäri vielä kysyy: - Mihin luulit niiden oppien johtavan, joita aloit kylvää Aiyérón miesten avulla. Ja Ofeyi vastaa: - Sen takaisin saamiseen minkä vähäinen kourallinen oli riistänyt yhteiskunnalta, itse yhteiskunnan uudelleenmuotoutumiseen.\nNäissä keskustelukatkelmissa liikutaan Soyinkan romaanin keskeisten alueiden tuntumassa. Aiyéró edustaa romaanissa Ujamaa-tyyppistä kyläkokeilua, perinteitä, omaa kehitystä. Sitä vastassa on Kartelli, kansainvälinen pääoma, kolonialismi, kansallinen korruptoitunut valta, joka kylvää ympärilleen väkivaltaa. Romaanin tapahtuma-aikaa tai paikkaa ei ole määritelty (mutta voidaan päätellä kirjan kuvaavan Biafran sotaa edeltävää Nigeriaa). Kaikki on äärimmäisen konkreettista ja samalla oudon pakenevaa, määrittymätöntä, maailma on salaperäinen ja nimetön. Uusi ja ikivanha limittyvät, vanhat riitit ja moderni teknologia. Kaikki on täynnä kauneutta ja uhkaa, valoa ja pimeää mykkää kauhua.\nSoyinkan romaani on uljasta empimätöntä kerrontaa, täytenään kuvia ja väriä. Siinä kuuluu heräävän maanosan, heräävän kulttuurin uusi ääni. Se on kirja vastuusta, väkivallasta, arvojen muuttumisesta ja muuttamisesta, maailmasta joka on pantu peliin kaikkineen.

SEASON OF ANOMY

SOYINKA, Wole

RANDOM HOUSE UK

The Nobel Prize-winning African writer, Wole Soyinka, was imprisoned without trial by the federal authorities at the start of the Nigerian Civil War. Here he records his arrest and interrogation, the efforts made to incriminate him, and the searing mental effects of solitary confinement.

Man Died: Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

Penguin

Winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize for Literature, this Nigerian poet, playwright, and novelist writes of the rich cultural traditions as well as the hopes and frustrations of black Africa. This two-volume collection of his plays includes A Dance of the Forests, The Swamp Dwellers, The Strong Breed, The Road, and The Bacchae of Euripides in the first volume, and The Lion and the Jewel, Kongi's Harvest, The Trials of Brother Jero, Jero's Metamorphosis, and Madmen and Specialists in the second volume.

Collected Plays: Volume 1 (Includes a Dance of the Forests/the Swamp Dwellers/the Strong Breed/the roaD/the Bacchae of Euripides)

Literature & Fiction

Dramas & Plays

Oxford University Press

A Dance of the Forests

Kongi's Harvest

On November 10, 1995, the Nigerian military government under General Sani Abacha executed dissident writer Ken Saro-Wiwa along with eight other activists, and the international community reacted with outrage. From the Geneva based International Commission of Jurists (who called the executions a criminal act of state murder) to governments around the world (including the United States) who recalled their ambassadors, to the Commonwealth of Former British Colonies, who suspended Nigeria from the group, the response was quick, decisive, and nearly unanimous: Nigeria is an outcast in the global village. The events that led up to Saro-Wiwa's execution mark Nigeria's decline from a post-colonial success story to its current military dictatorship, and few writers have been more outspoken in decrying and lamenting this decline than Nobel Prize laureate and Nigerian exile Wole Soyinka. In The Open Sore of a Continent, Soyinka, whose own Nigerian passport was confiscated by General Abacha in 1994, explores the history and future of Nigeria in a compelling jeremiad that is as intense as it is provocative, learned, and wide-ranging. He deftly explains the shifting dramatis personae of Nigerian history and politics to westerners unfamiliar with the players and the process, tracing the growth of Nigeria as a player in the world economy, through the corrupt regime of Babangida, the civil war occasioned by the secession of Biafra under the leadership of Chief Odumegwu Ojukwu, the lameduck reign of Ernest Sonekan, and the coup led by General Sani Abacha, arguing that "a glance at the mildewed tapestry of the stubbornly unfinished nation edifice is necessary" to explain where Nigeria can go next. And, in the process of elucidating the Nigerian crisis, Soyinka opens readers to the broader questions of nationhood, identity, and the general state of African culture and politics at the end of the twentieth century. Here are a range of issues that investigate the interaction of peoples who have been shaped by the clash of cultures: nationalism, power, corruption, violence, and the enduring legacy of colonialism. In a world tormented by devastation from Bosnia to Rwanda, how do we define a nation: is it simply a condition of the collective mind, a passive, unquestioned habit of cohabitation? Or is what we think of as a nation a rigorous conclusion that derives from history? Is it geography, or is it a bond that transcends accidents of mountain, river, and valley? How do these varying definitions of nationhood impact the people who live under them? Soyinka concludes with a resounding call for international attention to this question: the global community must address the issue of nationhood to prevent further religious mandates and calls for ethnic purity of the sort that have turned Algeria, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Sri Lanka into killing fields. Soyinka brings a lifetime of study and experience to bear on his writing, combining the skills of a poet and playwright with the astute political observations of a seasoned activist. An important and timely volume, The Open Sore of a Continent will be required reading for anyone who cares about Africa, human rights, and the future of the global village.

The Open Sore of a Continent: A Personal Narrative of the Nigerian Crisis (The ^AW.E.B. Du Bois Institute Series)

History

Africa

On November 10, 1995, the Nigerian military government under General Sani Abacha executed dissident writer Ken Saro-Wiwa along with eight other activists, and the international community reacted with outrage. From the Geneva based International Commission of Jurists (who called the executions a criminal act of state murder) to governments around the world (including the United States) who recalled their ambassadors, to the Commonwealth of Former British Colonies, who suspended Nigeria from the group, the response was quick, decisive, and nearly unanimous: Nigeria is an outcast in the global village. The events that led up to Saro-Wiwa's execution mark Nigeria's decline from a post-colonial success story to its current military dictatorship, and few writers have been more outspoken in decrying and lamenting this decline than Nobel Prize laureate and Nigerian exile Wole Soyinka. In The Open Sore of a Continent, Soyinka, whose own Nigerian passport was confiscated by General Abacha in 1994, explores the history and future of Nigeria in a compelling jeremiad that is as intense as it is provocative, learned, and wide-ranging. He deftly explains the shifting dramatis personae of Nigerian history and politics to westerners unfamiliar with the players and the process, tracing the growth of Nigeria as a player in the world economy, through the corrupt regime of Babangida, the civil war occasioned by the secession of Biafra under the leadership of Chief Odumegwu Ojukwu, the lameduck reign of Ernest Sonekan, and the coup led by General Sani Abacha, arguing that "a glance at the mildewed tapestry of the stubbornly unfinished nation edifice is necessary" to explain where Nigeria can go next. And, in the process of elucidating the Nigerian crisis, Soyinka opens readers to the broader questions of nationhood, identity, and the general state of African culture and politics at the end of the twentieth century. Here are a range of issues that investigate the interaction of peoples who have been shaped by the clash of cultures: nationalism, power, corruption, violence, and the enduring legacy of colonialism. In a world tormented by devastation from Bosnia to Rwanda, how do we define a nation: is it simply a condition of the collective mind, a passive, unquestioned habit of cohabitation? Or is what we think of as a nation a rigorous conclusion that derives from history? Is it geography, or is it a bond that transcends accidents of mountain, river, and valley? How do these varying definitions of nationhood impact the people who live under them? Soyinka concludes with a resounding call for international attention to this question: the global community must address the issue of nationhood to prevent further religious mandates and calls for ethnic purity of the sort that have turned Algeria, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Sri Lanka into killing fields. Soyinka brings a lifetime of study and experience to bear on his writing, combining the skills of a poet and playwright with the astute political observations of a seasoned activist. An important and timely volume, The Open Sore of a Continent will be required reading for anyone who cares about Africa, human rights, and the future of the global village.

The Open Sore of a Continent: A Personal Narrative of the Nigerian Crisis (W.E.B. Du Bois Institute)

Biographies & Memoirs

Historical

Wole Soyinka, a Nobel Prize laureate and Nigerian exile, has been described by The New York Times as "one of the most compelling literary voices in black Africa." This collection brings together Idanre and Other Poems and A Shuttle in the Crypt, two powerful and distinctive volumes of Soyinka's early poetry. The first set of poems, Idanre and Other Poems, traces the author's increasingly radical political awareness and the growth of his appreciation for Africa's indigenous cultural traditions. The second set of poems, A Shuttle in the Crypt, was written by Soyinka after his arrest in 1967 by the Nigerian government for writings sympathetic to secessionist Biafra and placement in solitary confinement for twenty-two months. These poems, penned during his imprisonment, often in the dark, on cigarette packs and toilet paper, describe the loss of human contact and ponder the future of Africa continuously at war with itself.  Taken as a whole, Soyinka's early poetry may be viewed as a valiant effort to reconcile the mysterious legacy of the old with the often harsh realities of an entire continent's abrupt entry into the twentieth century.

Early Poems

Poetry

When Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka's The Open Sore of a Continent appeared in 1996, it received rave reviews in the national media. Now comes Soyinka's powerful sequel to that fearless and passionate book, The Burden of Memory. Where Open Sore offered a critique of African nationhood and a searing indictment of the Nigerian military and its repression of human and civil rights, The Burden of Memory considers all of Africa--indeed, all the world--as it poses the next logical question: Once repression stops, is reconciliation between oppressor and victim possible? In the face of centuries long devastations wrought on the African continent and her Diaspora by slavery, colonialism, Apartheid and the manifold faces of racism what form of recompense could possibly be adequate? In a voice as eloquent and humane as it is forceful, Soyinka examines this fundamental question as he illuminates the principle duty and "near intolerable burden" of memory to bear the record of injustice. In so doing, he challenges notions of simple forgiveness, of confession and absolution, as strategies for social healing. Ultimately, he turns to art--poetry, music, painting--as one source that may nourish the seed of reconciliation, art as the generous vessel that can hold together the burden of memory and the hope of forgiveness. Based on Soyinka's Stewart-McMillan lectures delivered at the Du Bois Institute at Harvard, The Burden of Memory speaks not only to those concerned specifically with African politics, but also to anyone seeking the path to social justice through some of history's most inhospitable terrain.

The Burden of Memory, the Muse of Forgiveness (The ^AW.E.B. Du Bois Institute Series)

Nobel Laureate in Literature Wole Soyinka considers all of Africa--indeed, all the world--as he poses this question: once repression stops, is reconciliation between oppressor and victim possible? In the face of centuries-long devastation wrought on the African continent and her Diaspora by slavery, colonialism, Apartheid, and the manifold faces of racism, what form of recompense could possibly suffice? In a voice as eloquent and humane as it is forceful, Soyinka boldly challenges in these pages the notions of simple forgiveness, confession, and absolution as strategies for social healing. Ultimately, he turns to art--poetry, music, painting, etc.--as the one source that can nourish the seed of reconciliation: art is the generous vessel that can hold together the burden of memory and the hope of forgiveness. Based on Soyinka's Stewart-McMillan lectures delivered at the DuBois Institute at Harvard, The Burden of Memory speaks not only to those concerned specifically with African politics, but also to anyone seeking the path to social justice through some of history's most inhospitable terrain.

The Burden of Memory, the Muse of Forgiveness (W.E.B. Du Bois Institute)

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