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Wole Soyinka grew up with the traditional theatre of Nigeria. He became attracted to creating theatre in both the African and British traditions, although he insists he didn’t set out to blend the two. His own work is a product of the many styles he was exposed to through his upbringing and education. He loves to combine music and poetry and incantations, rather like the work of Bertolt Brecht.
Curator’s notes
Wole Soyinka’s best-known work is his memoirs. They are in three parts: Ake: The Years of Childhood (1981), Isara: A Voyage Around Essay (1990) and Ibadan:The Penkelemes Years (1994), and written in English, the language of the colonial era, for which he makes no apology. Nigeria is a country with over 100 million people of several nations trying to be one nation. He writes in English because he wants all the different nations of Africa to read his work.
Wole Soyinka grew up amongst Islamic neighbours and Christian missionaries. His father was a schoolteacher and Wole went to the United Kingdom to study literature. He chose Leeds University, which has since become a centre for post-colonial literature. He returned to Nigeria in 1960, not long before the country became independent on 1 October, and began to write and perform radio plays that celebrated the past. His work also offered a satirical critique of the first generation of Nigerian rulers who were developing once again the inhumanity, indifference and alienation of pre-colonial times. He was sent to jail for trying to broker a peace between the warring factions, which led to tragic civil war.
He must now live in exile and tells about missing the smells, sounds and textures of his native land. With his vivid imagination he tries to keep his African memories alive. He feels he must never give in to self-pity, as long as General Sani Abacha, supported by the multinational oil companies, still holds power in Nigeria.
