Collected Plays, Vol. 2

Can you top a collection of plays written by a Nobel laureate with a fierce sense of comedy and the courage to stand up to the murderous threats of his own country’s military leaders?When you are dealing with a writer as talented in every medium---poetry, non- fiction, novels, autobiography, playwrighting, as Wole Soyinka, the answer is no.After all, the 1986 Nobel Prize Winner for Literature destroyed his greencard in protest against the election of Donald Trump even though his son lives in the United States.In the second volume of his collected plays, Soyinka offers up some of his classic constructions: “The Lion and the Jewel,” Kongi’s Harvest, “The Trials of Brother Jero,” “Jero’s Metamorphis,” and “Madmen and Specialists.”For some reason not clear to me, tyrants and their supporters still imagine they can get away with human atrocities and not be found out. Soyinka’s plays here, with their minute detail of the sickening crimes of Nigerian generals, demonstrate that like God’s moral conscience, evil deeds never escape human eyes and memory. Indeed in the early 21st century, DNA forensics are able to tell us that corpses frozen 10,000 years ago were murdered.Having come of age in the feminist mid- 20th century, Soyinka is not bashful in making fun of male chauvinism. He writes this dialogue in the “Lion and the Jewel.”Lakunle: “Women have a smaller brain than menThat’s why they are called the weaker sex.Sidi: “The weaker sex is it?Is it a weaker breed that pounds the yamOr bends all day to plant the milletWith a child strapped to her back?”Lakunle, like all male chauvinists, is probably traumatized by modernity:“Bride price will be a thing forgottenAnd wives will take their place by menA motor road will pass this spotAnd bring the City ways to usWe’ll buy saucepans for all the womenClay pots are erude and unhygienicNo man shall take more wives than oneThat’s why there impotent too soon………Soyinka is blistering in his attacks on men who have longConsidered their wives inferior to slaves and work animals:Baroka: Is this man Good and kindly.Sidi: They say he uses wellHis dogs and horses.”Not all in the plays is a fierce attack on chauvinists and generals.There is age old wisdom. “One way the world remains the same,The child still thinks she is wiser thanThe cotton head of age.”Soyina is no less acerbic in his understanding of pretentious clerics:Fifth: “Why do we need an image?”First: “I suggest we pattern ourselves on our predecessors. Oh I do admit theyWere a little old-fashioned, but they had er…a certain style. Yes, I think style is the word I want. Yes, I think we could do worse than model ourselves on the old Aweri.Fifth: “You mean, speak in proverbs and ponderous tone rhythms?Fourth:” I’m afraid that is out anyway. Kongi would prefer a clean break from the traditionalConclave of the so-called wise ones.”First: “They were remote, impersonal—we need these aspects. They breed fear in the common man.”Military strong man after military strongman in Nigeria made similar attempts at image rehabilitation after committing atrocities to keep power. Soyinka sets down their PR strategy in this rift from “Kongi’s Harvest:”Fifth: “Persuade him to grant some form of amnesty. Then go to Danola and tell him that in exchange for the New Yam, a few of the detainees will be set free.”Secretary: “And do you think that will have the slightest effect on the old man? He’ll say they will be chucked right back again at the first excuse.”Equally powerful is Soyinka’s handling of subordinates who suck up to these monsters in power.Harvest: “This year shall be known as the year of Kongi’s Harvest. Everything shall date from that.Kongi: “Who thought that up?”Secretary:” It is among the surprise gifts we have planned for our beloved Leader. I shouldn’t have let it slip out.Kongi: “You mean, things like 200 K.H.Secretary:” A.H. My Leader. After the Harvest. In a thousand years, one thousand A.H. And last year shall be referred to as 1 B.H. There will be only one harvest worth remembering.”Kongi:” No. K.H. is less ambiguous. The year of Kongi’s harvest. Then for the purpose of back-dating, B.K.H. Before Kongi’s Harvest. No reason why we should conform to the habit of two initials only. You lack imagination.”Well, of course Soyinka was not writing about a leader who wanted to build a wall on the border between Mexico and the United States, so that his name could be remembered with a wall, such as Hadrian’s Wall, but you get the idea.And you get the idea why Soyinka destroyed his greencard last November.[Hansen Alexander’s new book, an Amazon exclusive, is entitled, HOW THE LIONS ATE TIM TEBOW, and no doubt was inspired by the humor of Wole Soyinka.]

Wole Soyinka brings to mind the Greek playwrights in the quality of his plays.Really some of the best drama ever written in English.Refreshing African myth and lore- entertaining and brilliant.

A great playwright. The dialogue is realistic and shows the characters to perfection. Very short but relevant without being boring