Title: The Gods are not
to Blame
Author: Ola Rotimi
Genre: Play/Tragedy
Publishers: University
Press PLC
Pages: 72
Year of First
Performance: 1968
Place of First
Performance: Ife Festival of Arts, Nigeria
Year of First
Publication: 1971 (this edition, 1990)
Country: Nigeria
In this play,
Sophocle's Oedipus Rex, is given a Nigerian treatment and having not read
Sophocle's, I really enjoyed Ola Rotimi's rendition. The gods are not to blame
is a play that questions destiny: are we in control of our destiny or we are
the product of our destiny? Can we escape it? At the end of the play, the
question is still not answered as an individual can argue both for or against
this theme.
The play opens with
someone narrating the events surrounding the birth of King Adetusa's first son.
Queen Ojuola, King Adetusa's wife, has just delivered her first son and the
soothsayer has been summoned to foretell the future of this newly born son. The
soothsayer, Baba Fakunle, announced that:
This boy, he will kill
his own father and then marry his own mother!
To avert this taboo
from materialising, the baby was sent to the evil grove and offered as a
sacrifice to the gods.
The first Scene of the
first Act opens thirty-two after, when King Adetusa has been succeeded by King
Odewale after a series of battles and conflicts with neighbouring villages and
Kutuje has become somewhat peaceful but for the sudden deaths and sicknesses
that have befallen the people of Kutuje. Having nowhere to go and not knowing
what to do, the people brought their grievances, their problems, to bear before
King Odewale.
Yesterday, my twins
died - both of them. My third child ... [unstrapping the baby on her back.]
here, feel her, feel how hot she is ... come feel.
However, since the King
himself has not been spared the sickness because 'sickness like rain falls on
every roof', he has sent Aderopo to the oracle of Ifa at the shrine of Orunmila
to seek the cause of their tribulations. Returning home, Aderopo - fearful for
the results he was carrying - decided to tell the chief, in private, the
response the oracle has given him. Haughty and temperamental as he is, King
Odewale demanded to receive the information right in front of his people, to
the hearing of everyone, mocking Aderopo in the process. After several
cajoling, mocking, insulting, and pleading, Aderopo told them what the oracle
had said:
Very well. Ifa oracle
says the curse, your highness, is on a man...
A full-grown man...
The man has killed
another man...
King Adetusa - my own
father, the King who ruled this land before you....
Having been told this, King Odewale set out
how the murderer would be punished
Before Ogun the god of
Iron, I stand on oath. Witness now all you present that before the feast of
Ogun, which starts at sunrise, I, Odewale, the son of Ogundele, shall search
and fully lay open before your very eyes the murderer of King Adetusa. And
having seized that murderer, I swear by this sacred arm of Ogun, that I shall
straightway bring him to the agony of death. First he shall be exposed to the
eyes of the world and put to shame - the beginning of living death. Next, he
shall be put into lasting darkness, his eyes tortured in their living sockets
until their blood and rheum swell forth to fill the hollow of crushed eyeballs.
And then, final agony: we shall cut him from his roots. Expelled from this land
of his birth, he shall roam in darkness in the land of nowhere, and there die
unmourned by men who know him, and buried by vultures who know him not... (Page
24)
Thus, like biblical
David, King Odewale narrated his punishment even before the culprit was found
and he did so, in anger and arrogance, swearing before the townspeople and the
gods they serve. Baba Fakunle was called forth to deconstruct the message he
gave to Aderopo. Approaching the palace, Baba Fakunle, the soothsayer, refused
to move farther claiming
... I smelled the truth
as I came to this land. The truth smelled stronger and stronger as I came into
this place. Now it is choking me...choking me. I say. Boy! Lead on home away
from here.(26/27)
Again, the anger and
arrogance of King Odewale would not allow the soothsayer depart to his village
until the truth is squeezed out of him. Several verbal struggles ensued with
attempts of morphing into physical persuasions until the soothsayer blurted it
out:
The truth that you are
the cursed murderer that you seek.
King Odewale took this
as an insult even as the soothsayer went on to call him a 'bedsharer'. Before
Baba Fakunle finally departed he told King Odewale that it was his 'hot temper,
like a disease from birth, .... that has brought you trouble' and that
King Odewale, King of
Kutuje, go sit in private and think deep before darkness covers you up ...
think ... think ... think!
Instead the King saw
this as a plot to get him out of the land because he was an Ijekun man ruling
the people of Kutuje. He accused Aderopo - son of King Adetusa - as behind this
plot, together with some of the chiefs and his own bodyguards. Here the
'blindness' that mostly follow leaders came into play. As the play unfolds King
Odewale made several statements - unconsciously though - that affirmed what
Baba Fakunle had said, calling Aderopo, his brother and inviting him to also
come and sleep with his mother. Again, like Macbeth, the King became almost
demented began accusing everyone of plotting against him.
Then a series of events
occurred. His best friend Alaka suddenly appeared in his palace in search of
his long-lost friend. Through conversations, and again, through his quick
temperament, Odewale nearly killed his friend when the issue of his birth came
up, for Alaka had called him a bastard in front of the townspeople. Again,
Alaka promised to tell Odewale how he came to be in Ijekun in private, but
again Odewale refused, setting the stage
for the denouement.
Though Baba Fakunle
linked King Odewale's 'hot temper' to his curse, was it really that? Or was it
his attitude against insult and falsities? Or even his unbending attitude
towards unfairness? I would prefer the last two and not the first.
The play could be
interpreted in several ways. For instance, King Odewale's message to the people
when they approached him for the solution to their problem is almost like a social commentary on the political
scene of Nigeria or most countries for that matter, or even on human nature. He
asked them what they have done for themselves in order to mitigate the effect
of the sickness instead of rushing to him. He says:
But what have you done
about it, I ask. You there - Mama Ibeji - what id you do to save your twins
from dying? ... each one of you lies down in his own small hut and does
nothing. ... Well, let me tell you, brothers and sisters, the ruin of the land
and its people begins in their homes. (Page 12)
This is a beautiful
play and even though one could tell how it would end, it is how the events
unfolded that makes it beautiful and worth the read. The adaptation of English
by Nigerians and making it their own is clearly seen. Interspersed with
proverbs the dialogues are natural and roll off the tongue leaving taste of
satisfaction on the reader's tongue. It is recommended to all who love good
plays. If you have never read a play, give this a try.
______________________
Brief Bio: Emanuel
Gladstone Olawale Rotimi (1938 – 2000) (AKA. Ola Rotimi) was born April 13th
1938, in Sapele, Nigeria, to Samuel Gladstone Enitan Rotimi and Dorcas Adolae Oruene
Addo. Ola Rotimi became one of contemporary Africa's leading playwrights and
theater directors. He obtained a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Boston
University, and the Master of Fine Arts from Yale, where he earned the
distinction of being a Rockefeller Foundation scholar in Playwriting and
Dramatic Literature. His graduate project-play was declared “Yale University's
Student Play of the Year."
His publications
include six full-length plays (two of them award-winning), and a number of
scholarly articles on Theater and Drama. He is featured in such reputable
international records as: the Encyclopedia Britanica, the Encyclopedia of World
Authors, Cambridge Guide to World Theater, and the International Authors and
Writers Who's Who.
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