By Tunde Olusunle
Typical of the extremely organised personality that he is, the multiple award-winning poet, Niyi Osundare, had already “served notice” of his imminent visit to Nigeria, weeks before he came. He had been invited by the organisers of the “Nigerian National Order of Merit,” (NNOM), to deliver a lecture at the 2022 edition of the Annual Forum of NNOM Laureates, in Abuja.
His presentation was titled “Poetry and the Human Voice”. The event was scheduled for Wednesday December 7, 2022, and the New Orleans, US-based Osundare needed to “forewarn” those of us who are his younger kith, that he was coming to our city. He does have a good number of we his mentees, inspired by his craft, in the Federal Capital Territory and it was going to be our pleasure to have him around.
For those who may not know or be familiar with Osundare, he is one
of Africa’s most prolific poets, who at the last count had at least 18
published volumes of poetry to his name. He has equally published four plays;
books on African literature and culture and assemblages of his writings as
public affairs interrogator.
For his conscientious academic and creative assiduity, he has
received every notable global award, except the Nobel Prize. He was joint
overall winner, Commonwealth Poetry Prize, (1986), and sole winner of the Noma
Award for Publishing in Africa, (1991), becoming the first Anglophone African
poet to receive the award. In 1998, he also earned the Fonlons/Nichols Prize
for “Excellence in Literary Creativity Combined with Significant Contributions
to Human Rights in Africa,” the African Literature Association, (ALA)’s most
distinguished award.
In 2008, Osundare also earned the “Tchicaya U Tam’si Prize for
Poetry, (regarded as Africa’s highest poetry prize). He was in 2014, invested
with the Nigerian National Order of Merit, (NNOM), Nigeria’s highest award for
academic excellence.
These medals preclude others Osundare has received on the local
literary scene, including those awarded by the Association of Nigerian Authors,
(ANA). He equally has the distinction of being the “first African poet,” to be
featured on the cover of World Poetry magazine. It has been
suggested that if the Nobel Prize for Literature is coming the way of West
Africa, and indeed Nigeria anytime soon, he will most fittingly be a top
contender.
Hakeem
Bello, Media Adviser to the Works Minister; Rasheed Na’Allah, Vice Chancellor
of the University of Abuja, and Denja Abdullahi, a Director with the Ministry
of Information and Culture, are some of Osundare’s younger friends in Abuja. In
the email he sent to me, he said he would be glad to have me attend the lecture
either physically or virtually.
There are select literary giants one is always glad to have around
and share moments and drinks with, ever drawing from the infinite pool of their
multidimensional wisdoms. Femi Osofisan and Olu Obafemi, both Emeritus
Professors and recipients of the NNOM, belong to this category. Our
contemporaries like Sunnie Ododo, chief executive of the National Theatre,
Lagos, and the Canada-based Nduka Otiono, are ever always welcome. We typically
banter and reminisce on our younger days and our subsisting endeavours.
I knew Osundare before I met him. Back in the days, in one of our
“literary criticism” classes as final year students at the University of
Ilorin, Russell Chambers, one of our American lecturers came to class one of
those days. He was clutching a file of cyclostyled documents, which he handed
over to one of us to distribute to the class. It was that era when Nigeria’s
educational system was supported at virtually all levels by quality expatriate
scholars and instructors, which provided requisite breadth, cosmopolitanism,
even globality, to education and learning. Obafemi refers to that era as that
during which universities exemplified the concept of universitas, a global
citadel in the truest sense of the word.
Chambers had stumbled on a review of Osundare’s poetry in the now
extinct London-based West Africa Magazine. We were taught
stylistics as a course for instance, with examples from the essays and columns
of the Olatunji Dares, Dan Agbeses, Dele Giwas, Ray Ekpus and so on, in our
time. Chambers’ discovery was an essay on Osundare’s second volume of poetry, Village
Voices, which was published in 1984. The review presented to Chambers a
refreshing newness in the substance and style of African literature. Away from
the molar-cracking, jaw-distending aesthetics of older poets like Wole Soyinka,
Christopher Okigbo, Michael Joseph Chukwudalu Echeruo, among similar icons in
their generation, here was poetry at its accessible best.
The language was simple without being simplistic, the themes understandable
without being underwhelming. The dramatic works of Osofisan, Obafemi, Bode
Sowande, Tunde Fatunde, which regularly featured in our theoretical and
practical classes, had helped to demystify the verbal esoterism of Soyinka and
Company. Here was Osundare bringing poetry to “the marketplace,” to adopt the title of his premiere volume of
poetry, published in 1983. Our universities were much better those days, so I
simply walked to the university bookshop and bought copies of those first two
Osundare volumes of poetry. I read and reread that cyclostyled copy of the
Osundare book availed to us by Chambers, virtually plastering the document in
my consciousness.
I returned to the University of Ilorin for my masters’ degree
shortly after undergoing the compulsory one-year post graduation National Youth
Service Corps, (NYSC). By this time, my mind was made up to forensically
interrogate the poetic oeuvre of Osundare, for my dissertation. Two new volumes
of poetry, namely A Nib in the Pond, (1986) and The Eye of the Earth,
published the same year, had been released. His fifth, Moonsongs, (1988), was
released while I was in the middle of my research work. My supervisor was
Prayag Tripathi, a most committed Indian professor with whom I chewed at my
topic and set the scope of work to be done and developed my project proposal.
I
should add that it is a measure of Tripathi’s uncommon disposition to
scholarship that he would himself go to the university library, loan books on
my behalf and bring them to my room in the “postgraduate hostel!”
My
inquisitions took me to the University of Ibadan, where Osundare was Head of
Department of English. I had an elaborate interview with him on June 17, 1988,
during which I took very copious notes in the absence of a recorder. Osundare
also ran the immensely popular and regular poetry column Songs of the Season in
the Sunday
Tribune at a time. He availed younger writers a platform for the public
aeration of their works by featuring their works as “Guest Poet.”
Osundare subsequently became my “customer,” to borrow that
reference from the streets. I attended readings from his seventh book, Waiting
Laughters, (1990) in Lagos, by which time an editorial staff of the Daily
Times. The organisation was being revolutionised and rehabilitated by
the charismatic literary scholar and administrator, Yemi Ogunbiyi. This availed
me regular information about happenings in the literature, arts and culture
sector. Osundare was physically present when my lovely wife, Funmi, and I got
wedded in Ibadan in 1994. He still has photographic memories of the way I
astounded the congregation with my dance and movements that day, celebrating
the consummation of our union.
Osundare announced his arrival in Nigeria from his Ibadan home on
Friday November 18, 2022. He was chatty and excited when we spoke. Nigeria
continues to hold its appeal for him, with its unique imprimatur, except for
the leadership question, which we still, very disturbingly haven’t gotten
right. He would be in Abuja Saturday December 3, and take his engagements from
that date until his return to Ibadan, Thursday December 8. His various hosts
were eager to receive him, including the University of Abuja, which scheduled a
reception for him for Tuesday December 6, and the Abuja chapter of the Association
of ANA. Then of course the NNOM lecture which he was to give on Wednesday
December 7. He had a potentially full plate on his hands.
Osundare and I fixed a meeting for 7:00pm, Sunday, December 4.
Tivlumun Nyitse, my eternal friend, classmate, brother and fellow poet, was in
Abuja for a few days. I had told him that Osundare was in Abuja and that Hakeem
Bello and I had fixed a visit to him. I also notified Osundare that Nyitse will
be on the “entourage.” Nyitse and I agreed to maximise the opportunity of the
visit to engage Osundare in an interview on a broad range of issues. I’m told
there is a proverb, which admonishes us to maximise any opportunity we get to
climb the Iroko tree. I hadn’t interviewed him since 2013 when he turned in his
response to my doctoral research questionnaire.
Osundare received Nyitse and I with tremendous joy as he opened
the door of his hotel room. He wore a facemask most probably as a safe guard,
while he transited through cities and countries. His generation of
intellectuals are not getting any younger, even as he strides towards 76 next
March. Osofisan, Ogunbiyi and Obafemi will be 77, 76 and 73 respectively this
new year. Other notable writers of that generation, notably Tanure Ojaide and
Odia Ofeimun will be 75 and 73 in the coming year. We shook hands and embraced
ourselves, as I introduced my friend. We all agreed to savour the evening sky,
sitting out by the poolside of his hotel, while expecting Bello to join the
party.
Our orders were taken as we settled ourselves into a relaxed L
shaped sitting position, which enabled us proximity to our guest. We threw
banters and enjoyed rich laughters. Osundare clutched his signature bottle of
water. You rarely find him with anything different, and so it has been for the
three and half decades I have known him.
Hakeem
Bello who missed that poolside hangout had lunch with him the next day. He also
shared photographs of himself and Osundare, with the latter typically clutching
a bottle of aqua! I need to commission a study on what he savours in private.
People in the business of creativity are known to have their “poisons.”
Osundare congratulated me once again on the eventual completion of my
doctorate, a few years back. He said it was due 30 years ago!
Osundare, by the way, was external examiner invited by the
university authorities to assess my work when I completed my masters’ degree in
1989. He had therefore, previously engaged with my work. He had equally
graciously, donated his regular poetry column published for several years by Sunday
Tribune to me, to accord provenance for my budding career as a creative
writer. His comment reminded me of similar comments by Femi Adesina, spokesman
to President Muhammadu Buhari, who was President of the Nigerian Guild of
Editors (NGE), when I was inducted a decade ago. “You were already qualified
for induction 20 years ago,” Adesina told me. “You should be a Fellow now.”
I presented an autographed copy of my newest volume of poetry, my
third, A Medley Of Echoes, which Foreword, was graciously penned by
Osofisan. He was glad that in spite of distractions occasioned by forays into
politics, I had continued to write and mature as a poet and journalist. He
flattered me generously as one of the “beacons of creative promise in my
generation,” an ascription which greatly humbled me. He “queried” Nyitse, who
has a doctorate in mass communications and lectures at Bingham University,
Karu, near Abuja, for abandoning the literary arts. Nyitse and I by the way, are
products of the same grooming mill in University of Ilorin, where we cut our
teeth in creative writing.
Other products of that “forge” include: Taiwo Oloruntoba-Oju,
Mopah Aileku, Sunnie Ododo, Wumi Raji, Na’Allah, among others. Nyitse explained
to Osundare that he still desired to study for a masters in literature to help
him rediscover his creative inclination. He reassured Osundare that he has
continued to fraternise with the writers’ commune, alluding to his
participation in the two most recent editions of the annual convention of ANA,
hosted in the brand new Mamman Vatsa Writers Village in Abuja. Nyitse and I ran
our recorder and had him respond to our inquiries for over 90 minutes!
*Dr. Olusunle is a poet,
journalist and member of Nigerians Guild of Editors
No comments:
Post a Comment