Contemporary African Art Exhibition Series

Professor Wole Soyinka
Patron

Wole Soyinka, who was born in Abeokuta, Nigeria, in 1934 and is the first black African author to be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, which he obtained in 1986.

After preparatory university studies at Government College Ibadan in 1954, he continued his education at the University of Leeds, where he earned a PhD in 1973. During his years in England, he became a playwright for the Royal Court Theatre in London.  In 1960, he received a Rockefeller bursary and returned to Africa to study African theatre. During the same period, he taught theatre and literature in various universities in Ibadan, Lagos, and Ife, where he has been professor of comparative literature since 1975. In 1960, he founded the theatre group, The 1960 Masks, and in 1964 The Orisun Theatre Company in which he produced and acted in his own plays. Whilst an Overseas Fellow at Churchill College, Cambridge, he wrote his widely acclaimed Death and the King’s Horseman. He has been awarded the George Benson Medal of Royal Society for Literature and the UNESCO Medal for the Arts.

During the civil war in Nigeria, Soyinka appealed in an article for cease-fire. He was arrested in 1967, accused of conspiring with the Biafra rebels, and was held as a political prisoner for 22 months. Forced into exile in 1994 by the military dictatorship, he now divides his time between Nigeria and California, and lectures in universities across Europe and the USA.

Soyinka has published over twenty works: drama, novels and poetry and is influenced by the popular tradition of African theatre with its combination of dance, music and performance, as well as the popular mythology of his own tribe, the Yorubas.

Selected works:

A QUALITY OF VIOLENCE   1959
THE TRIALS OF BROTHER JERO   1960
A DANCE OF THE FORESTS   1963
THE STRONG BREED   1963
THREE PLAYS (The Swamp Dwellers, The Trials of Brother Jero,
The Strong Breed)
  1963
THE LION AND THE JEWEL   1963
KONGI'S HARVEST   1965
THE INTERPRETERS - Tulkit (Risto Lehmusoksa, 1980)   1965
THE ROAD   1965
IDANRAE AND OTHER POEMS   1967
THE FOREST OF A THOUSAND DAEMONS   1968
POEMS FROM PRISON   1969
MADMEN AND SPECIALISTS   1970
BEFORE THE BLACKOUT   1971
JERO'S METAMORPHOSIS   1972
A SHUTTLE IN THE CRYPT   1972
THE MAN DIED   1972
SEASON OF ANOMY, - Laittomuuden kausi
(suom. Risto Lehmusoksa, 1976)
  1973
CAMWOOD ON THE LEAVES   1973
COLLECTED PLAYS 1   1973
COLLECTED PLAYS 2   1974
DEATH AND THE KING'S HORSEMEN   1975
MYTH, LITERATURE, AND THE AfricaN WORLD   1976
OGUN ABIBIMAN   1976
AKÉ: THE YEARS OF CHILDHOOD, -Aké - lapsuusvuodet
(suom. Pentti Isomursu, 1983)
  1981
OPERA WONYOSI   1981
THE CRITIC AND SOCIETY   1982
A PLAY OF GIANTS   1984
SIX PLAYS   1984
REQUIEM FOR A FUTUROLOGIST   1985
THIS PAST MUST ADDRESS ITS PRESENT, (Nobel Lecture)   1986
MANDELA'S EARTH AND OTHER POEMS   1988
ART, DIALOGUE AND OUTRAGE: ESSAYS ON LITERATURE AND CULTURE, (rev. 1993)   1988
ÌSARÀ: A VOYAGE AROUND 'ESSAY', - Isara: matka "Esseen" ympäri (suomentanut Seppo Loponen, 1992)   1989
THE CREDO OF BEING AND NOTHINGNESS   1991
FROM ZIA, WITH LOVE   1992
BEYOND THE BERLIN WALL   1993
IBADAN: THE PENKELEMES YEARS   1994
THE BEATIFICATION OF AREA BOY   1995
THE OPEN SORE OF A CONTINENT: A PERSONAL NARRATIVE OF THE NIGERIAN CRISIS   1996
THE BURDEN OF MEMORY, THE MUSE OF FORGIVENESS   1999
KING BAABU   2001
YOU MUST SET FORTH AT DAWN: A MEMOIR   2006