50 years on: Remembering Christopher
Okigbo, the Poet with distinction
Gbenro Adesina/Ibadan
The nation’s foremost tertiary
institution, University of Ibadan, UI, was agog; all roads led to the apex
institution. Between 20 and 21 September 2017, the school was beehive of
activities, academics, writers, poets and several others thronged the
institution for a common purpose and goal. That was to celebrate a poet, a
literary icon, Christopher Okigbo who passed on 50 years ago. Okigbo lived
between August 16, 1932 and September 1967, he was a literary giant whose works
live on despite the fact that many of those who terminated his life 50 years
ago had long been forgotten.
The event in form of a conference
was the golden jubilee anniversary of the demise of Okigbo. The conference was
organised by Okigbo Foundation, COF, in collaboration with UI, through her
Departments of English and Classics, Faculty of Arts. In attendance at the
opening ceremony held at the institution’s Trenchard Hall were renowned
literary icons, scholars, publishers, traditional leaders, academics and
socio-cultural groups, family and friends of the deceased.
The conference has the theme:
“Legacy of Christopher Okigbo-50 years.”
Deputy Vice Chancellor, Academic,
UI, Prof. Yinka Aderinto; Prof. Olutayo Charles Adesina, Prof. Olu Obafemi,
Prof. Oluwatoyin Jegede, Prof. Babatunde Omobowale, Prof. Mufutau Temitayo
Lamidi, Prof. Ademola Omobewaji Dasylva, Prof. Dele Layiwola, Prof. Ayo
Ogunsiji, Dr Doyin Aguoru, Dr Kazeem Adebiyi, Dr Tunde Awosanmi, Governor
Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State represented by his Deputy, Chief Moses Adeyemo
Alake; Ambassador Judith Sefi Attah, Kunle Ajibade, Executive Editor of The
News Magazine; Chief Joop Berkhout, Chairman, Safari Books Limited, and Bankole
Olayebi, Director, Bookcraft Limited were among the participants.
Setting the agenda of the day, COF
Chairman, Okey Okuzu, said that the goal of the foundation was to restore to
Okigbo the place he deserved internationally and to further his humanist vision
and ideal through the promotion of contemporary creation in Nigeria and
cultural exchange worldwide.
Addressing the conference, the Vice
Chancellor, UI, Prof. Abel Olayinka, who was represented by the institution’s
Deputy Vice Chancellor, DVC, Administration, Professor Emilolorun Ayelari
described Okigbo as a literary giant, and icon of African literature, who was
famous for his exploits in the genre of poetry.
“He was one of the early African
writers who later came to define what is today known as modern African poetry.
As a member and pioneer of what literary critics today refer to as the Ibadan
School of Poetry, Okigbo is unarguably the crest bearer of his generation of
poets, the generation often described as the modernist or obscurantist. The
University of Ibadan is proud of his contributions to the evolution of this
school.
“Though simultaneously famous and
notorious for his style of versification, some of the major strengths of Okigbo
as a poet were his prophetic vision and capacity for myth-making. As a poet
with prophetic endowment, intimations of the political crises and the Nigerian
civil war had been foreshadowed in his poetry long before the events actually
happened. This prophetic vision is one of the qualities that continues to
endear his works to generations of literary critics and readers of his works.
Even his most inveterate critics recognise this gift of his”, he said.
Olayinka explained: “Perhaps,
Okigbo’s significance as a literary icon is best measured not just by what he
did as a poet, but by the effects of such deeds. His works have continued to
inspire many poets of succeeding generations. His works have also continued to
generate enduring bodies of criticisms, which also continued to enrich African
literary scholarship.
There is no African anthology of poetry devoid of
regional, national or temporal limitations that does not feature Christopher
Okigbo. Okigbo has been listed in Encyclopedias, yearbooks and has been the
subject of many conferences, dissertations, doctoral theses and book length
studies. There is no doubt that UI shares in these achievements since Okigbo
was a product of our prestigious university. This is why the university will
always be interested in sustaining his legacy”.
Delivering a paper titled, “Why
Okigbo Matters,” Prof. Dan Izevbaye provided a description of the poetry of
Okigbo. According to him, Okigbo’s earliest poems, lyrics in ‘The Horn and
Black Orpheus’ published between 1958 and 1961, are modelled mainly on Igbo
musical forms, as well as elements of Latin and Italian poetry. This shows that
Okigbo was not deracinated but cosmopolitan, and also firmly rooted in his
culture of origin. It also shows the central role of music in his composition.”
He said that Okigbo’s poetry and
poetics were shaped by historical necessity in the form of the cultural
encounters that produced the translation of African cultures into their modern
forms. “With the approach of independence in the 1950s and ‘60s, the new
African elite had a choice – to continue from a colonial to a neo-colonial
status, or to seek a distinct identity by re-examining the cultures in which
they function and the institutions that regulated their lives.
The translation
of their European experience into new forms of identities and institution was
the necessary solution to the alternatives of a subaltern status for colonised
cultures, which included their imperfect control of the vehicles of
communication between the cultures of the colonised and the colonisers, with
particular regard to language, worldview, institutions and lifestyles”,
Izevbaye said.
Izevbaye further noted that this
activity of adapting the two sets of inherited forms and institutions into new
ones was evident, not only in the language and worldview of the emergent
African language literature by the generation of Okigbo, Chinua Achebe, John
Pepper Clark and Wole Soyinka, but also in the enabling cultural and
institutional contexts of the literature. This context includes the formation
of new forms of knowledge that were similar in composition to the syncretism of
African Christianity.
Izevbaye pointed out that Okigbo’s
form of poetry was distinct: “The form of his poetry was distinct from those of
his contemporaries with whom he shares many features of this mixing of the
modernity and traditional, only because the process of translating his sources
into the final product was more explicit than usual. The generation and
incubation of his creative forms, an early stage of the creative process, was
stamped on the final product for the reader to see”.
Izevbaye added that Okigbo maximally
utilised ‘The Horn,’ the student creative writing magazine of the English
Department of the University of Ibadan, which was edited by Clark where the
early poems were first published and ‘Black Orpheus,’ an organ of black
cultural awareness and creative edited by Ulli Beier, Soyinka and Ezekiel
Mphahlele, as well as the Mbari Club to bring out his poems out of their
privacy to the knowledge of an audience that was being weaned from the literary
culture of the West. He added that Heinemann was the other important publishing
resource for Okigbo’s poetry, which fulfilled his wish for an international
audience.
He pointed out that Okigbo’s entry
into the field of conflict was an act of heroism, but noted that some did not
see it as such. “But a modern battlefield is more often a field of slaughter
and sacrifice than field of heroes. Sadly, modern warfare and weapons of war
cannot differentiate between a poet and the ordinary soldier. The response by
the literary community to Okigbo’s death ranged from unbelief and grief
culminating in the tributes collected by Achebe in ‘Don’t Let Him Die,’ to the
now infamous fictional trial of the victim set up by Ali Mazrui. Mazrui, was
not, of course, the only dissenter to Okigbo’s choice. Heinemann’s James
Currey, who understandably had a corporate interest in the matter, described
Okigbo as a Biafran major who “went off and got himself killed in Byronic
style, at a road junction”, the scholar added.
According to Izevbaye, “Okigbo’s
poetic development was a progression from the personal exploration of the self
in the early poems, to a re-connection with his community in form of the
religious sacrifice to his domestic gods, followed by a concern with the fate
of suffering heroes like Awolowo and Lumumba, ending with his political
engagement in the last poems preparing him for his heroic sacrifice. The poetry
finally incorporates the heroic element that had not been prominent in the
earlier poetry because it was the product of an age where the heroic ethos was
lacking, bringing out the satirical elements in the last poems”.
Speaking on Okigbo, Prof. Wole
Soyinka said that he was happy when he was told about the programme which would
feature huge feast, lot of talks, reminiscences, and serious literal analysis,
stating that he was equally happy at the aspect of Izevbaye’s paper which
touched on the music aspect of Okigbo.
“Chris used to accompany me on the
piano right here. Chris used to compose musical pieces, short pieces. Chris was
a multivalent person. Chris was a musical person. The soul of Chris was music
and I am glad that aspect of him has been expressed this afternoon”.
He said, “One of the things that was
not known about Chris was that he was a teacher. He was an assistant principal
of Fiditi Grammar School at one time. Chris was one of the genuine renaissance
people of our generation. He was a Poet, musician, gregarious, an activist and
at the same time, a great introvert. I remembered a lot of times we would be
downstairs at Cambridge House, maybe his steward has prepared lunch or snack.
“I would go upstairs and say Chris,
we were all ready now. And I just found Chris in one of those very
contemplative moods, out of that mood, marked down one line of a poetry, which
he would then later on read to me or to us and say I had been busy working on
that particular line at that time. He was not just an armchair activist. He
arrived at a certain point of conviction. I meant putting his life on the line
and not many of us do that. It was the most important legacy”.
Soyinka confided that Christopher
was a chicken thief, stating, “He was a chicken thief. I ate out of it. When he
was teaching in Fiditi, and I used to drive out of campus to go and stay with
him, Chris never had food in his house. He had a little backyard. Chris would
spread grains of corn on a side of the fence. He made a little hole in the
fence. Those chickens would come through the hole and Chris would catch the
chicken, dinner. I confessed, I participated in the eating of the stolen
chicken but I swear I never killed one chicken”.
Speaking, Prof. J. P. Clark, said
that Nigerians were seeking restructuring because there was a need for a
genuine system that would make everyone to have a true sense of belonging. He
said that by joining Biafra army, Okigbo was just asking for the restructuring
of the nation, stressing that ever since the death of Chris, nothing had
changed.
In his paper, titled, “Okigbo, the
Martyr”, Hon. Chudi Offodile lauded the University of Ibadan for nurturing the
most creative and most talented of Nigeria’s post-colonial generation,
including Christopher Okigbo and Prof. Wole Soyinka.
Describing Okigbo as a martyr, as he
died fighting for the freedom of his people of Biafra, Offodile pointed out
that he was relying on the comments of Chinua Achebe in his book, “There was a
Country” and Soyinka’s “The Man Died.” According to him, Achebe described
Okigbo as the finest Nigerian Poet of his generation, noting that he conjured
up for the world, an amazing, haunting, poetic firmament of a wild and violent
beauty.
Achebe, according to Offodile, wrote
that when Okigbo decided to join the Biafran army, he went to a great length to
conceal his plan, making up a story about a secret mission to Europe and that
by the time he saw him two weeks later, he had become a major by special
commission in the Biafran Army.
“On his own part, Soyinka, who was
detained by the Gowon regime on his return to Nigeria wrote from prison: “Of
the many ghosts that haunt me here, the most frequent and welcome are the
ghosts of dead relations, grandfather and the two ghosts of Christopher Okigbo,
Adekunle Fajuyi… Banjo and Alale also visit, but hardly as ghosts”. Soyinka
also recounted an encounter with Okigbo in a police cell in November 1965 which
lasted several hours discussing poetry.”
Offodile noted that because of what
Okigbo considered to be grave injustice suffered by Easterners, with the
declaration of Biafra in May 1967 and the war that followed in July 1967, he
joined the army and headed to the battlefield. Two months into the war, in
September 1967, he was killed in active combat in Nsukka sector and thus, he
was a hero and was honoured posthumously with Biafra’s Medal of Honour.
He contrasted Okigbo’s act with that
of another alumnus of the University of Ibadan, Ukpabi Asika, who was opposed
to Biafra. In his reminiscence, he said that Asika joined the federal side and
accepted the role of Administrator of the defunct East Central state and he
lived and died a Nigerian. Offodile, however, posed some rhetorical questions:
“What if Asika had died in active service during the war, would he have
qualified for martyrdom in the eyes of Nigerians? Is Asika a Nigerian hero? By
the way, who are Nigeria’s heroes?”
Offodile stated further, “Nigeria’s
complicated history frustrates the march to nationhood as different sections of
the country see things differently and oftentimes interpret the same set of
facts differently. There cannot be two sides of truth. An account of events is
either true or false. Our different accounts of historical facts cannot all be
true and that makes the teaching of history rather problematic.
“The solution is not to remove
history as a subject in our school curriculum or to engage in the dangerous
dance of pythons with needless fatalities, but to commit to the universal
ideals of justice and fairness so that even with all our differences, applying
the universal standards of justice, we can begin to pull closer, begin to see
some things the same way and begin to forge a common worldview with the same
heroes. Not different heroes for different ethnicities.”
On his part, Chief Alex Olu Ajayi
reminisced on how, as principal of Fiditi Grammar School in 1958, he brought on
board Okigbo as his vice. This move, according to him, provided the turning
point in Okigbo’s life and was the launching pad from which his poetic soul
leapt, liberated and unbound into the freedom of the muse’s and prolific
productivity of the avant garde he became.
In his address titled “Memories of
Chris Okigbo”, His Majesty Eze Chukwuemeka Ike, who chaired the occasion,
recounted that he knew Christopher in January 1945, some 72 years ago.
Recounting some memories he had with Christopher, he said, “One Sunday, after
morning worship in the admin block, Christopher pleaded with me to accompany
him to our principal’s office. There I was stunned to hear him offer to drive
the principal home in his car, mentioning that I had consented to come along.
Bewildered, Mr. Simpson went red momentarily. To my surprise, he handed the key
to Chris, who started the engine professionally, and drove us smoothly to the
principal’s official residence. While thanking me as we walked back to our
dormitory, Chris mentioned that he had taken me along because I was one of the
principal’s boys”.
“Umuahia taught us to play the game
of cricket with a straight bat. I earned a place in the 1st X1 cricket team by
excelling in the straight bat. When, however, I scored a “pair of spectacles”
in one of our annual cricket matches with Government College, Ibadan, I lost my
place in the 1st X1. Chris, who played the “cross bat”, swimming his bat as the
spirit moved him, became the top scorer. He not only remained in the 1st X1 but
proceeded to win his colours in cricket! Because of his hatred of the subject
Geography, Chris had difficulty finding enough subjects to fit into the
available International Bachelor of Arts (London) programmes then available at
University College, Ibadan. Inspired by the spectacular performances of Mr.
Charles Low, our Australian teacher who was a Classical scholar as well as a
poet and playwright, Chris registered for Latin, Greek, and ancient History.
His brawn and brain saw him through”, he added.
Eze Ike also pointed out that Chris
as an undergraduate published a cyclostyled newspaper which he called ‘Varsity
Weekly,’ which turned out to be a weekly only in name, adding that Chris was
the proprietor, editor, correspondent, marketer and accountant for the newspaper.
He added, “He took copies to the halls of residence. His eyes quickly scanned
each room he entered, and he unobtrusively pulled out the cost of one copy from
any wallet in the room, dropped a copy of the weekly, and left for the next
room”.
The monarch said they were both
pioneer staff of University of Nigeria, Nsukka stating, “The African Writers
Association soon emerged, involving both of us and others including Obi Wali,
Mike Echeruo, et cetera. UNN saw the emergence of Chris as a talented poet with
a unique, unconventional style. He would knock on my outer door at the crack of
dawn, hand my wife an empty beer bottle and spoon, and instruct her to keep the
rhythm, and thereafter invited both of us to listen to what came last night,
namely his latest poem”.
The monarch noted that the outbreak
of the Nigeria/Biafran War in 1967 so touched Chris that he could not resist
the urge to enroll in the Biafran Army, without military training. “I was at
Stanford University, California, USA, from January to December 1966 when, as a
result of the tragedy that befell Eastern Nigerians, Chinua Achebe, Chris, and
many others fled home primarily from Northern and Western Nigeria. Chinua,
Chris, Arthur, named Citadel Press, at Enugu, with Chris as manager. I was to
join them on my return from Stanford. When I learnt that the first enemy air
raid on Enugu had dropped a bomb in the premises of Citadel Press, I drove to
Enugu to size up the situation.
Providentially, Chris, taking a
short break from the war front, was in his office. After giving me a hug, he
described his unconventional troop formations which usually confounded the
enemy. The watch on his wrist belonged to a white mercenary fighting for
Nigeria, killed with a hand grenade lobbed by one of Chris’ courageous boys
into the Nigerian armoured vehicle the mercenary was driving. I noticed your
uniform has no rank, I observed. Yes, Chris replied with a smile. I’m a Major.
If I wear my rank I will be obliged to salute a Lieutenant Colonel for whom I
have no respect”.
Also in a short address, Professor
Kole Omotoso who spoke on “Okigbo, the family Man”, described Okigbo as a
family man in the sense of the family of letters, and the family of writers. “I
was nobody and yet he took this interest in me. He used to talk to me.
Sometimes, he would read a couple of lines in his poetry and go to something
else. He lived in this incredible house in Jericho where the carpet was totally
white and fluffy. Then your fist hesitation is: do you go with your miserable
tyre soled shoe/slippers on this beautiful thing or do you take them off? He
was something close and something distance. He was that kind of person.”
According to Omotoso, the last
discussion he had with Chris was when he asked him when he would be coming back
to Ibadan from the East, “He said he would come back. Of course, he never came
back”.
Former Dean, UI Faculty of Arts,
Professor Remi Raji who spoke on “Okigbo, the Poet”, pointed out that Okigbo’s
name would live for many generations that people would continue to read,
stressing that he remained one of the few poets who have been honoured by his
peers. “He was a highly influential poet whose imprint is seen everywhere”,
Raji added.
The conference was rounded off on
Thursday September 22 with paper presentations on the conference sub-themes
with three panels chaired by Prof. Ayo Banjo, Prof. Dan Izevbaye and Prof.
Abdulrasheed Na’Allah
https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2017/09/22/50-years-on-remembering-christopher-okigbo-the-poet-with-distinction/
