Okot p”Bitek and the identity of Africa

Okot p’Bitek the great Ugandan poet was born in 1931 in Gulu, Northern Uganda to Acholi Christian parents. He died in 1982. His three collections of poetry; Song of Lawino 1966, Song of Ocol 1970, and Two Songs 1971 are considered to be amongst the best African poetry of all times. From early in his life, Okot gradually became aware of the conflict between African and European traditions. The climax of it was when he enrolled at Oxford to study anthropology in the 1960’s. In his very first lecture, the teacher kept referring to Africans and non Western people as barbarians, savages and primitive tribes. This greatly angered Okot that he began to employed his mind into trying to understand the real value and dignity of African people and particularly the Acholi. Okot changed his study focus from Anthropology to the Oral literature of the Acholi. Orature involved exploring the songs, rituals, and culture from inside the Acholi because Okot strongly felt that Africa had been studied by European anthropologists from outside and had been wrongly condemned as savage. He also founded the Gulu festival in which different traditional musical groups from all Uganda came to perform. That is when he wrote and published the well known long series called Song Of Lawino. It is a hilarious poem that teaches through laughter. His first collection, Song of Lawino, addresses the issue of the conflict of cultures which became an outstanding theme in African Literature across the continent. It is good for loud and public reading. Song of Lawino is the lament of a non literate woman over the strange ways of her university educated husband, whose new ways are incompatible with traditional African concepts of manhood. The main character, Lawino musically laments the cultural death of her western educated husband called Ocol. In one moment she says about Ocol: “You say I do not know the letter A Because I have not been to school And I have not been baptized. I do not understand The ways of foreigners But I do not despise their Customs. Why should you despise yours?” That last line is critical in her philosophical thrust; do not despise your own customs because it is not our way to despise other people’s customs. Lawino also attacks the mental colonisation of her husband through extensive reading of foreign books: “My husband has read much, He has read extensively and Deeply. He has read among white men And he is clever like white men And reading Has killed my man, In the ways of his people He has become A stump.” This means that western education has a tendency of moving Africans from what they know to what they know not. In an even more daring stance, she says the following about the effects of western education on African young men: “Their testicles Were smashed With big books” This sounds philosophical, but looked at closely, it is practical. Book knowledge has made the black man to be dead and ineffective. Through education, black men are becoming more deskbound and less rigorous in the homestead as in the marital bed itself! According to Lawino, the idea of the study and its huge bookshelves tend to turn the home into a forest, meaning that there is not much that the African can see clearly since he is using borrowed senses: “My husband’s house Is dark forest of books. Some stand there Tall and huge Like the tido tree Some are old Their barks are peeling off And they smell strongly. Some are thin and soft. The backs of some books Are hard like the rocky stem of the poi tree, Some are green Others red as blood Some books are black and oily, Their backs shine like The dangerous ororo snake Coiled on a tree top.” These foreign books have now taken the eerie and awkward place of spooks and even evil spirits as known in traditional African society: “Some have pictures on their backs, Dead faces of witch-looking men and women, Unshaven, bold, fat-stomached Bony-cheeked, angry revengeful- looking people, Pictures of men and women Who died long ago.” Apart from that, Lawino abhors European dances and manners and says that they are mere awkward moves that promote immorality and very poor hygiene: “I cannot dance ball room I feel ashamed Being held so tightly in public… Women throw their arms Around the necks of their Partners And put their cheeks On the cheeks of their men. Men hold the waists of the Women tightly, tightly…” The other folly of Ocol, is that after becoming western educated, she forsakes his wife and chooses another woman (Clementine) who takes over Lawino’s place. Clementine is the western woman whom Lawino prefers. Lawino becomes very bitter: “Ocol is no longer in love with the old type. He is in love with a modern girl; The name of the beautiful one Is Clementine. Brother, when you see Clementine! The beautiful one aspires To look like a white woman; Her lips are red-hot Like glowing charcoal, She resembles the wild cat That has dipped its mouth in blood, Her mouth is like raw yaws It looks like an open ulcer, Like the mouth of a fiend! Tina dusts powder on her face And it looks so pale; She resembles the wizard Getting ready of the midnight dance;” Lawino says she is not against competition as African tradition says women should comete over men. She is very clear on the matter and says: “I do not block my husband’s path From his new wife. If he likes, let him build for her An iron roofed house on the hill! I do not complain, My grass thatched house is enough for me. I am not angry With the woman with whom I share my husband. I do not fear to compete with her. All I ask Is that my husband should stop the insults, My husband should refrain From heaping abuses on my head. He should stop being half-crazy, And saying terrible things about my mother.” This poem was originally written in Acholi and was meant to be performed on stage and not to be read or studied quietly. In the Acholi tradition, songs are meant to be performed to a responsive audience on a particular occasion. Poetry is or a specific purpose and is accompanied by several traditional instruments. Acholi poetry is divided into children’s songs, historical songs, funeral songs, satirical and spiritual possession songs. Coming together, these songs should for a festival. It is said that Okot’s mother was aware of the creation of Song of Lawino. She encouraged Okot to stick to Acholi traditions. As a result, the common symbols of Okot’s poetry are Acholi, as seen in the horn, the spear, the pumpkin, the bull and the cave. Among the Acholi, the horn is not only a musical instrument but also a ritual object connected with the initiation into adulthood. In ceremonies young men blow their horns as signalling their individuality. Lawino speaks of her fame that spreads like the sound of a horn. The bull is a symbol for bravery and respect. The spear has ritual essences. A man is never buried without his spear. It symbolises the male organ and a man’s virility. Other sexual symbols in Song of Lawino are the hoe, the knife and the battle axe. The pumpkin represents the home front, survival and settlement. And that is why she says: “Listen, my husband, You are the son of a Chief. The pumpkin in the old homestead Must not be uprooted!” That saying is packed. It dwells on the importance of looking after values that last. It is considered a wise move among the Acholi to leave the pumpkin plant alone even when people are moving to a new homestead. Although he wrote in English, Okot relied for his success on the right choice of words because he thought that it is not language as such that matters but the way in which one handles language. Although Okot uses English, he deliberately looks at the world from an Acholi standpoint. Clementine’s painted lips are referred to as “red hot like glowing charcoal” and she is said to resembles “the wild cat.” Ash dirt is useless and is trampled upon. Glowing charcoal is dangerous and harmful. A wild cat represents abandonment homelessness. Lawino describes what she sees and the way she sees it. She sees no beauty in Clementine. She suggests that beauty is relative and not absolute. “What is yours is what is good,” she argues. Okot’s poetry is therefore communal. The ‘I’ in Song of Lawino is equivalent to ‘We.’ This is traditional Literature. It is different from Euro modern Literature in which poets and writers are isolated introverts who are individualised in approach. Okot’s poetry, as stated by Achebe, is a literature that speaks to a particular people with a specific history and dynamics. For instance, the bull, the dog, the goat and the guinea fowl represent specific meaning in East Africa. Lawino insists on traditional African beauty. This is a beauty that transcends the flesh and looks. It encompasses good manners, hard work and hospitality. Beauty is both flesh and mind. Love is not just mental but is about concrete social actions. That is why the village boys compete for Lawino. One of the fundamental issues in Song of Lawino is about being connected to the past and present. There is organic connection to the ancestors to the bulls in the family and to the life giving plants like the pumpkin. There is also anger against the political elite who have abandoned the people. Song of Lawino is a very rich poem, addressing important issues affecting post independence Africa. The poems is a satirical comment on the neo-colonial mentality of the African petty bourgeoisie -the intellectuals and political leaders who seem to be running away from their identity. The poem deliberately uses the literary device of a female character to address issues that were facing Africa at the time. When Okot p’Bitek wrote this poem, many African countries had recently been liberated and there was a question whether or not Africa should keep its African values or look to the West for new ideals. Song of Lawino, after publication, was quickly translated into other languages and is more known for its scathing attempt in the exposure of how African society was being destroyed by the colonization of Africa. That is why the final part of Song of Lawino is actually full of sympathy: “Forgive me, brother, Do not think I am insulting The woman with whom I share my husband! Do not think my tongue Is being sharpened by jealousy. It is the sight of Tina That provokes sympathy from my heart.” Memory Chirere