Wole Soyinka Interview (page: 4 / 9) Nobel Prize for Literature	Print Interview

It sounds like your teacher, Mr. Olagbaju, was a big influence in your early life. Who else inspired you as a young person?

Get the Flash Player to see this video. Wole Soyinka: The early influence in my life I think was my father. That's the earliest influence. He and his circle of friends. Usually, in our society, children are supposed to be neither seen nor heard. When elders are around, they're supposed to very respectfully leave them alone. But I was curious. I just loved their debates. They used to get excited over issues, and so somehow I was allowed to eavesdrop, unlike the other children. And I picked up some of the ideas that they had, and I would ask questions. I was known as the questioner. Afterwards, I would ask questions, and my father would indulge me by trying to explain things to me. So that's one of the reasons I consider him the earliest influence. And also, he had a small library, and I used to go into his library and try and read the books which I found there.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. Later on, as my circle of adult acquaintances increased, I think the next influence on me was my uncle, the Reverend I.O. Ransome-Kuti, who was another very erudite person, a great educationist. I used to visit them in Igbein, where he lived with his wife and they ran a school. So on weekends sometimes I would go there. And of course it was the usual story. I wanted to listen to them discussing and so on. Don't misunderstand me. I was also very playful. I loved disappearing by myself, climbing trees, all that I did. But additionally, I was just fascinated by the whole discourse. Exchange of ideas between adults just used to fascinate me for some reason. I was never tired of listening to them. So my uncle was my next great influence.

What books did you enjoy reading as a child?

Wole Soyinka: Oh, I just picked out books. Anything at all. I read catalogues. I read the newspaper, The Egbaland Echo. Among the books, I remember reading the bowdlerized versions of Charles Dickens. Oliver Twist, A Tale of Two Cities, I remember. They were two of my favorites. They were not the full editions. These were bowdlerized versions. And also some plays. I remember I came early in contact with Euripides, and I remember exactly, it was the Medea. I can't say that I fully grasped it, but I certainly read it. It was very fascinating.

So you had an extensive variety of books available to you?

Wole Soyinka: Yes. It wasn't that huge. Of course the Bible was always there. I found the Bible a wonderful piece of literature. I was never a very religious person in childhood, but I read that as well. It wasn't large, it was an eclectic kind of program, but they were sufficiently varied to be of permanent interest to a young child.

You said you weren't very religious as a child, but people around you were. Did that influence you in any way?

Wole Soyinka: Only in a rebellious way.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. First, we had to go to church every Sunday morning -- morning and evening on Sundays. Then there was Sunday school. The various seasons were observed. You know, Easter, Christmas. I enjoyed those seasons, anything to do with festivals was okay by me. And that included the Muslim festivals. Because even though we lived in a Christian missionary compound -- a parsonage, as it was called -- St. Peter's Parsonage, we had Muslim neighbors. And the interaction between the two faiths was quite a normal accommodative communal kind of existence. Not the kind of murderous nonsense you have these days, religious extremists and so on. We celebrated, with the Muslims, their festivals -- the Eid, the Ramadan, et cetera, sometimes even observed part of their fast days. And then there were the traditional religionists, as I said. I learned very early of traditional deities (of the) Yorùbá: Ogun, for instance, God of Iron, the Road, Poetry, et cetera; Shango, God of Lightning.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. I found the traditional religions far more fascinating, because they didn't force me to go to the regular service and dress up and things like that. A bit more relaxed, more humanist in my view. But it didn't mean that I didn't like the other religions either. I was a member of the church choir quite early, because I liked music, and in any case, as a son of the headmaster who was also a deacon. And of course my mother was a very passionate Christian, used to go out evangelizing. So I was expected to also be religious. Well, I had no problem with the choir. I loved singing, loved music, loved the sound of the organ and even enjoyed the processions during the seasonal days. But I never really took to religion, as such. For me, religion was just another aspect, an aspect of the totality of one's existence. I think both my parents tried too hard, so I rebelled quite early and found myself more attuned to a comparative approach to religions, comparative.

You had a nickname for your mother.

Wole Soyinka: Oh, the "Wild Christian?" Oh yes, she was wild as a Christian! She was also wild as a disciplinarian, so somehow, in my head, I used to refer to her mentally as a Wild Christian.

Do you think the diversity of that community, and of all the visitors that came to your family home influenced your perception of culture?

Wole Soyinka: Yes, this is true. If you take the sort of micro-community in my household when I was a child, for instance, we had people from all parts of the country. I remember we had a young Benin boy living with us who was from my father's secular acquaintances. We had somebody from the North at one period. And then outside the compound itself, I couldn't help noticing, in a kind of osmotic way, how even those who did not belong to my father's profession or my mother's profession, the townspeople, somehow they formed a kind of outer perimeter of the immediate micro-community. So it was like the community was constantly expanding outwards. We discussed problems. Problems were brought within, and there was a continuing attention to mutual problems. This created a kind of bond. We felt everybody who came into that micro-community was just part of a larger community. Even when there were disagreements, it was still part of the same community. Looking out for members, looking out for one another, accepting the trials and celebrating the triumphs together. And at the same time, lamenting the setbacks and taking collective remedial action. So that's how I came to absorb that sense of community.

Where do you think your confidence as a child came from?

Wole Soyinka: It's interesting that you should use that word. Traditional society has both its virtues and its drawbacks, like all kinds of cultures. There are sets of values in any community.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. There's a way in which a child is brought up in my society. The first thing is that a child is supposed to be a responsible member of the household. You had your duties, and you had better carry them out. On the other hand, a child, as I said, was supposed to be seen, not heard. In fact, preferably neither seen nor heard. You took instructions and you made yourself available at all times for any kind of extra duties that might be imposed on you. I had no problem carrying out duties. But somehow, as a child, I also insisted on my own space. And sometimes I would go far to find that space, which we were not supposed to do. You're not supposed to leave the house without telling the parents where you were going, or someone in the household. And I'm afraid I didn't take very kindly to over-restriction. So one of the expressions which I remember I would get from my mother was, "You are too overconfident. You are overconfident. That's what your father always says to you, you know. This overconfidence, that's going to kill you one of these days." That kind of a thing. But it made no difference. I just was the way I was.

I found one had to thread one's way through, on the one hand, the recognition in society of the individual stamp of every child. It's a paradox, because even in traditional religion, recognition is given to a child who, as we say, has brought his own head into the world, his personal head. But at the same time, it's not considered healthy for a child to be too individual. So you had to manage to manipulate your way through that.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. A child who appeared introspective was considered to be a possible danger to himself or herself. An effort would be made to draw that child out of that child's habit of solitude, isolation. So I think it has to do with the very unique virtue in Yorùbá society, this threading of balance between the social aspect of the child and a recognition of that unique individual characteristic of the child. But with the balance in favor of the social child. The child is not supposed to desert the community, and if too much of that side is seen, then efforts are made to bring you out of it. They feel there is something wrong with you. Now, I had to fight that as a child. That led to accusations of over-self-confidence, that kind of thing.

Do you think that you were always destined to be an achiever? Do you think that you were different from other kids?

Wole Soyinka: No, I don't think so. I don't think I ever felt different from other kids. I know that I tend to be more passionate about things than others, but beyond that, no. I never felt that I was set apart. No, not at all.

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