I never knew he is late

pyyxxaro:
The Gods are not to blame

Now

The Gods are to Blame

No, the gods are still not to blame
How many of your actions did you seek direction from God before doing them ? God said in the bible that your ways are not my way.
you fail then blame God for action.

One of my favorite novels

OUR HUSBAND HAS GONE MAD AGAIN is actually my favourite

[quote author=kunyeo post=55527441]

It is a play sir,not a novel!

Don't talk when your elders are talking, The Gods Are Not To Blame is a 1968 play and a 1971 novel by Ola Rotimi.

Tolulopefinest:
He also wrote OUR HUSBAND HAS GONE MAD AGAIN

I like this more

#BigManWithAnAlmightyGod

Bibi294:
OUR HUSBAND HAS GONE MAD AGAIN is actually my favourite

Women and husband!

I can never ever in my life time forget these book.. The gods are not to blame.. indeed after much reading you will come to understand the gods were not to be blamed.

Many indomie-generation children will ignore this thread as long as its not about Efe, Tboss, Davido, Cossy's breasts and Oge Okoye's stolen dog pictures.

We have lost our reading culture. So disheartening.
Happy post-humous birthday to one of Africa's greatest playwright who so deftly adapted Sophocles' " Oedipus Rex" to the African reality.

Splashme:


Women and husband!

I don't understand... What's the relationship between liking a play and being a woman... Doh* in Edo voice

justi4jesu:
"The gods are not to blame" very interesting NOVEL in my secondary school days.. This DRAMA will forever ."[/b]

My sister what are you saying? Asin words in capital

Legendary... Rest on sir

[quote author=justi4jesu post=55524556]"The gods are not to blame" very interesting novel in my secondary school days.. This drama will forever be one of my all time favorite and not to talk of its beautiful quotes

Some proverbs i can remember after we acted the play.

There is a difference between Drama and novel.... Novel is under Prose

CzarChris:
the book "Gods are not to blame" is a plagiarized version of the Greek mythological story of Oedipus who killed his father and married his father. Originality is always an issue.

Like I knew someone would bring this up.
BTW, it was written in the preface of the book that it was an adaptation.
It was a good adaptation tho

CzarChris:
the book "Gods are not to blame" is a plagiarized version of the Greek mythological story of Oedipus who killed his father and married his father. Originality is always an issue.

He didn't plagiarise sir. He adapted it.

pyyxxaro:
The Gods are not to blame

Now

The Gods are to Blame

u took the words out of my mouth
weldone Sir

Destiny cannot be averted and no human efforts can change what is ordained.


A didactic, daring and a book filled with troubling truths.....The gods are not to blame

Azeequeen:
You cannot avert your destiny

You will kill your father and marry your mother and it came to pass

The gods are not to blame still remains one of my favourite African novel till date

CzarChris:
the book "Gods are not to blame" is a plagiarized version of the Greek mythological story of Oedipus who killed his father and married his father. Originality is always an issue.

This.
Let's call it an adaptation. Several authors the world over remixed Sophocles' Oedipus Rex. Good work by Mr. Rotimi overall, but it unfairly takes away from his other fantastic Our Husband has gone Mad Again.

Jobos:

No, the gods are still not to blame
How many of your actions did you seek direction from God before doing them ? God said in the bible that your ways are not my way.
you fail then blame God for action.

I said GODS not GOD

well written play by the master himself....its one of those books i like reading over and over again

One of my all - time favourites. "You bed-sharer"!

THE MOD ARE NOT TO BE BLAME, PLS NA JOKE..O

See more details on Ola Rotimi.
May his gentle soul continue to rest in peace.

Born Olawale Gladstone Emmanuel Rotimi 13 April 1938 at Sapele, Delta State, Nigeria;
Died 18 August 2000 (aged 62)
Occupation: Playwright, director. head of department of creative arts at the University of Port Harcourt, Lecturer at Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria; has also served as visiting professor, playwright, and director in Germany and Italy, as well as at DePauw University and Wabash College.
Nationality: Nigerian
Ethnicity: Yoruba
Period: 1938–2000
Notable works: The Gods Are Not To Blame, Ovonramwen Nogbaisi, and The Epilogue

Olawale Gladstone Emmanuel Rotimi, best known as Ola Rotimi (13 April 1938 – 18 August 2000),[1] was one of Nigeria's leading playwrights and theatre directors. He has been called "a complete man of the theatre – an actor, director, choreographer and designer – who created performance spaces, influenced by traditional architectural forms."[2]


Early life

Rotimi was the son of Samuel Gladstone Enitan Rotimi a Yoruba steam-launch engineer (a successful director and producer of amateur theatricals)[3] and Dorcas Adolae Oruene Addo an Ijaw drama enthusiast. He was born in Sapele, Nigeria;[4] cultural diversity was a recurring theme in his work. He attended St. Cyprian's School in Port Harcourt from 1945 to 1949, St Jude's School, Lagos, from 1951 to 1952 and the Methodist Boys High School in Lagos, before travelling to the United States in 1959 to study at Boston University, where he obtained a BA in fine arts. In 1965, he married Hazel Mae Guadreau, originally from Gloucester; Hazel also studied at Boston University, where she majored in opera, voice and music education. In 1966 he obtained an MA from Yale School of Drama,[nb 1] where he earned the distinction of being a Rockefeller Foundation scholar in playwriting and dramatic literature.[nb 2]

Theatrical career

Rotimi often examined Nigeria's history and local traditions in his works. His first plays, To Stir the God of Iron (produced 1963) and Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again (produced 1966; published 1977), were staged at the drama schools of Boston University and Yale, respectively.
Later years

Upon returning to Nigeria in the 1960s, Rotimi taught at the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University), where he founded the Ori Olokun Acting Company,[5] and Port Harcourt. Owing, in part, to political conditions in Nigeria, Rotimi spent much of the 1990s living in the Caribbean and the United States, where he taught at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. In 2000 he returned to Ile-Ife where he lectured in Obafemi Awolowo University till his demise. Hazel (his wife) died in May 2000, only a couple of months before Rotimi's death.

His later dramas include The Gods Are Not to Blame (produced 1968; published 1971), a retelling of Sophocles' Oedipus Rex[5] in imaginative verse; Kurunmi and the Prodigal (produced 1969; published as Kurunmi, 1971), written for the second Ife Festival of Arts; Ovonramwen Nogbaisi (produced 1971; published 1974), about the last ruler of the Benin empire; and Holding Talks (1979).

Later plays, such as If: A Tragedy of the Ruled (1983) and Hopes of the Living Dead (1988), premiered at the University of Port Harcourt and was a common play in OAU Drama Department. The radio play Everyone His/Her Own Problem, was broadcast in 1987. His book African Dramatic Literature: To Be or to Become? was published in 1991.

Rotimi, a patriot who shunned the attraction of the West and Europe and returned home to contribute his own quota to nation building, was a rare breed. Diminutive in size but a giant in drama in Africa, he was one of the best things that could have happened to the literary community.

His dream of directing a play of 5000 cast members materialised at the Amphi Africa Theater when he was being put to rest as the crowd was drawn to a manuscript of the day's program outline. People made dramatic entry and exit to the stage around his casket with the man turning his casket.

Rotimi spent the second half of his last creative decade reworking two of his plays – Man Talk, Woman Talk and also Tororo, Tororo, Roro – and the result, unpublished at the time of his death in 2002, have now been published under the title The Epilogue. The two plays were probably meant as an epilogue to both Rotimi's theatrical and comic careers, which span the entire spectrum of his career.

It is comical and the language used is a version of "Nigerian English" (for example: "Se you get?" "I called God on him".

The works are also a social satire and this publication will spur renewed interest in his satires. Rotimi is sure to be remembered as a model in the literary genre whose views have shaped the conduct of the theatre and whose plays have demonstrated the power of drama to shape the thinking of the society and attempted to solve some of the problems encountered in everyday living.

Plays

(1963) To Stir the God of Iron
(1966) Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again—depicts the cocoa farmer and businessman Lejoka-Brown as a self-seeking, opportunistic leader who could make better contributions to his country outside of the political arena.
(1968) The Gods Are Not To Blame—an adaptation of the Greek classic Oedipus Rex; the main character gets trapped by pride, ignorance and the caprices of the divinities.
(1969) Kurunmi
(1970) Holding Talks
(1971) Ovonramven Nogbaisi—the title character simply luxuriates in the grandeur of his office. Although he is a custodian of culture who inspires people, he does not actively participate in their struggles.
(1973) Grip Am
(1973) Invitation into Madness
(1977) Akassa Youmi*
(1979) If: A Tragedy of the Ruled—in If, the young firebrand Hamidu is nowhere to be found when a real commitment is required.
(1985) Hopes of The Living Dead—Rotimi here depicts a different kind of leader: a selfless, result-oriented, committed leadership complemented by a followership that believes in the good of the generality of its members through the application of itself to the cause that is beneficial.
When the Criminals Become Judges

The Epilogue: Two unpublished plays of Ola Rotimi

Man Talk, Woman Talk

Man Talk, Woman Talk is humorous, as quintessential comedies from the author can be. He makes use of wry humour to seek a level playing ground for resolution of the biases men and women nurse about one another and which affect mutual co-existence of the two. The scene is a court though devoid of the usual technicalities of court rooms. Instead of legal jargon, there is humour, arguments and counter arguments. What the author arrives at is not to prove which gender is superior but to show the complementary roles of men and women. There is a great deal of wit in the work and the setting here is the university environment where the youthful contenders are idealistic.

Tororo, Tororo, Roro

Tororo, Tororo, Roro is a coincidental meeting of two fellows from Man Talk, Woman Talk, Tunji Oginni and Philomena James. Both run Hotel Kilimanjaro with different motives and a chance meeting between them elicits lessons as both share each other’s problems.

Performances

First performed in Nigeria in 1968, The Gods Are Not To Blame was produced at the Arcola Theatre in Hackney, London, in 2005. Femi Elufowoju Jr had his first theatre experience in 1975, at the age of 11, when he saw a revival of this very play, performed in a reconstructed Greek amphitheatre at a university campus in Ife; and brought it to the UK shores as a British leading theatre director under the company name Tiata Fahodzi[6]

His last production was a staging of Man Talk, Woman Talk at the French Institute in Lagos, Nigeria. He also produced Tororo Tororo roro, a play of the Absurd, as a convocation play.
Textual sources
Style

For Man Talk, Woman Talk, directorial approach must have fluidity which will allow for creativity of the actors. The technicalities of the stage should be carefully applied in such a way that they will kill expected boredom associated with court scenes for if not done, the whole dramatic in the act will be flattened out. It might do the play a favour if it is given the kind of approach Ola Rotimi himself used in the directing of the premiere of the play. It is the technique that allows a kind of participatory interaction; the one that accommodates the audience contribution.

Awards

Rotimi was awarded two Fulbright Scholarships.


Plays and literature

Kurunmi[nb 3]
The Gods Are Not To Blame[nb 4]
Ovọnramwẹn Nọgbaisi[nb 5]
Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again[nb 6]
Holding Talks[nb 7]
If: A Tragedy of the ruled[nb 8]
Understanding "The Gods Are Not to Blame"[nb 9]
Hopes of the Living Dead[nb 10]
Viandanti della storia[nb 11]%
African Dramatic Literature
Playwriting and Directing in Nigeria
The Epilogue[nb 12]

Books, essays and political commentary

Books

A Dictionary of Nigerian Pidgin English: with an introductory survey of the history, linguistics and socio-literary functions
Introduction to Nigerian literature[nb 13]%
The Living Culture of Nigeria[nb 14]%
A translation of the play "The Gods Are Not to Blame" into Setswana[nb 15]†
Statement towards August '83-[nb 16]
The Masquerade in Nigerian history and culture[nb 17]*%
An interview (1975) with Ola Rotimi, Senior Research Fellow, Institute of African Studies, University of Ifẹ, Ile Ifẹ[nb 18]
Diversity of Creativity in Nigeria*
African Theatre in Performance%
Akassa you mi
Issues in African Theatre

Articles

"Conversation with Ola Rotimi"
"How the kingfisher learned fear"
"Review of: Kiabàrà: Journal of the Humanities 1" (June 1978)
"Through whom the spirits breathe"
"The trials of African literature"
"Everyone his/her own problem"
"No direction home"

Archival material and ebooks

Archival material

Papers[nb 19]*
African Papers, 1963, 1968–1989
Gbe'ku De:pièce en 1 acte

ebooks

Initiation into Madness
Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again
If
Holding Talks
Hopes of the Living Dead
Grip Am
Akassa you mi
Kurunmi
Ovonramwen Nogbaisi

In 2015 Society of Young Nigerian Writers under the leadership of Wole Adedoyin founded Ola Rotimi Literary Society(www.olarotimiliterarysociety..com) aim at promoting and reading the works of Ola Rotimi.

Source: Wikipedia The free Encyclopedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ola_Rotimi. Accessed Thursday 13th April, 2017.

How to Apply for NLNG Prize for Science – 2017 [The Prize:$100, 000] CLICK HERE TO APPLY NOW

CzarChris:
the book "Gods are not to blame" is a plagiarized version of the Greek mythological story of Oedipus who killed his father and married his father. Originality is always an issue.

U know wetin plagiarism mean abi u just wan open mouth? The mythology u speak of inspired it. Finish. So if I write about the Chibok girls na plagiarism abi? Anybody fit draw inspiration from anywhere abeg.

Only true genius could have taken Greek mythology and masterfully turned it into a Yoruba story that looked so original. Too bad he didn't live as long as some. But I am thankful for his works. Fusion of poetry and drama in a manner almost everyone can appreciate is something only few can do.

The struggles of man begins at birth; it is meet then that our play begins with. The birth of a child... The place is the land of Kutuje. I kept quoting from this book till I ended up being called Ojuola.
My favorite character was baba Fakunle... truthful at all times....

CzarChris:
the book "Gods are not to blame" is a plagiarized version of the Greek mythological story of Oedipus who killed his father and married his father. Originality is always an issue.

Have you eaten today?

BoboYekini:


This.
Let's call it an adaptation. Several authors the world over remixed Sophocles' Oedipus Rex. Good work by Mr. Rotimi overall, but it unfairly takes away from his fantastic Our Husband has gone Mad Again.

Another favorite of mine