Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-sh8wx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-19T13:14:07.495Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Greek tragedies in West African adaptations*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2013

Felix Budelmann
Felix Budelmann
Affiliation:
The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Not so many years ago African adaptations of Greek tragedy would have been a most obscure subject for a classicist to write about. But since then, as a result of the everincreasing academic interest in post-colonialism on the one hand, and in the reception of Greek tragedy on the other, a number of discussions have been published, not only by experts in African, and more generally post-colonial literatures, but also by classicists. This article continues their work, focusing in more detail on a narrower, though still large and varied, geographical area: West Africa. Much more work, including work within Africa itself, will be necessary in the future to gain a more complete and nuanced picture. Moreover, I should state clearly that, as a classicist, I have only an incomplete knowledge of African literatures and cultures. Therefore, inevitably, much of what I say can itself only be a starting-point for more. However, I believe that such a start is well worth making, as the plays in question hold considerable interest for classicists.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Cambridge Classical Journal , Volume 50 , 2004 , pp. 1 - 28
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s). Published online by Cambridge University Press 2004

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Appiah, K. A. (1988) ‘An evening with Wole Soyinka’, Black American Literature Forum 22, 777–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Appiah, K. A.(1992) In my father's house: Africa in the philosophy of culture, New York.Google Scholar
Armstrong, R. P. (1976) ‘Tragedy – Greek and Yoruba: a cross-cultural perspective’, Research in African Literatures 7, 23–43.Google Scholar
Asgill, E. J. (1980) ‘African adaptations of Greek tragedies’, African Literature Today 11, 175–89.Google Scholar
Balme, (1999) Decolonizing the stage: theatrical syncretism and post-colonial drama, Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Banham, M. (1985) A critical view on John Pepper Clark's Three plays, London.Google Scholar
Banham, M. et al. (eds) (1994) The Cambridge guide to African and Caribbean theatre, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Bharucha, R. (1990) Theatre and the world: performance and the politics of culture, London and New York.Google Scholar
Bishop, N. (1983) ‘A Nigerian version of a Greek classic: Soyinka's transformation of the Bacchae’, Research in African Literatures 14, 68–80.Google Scholar
Bonneau, D. (1986) ‘From myth to rite’, in Gérard, A. S. (ed.) European-language writing in sub-Saharan Africa, Budapest, 1191–1200.Google Scholar
Bremmer, J. N. (1998) “Religion”, “ritual”, and the opposition “sacred vs. profane”: notes towards a terminological “genealogy”, in Graf, F. (ed.) Ansichten griechischer Rituale: Geburtstags-Symposium für Walter Burkert, Stuttgart and Leipzig, 9–32.Google Scholar
Broich, U. (1997) ‘Postkoloniales Drama und griechische Tragödie’, in Flashar, H. (ed.) Tragödie: Idee und Transformation, Stuttgart and Leipzig, 332–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brunkhorst, M. (1995) ‘Fugard, Soyinka und die attische Tragödie: über die Bedingungen der Möglichkeit eines Konzeptes von Weltliteratur’, in Schmeling, M. (ed.) Weltliteratur heute: Konzepte und Perspektive, Würzburg, 29–48.Google Scholar
Brunkhorst, M. (1998) ‘Rituale der Grausamkeit – Traditionen des Widerstands: Antikenrezeption bei Ted Hughes, Wole Soyinka und Athol Fugard’, in Hölz, K. et al. (eds) Antike Dramen – neu gelesen, neu gesehen, Frankfurt, 119–36.Google Scholar
Budelmann, F. (forthcoming), ‘Trojan Women in Yorubaland: ‘Femi Osofisan's Women of Owu in Hardwick, L., Dowson, T. and Gillespie, C. (eds.) Classics in post-colonial worlds.Google Scholar
Calame, C. (1991) ‘Mythe' et “rite” en Grèce: des categories indigènes?’, Kernos, 4, 179–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, J. P. (1973) ‘Aspects of Nigerian drama’, in Killam, G. D. (ed.) African writers on African writing, London, 19–32.Google Scholar
Conradie, P. J. (1990) ‘Syncretism in Wole Soyinka's play “The Bacchae of Euripides”, South African Theatre Journal 4, 61–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Costello, M. L. (1981) ‘Greek drama and the African world: a study of three African dramas in the light of Greek antecedents’, PhD thesis, University of Southern California.Google Scholar
Crow, B. and Banfield, C. (1996) An introduction to post-colonial theatre, Cambridge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dominik, W. J. (1999) s.v. ‘Africa’, in Der Neue Pauly, vol. 13.Google Scholar
Dunton, C. (1992) Make man talk true: Nigerian drama in English since 1970, London.Google Scholar
Easterling, P. E. (1993) ‘Tragedy and ritual’, in Scodel, R. (ed.) Theater and society in the classical world, Ann Arbor, 7–23.Google Scholar
Echeruo, M. J. C. (1973) ‘The dramatic limits of Igbo ritual’, Research in African Literatures 4, 21–31.Google Scholar
Edgal, S. F. (1958) ‘Why and how the classics should be taught in West Africa’, in Ferguson, J. (ed.) Nigeria and the classics: papers read at the second conference on classics organised by the Department of Extra-Mural Studies in collaboration with the Department of Classics and the Classical Association of Nigeria…, Ibadan.Google Scholar
Enekwe, O. O. (1985) ‘Interview with Ola Rotimi’, Okike 25, 36–42.Google Scholar
Etherton, M. (1982) The development of African drama, London.Google Scholar
Fischer-Lichte, E. et al. (eds) (1990) The dramatic touch of difference: theatre, own and foreign, Tubingen.Google Scholar
Gibbs, J. et al. (1986) Wole Soyinka: a bibliography of primary and secondary sources, Westport, 55–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilbert, H. (ed.) (1999) (Post)colonial stages: critical and creative views on drama, theatre and performance, Hebden Bridge (UK).Google Scholar
Gilbert, H. and Tompkins, J. (1996) Post-colonial drama: theory, practice, politics, London and New York.Google Scholar
Gödde, S. (2000) ‘Zu einer Poetik des Rituals in Aischylos' Persern’, in Gödde, S. and Heinze, T. (eds.) Skenika: Beiträge zum antiken Theater und seiner Rezeption: Festschrift zum 65. Geburtstag von Hans-Dieter Blume, Darmstadt, 31–47.Google Scholar
Graf, F. (1991) ‘Prayer in magic and religious ritual’, in Faraone, C. and Obbink, D. (eds.) Magika hiera: ancient Greek magic and religion, New York and Oxford, 188–213.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graham-White, A. (1974) The drama of black Africa, London and New York.Google Scholar
Hardwick, L. (2003) Reception studies, Greece & Rome New Surveys in the Classics 33, Oxford.Google Scholar
Hardwick, L. (2004) ‘Greek drama and anti-colonialism: decolonising classics’, in Hall, E., Macintosh, F. and Wrigley, A.. (eds.) Dionysus since '69, Oxford, 219–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howe, S. (1998) Afrocentrism: mythical pasts and imagined homes, London and New York.Google Scholar
Innes, C. (1981) Holy theatre: ritual and the avant garde, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Jeyifo, B. (1978) ‘Books: some corrective myths for the misguided native and the arrogant alien’, Positive Review 1.1, 15–16.Google Scholar
Jeyifo, B. (ed.) (2002) Modern African drama. New York and London.Google Scholar
Jones, E. D. (1988) The writing of Wole Soyinka (3rd edn.), London.Google Scholar
Katrak, K. H. (1986) Wole Soyinka and modern tragedy: a study of dramatic theory and practice. New York.Google Scholar
King, B. (ed.) (1992) Post-colonial English drama: commonwealth drama since 1960, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krummen, E. (1998) ‘Ritual und Katastrophe: Rituelle Handlung und Bildersprache bei Sophokles und Euripides’, in Graf, F. (ed.) Ansichten griechischer Rituale. Geburtstags-Symposium für Walter Burkert, Stuttgart and Leipzig, 296–325.Google Scholar
Lefèvre, A. (1986) ‘Changing the code: Soyinka's ironic aetiology’, in Gérard, A. S. (ed.) European-language writing in sub-Saharan Africa, Budapest, 1201–10.Google Scholar
Macintosh, F. (2001) ‘Oedipus in Africa’, Omnibus 42, 8–9.Google Scholar
Masolo, D. A. (1994) African philosophy in search of identity, Bloomington.Google Scholar
McDonald, M. (2000) ‘Black Dionysus: Greek tragedy from Africa’, in Hardwick, L. et al. (eds) Theatre ancient and modern, Milton Keynes, 95–108, and electronically at http://www.open.ac.uk/Arts/CC99/.Google Scholar
Mirecki, P. and Meyer, M. (eds.) (2002) Magic and ritual in the ancient world, Leiden.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Okpewho, I. (1983) Myth in Africa: a study of its aesthetic and cultural relevance, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Okpewho, I. (1999) ‘Soyinka, Euripides, and the anxiety of empire’, Research in African Literatures 30, 32–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Olaniyan, T. (1995) Scars of conquest / masks of resistance: the invention of cultural identities in African, African-American, and Caribbean drama. New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Osofisan, F. (1982) ‘Ritual and the revolutionary ethos: the humanistic dilemma in contemporary Nigerian theatre’, Okike 22, 72–81.Google Scholar
Osofisan, F. (1999) Recent outings comprising Tegonni, an African Antigone and Many colours make the thunder-king, Ibadan.Google Scholar
Pavis, P. (ed.) (1996) The intercultural performance reader, London.Google Scholar
Richards, S. L. (1996) Ancient songs set ablaze: the theater of Femi Osofisan, Washington.Google Scholar
Rubin, D. et al. (eds) (1997) The world encyclopaedia of contemporary theatre: Africa, London.Google Scholar
Schein, S. (1977) ‘Wole Soyinka: The Bacchae of Euripides. A communion rite’, CW 70, 403.Google Scholar
Seanu, K. (1980) ‘The exigencies of adaptation: the case of Soyinka's Bacchae’, in Gibbs, J. (ed.) Critical perspectives on Wole Soyinka, London, 108–12.Google Scholar
Smith, E. W. and Dale, A. M. (1920) The Ila-speaking peoples of Northern Rhodesia, London.Google Scholar
Sotto, W. (1985) The rounded rite: a study of Wole Soyinka's play The Bacchae of Euripides, Lund.Google Scholar
Soyinka, W. (1973a) The Bacchae of Euripides, London.Google Scholar
Soyinka, , (1973b) Collected plays I, London.Google Scholar
Soyinka, , (1976) Myth, literature and the African world, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Soyinka, , (1988) Art, dialogue and outrage: essays on literature and culture, Ibadan.Google Scholar
Soyinka, , (1998) Early poems, New York.Google Scholar
Tiffin, H. (1987) ‘Post-colonial literatures and counter-discourse’, Kunapipi 9, 17–34.Google Scholar
Viswanathan, G. (1989) Masks of conquest: literary study and British rule in India, New York.Google Scholar
Wetmore, K. J. (2002) The Athenian sun in an African sky: modern African adaptations of classical Greek tragedy, Jefferson, North Carolina, and London.Google Scholar
Wiles, D. (2000) Greek theatre performance: an introduction, Cambridge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wren, R. M. (1991) Those magical years: the making of Nigerian literature at Ibadan: 1948–1966, Washington.Google Scholar
Wright, D. (1993) Wole Soyinka revisited, New York.Google Scholar