^{Page 171 note 1} See, however, Jackson, Robert H. and Rosberg, Carl G., Personal Rule in Black Africa: prince, autocrat, prophet, tyrant (Berkeley, 1982).Google Scholar

^{Page 171 note 2} For a later account of the oppression of the Guinean people, see novel, Alioum Fantouré's, Le Cercle des tropiques (Paris, 1972). This concludes with a military coup d'état, a fate that was to befall not Sékou Touré, but his heirs within a few days of their succession, on 3 04 1984.Google Scholar

^{Page 171 note 3} Once Nkrumah had fallen, Soyinka refused to join the anti-Nkrumah crowd. According to Gibbs, James, Wole Soyinka (London, 1986), p. 96, when Kongi's Harvest was staged in Accra in 1970, in a production that curried favour with the authorities of the day by stressing the references to the abuses of the Nkrumah régime, Soyinka refused permission and declined the royalties due to him.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

^{Page 172 note 1} Tonton (a familiar variant of uncle in French), a composite of Amin and Bokassa, is the butt of Lopes's, Henri burlesque novel, Le Pleurer-rire (Paris and Dakar, 1982),Google Scholar translated into English by Moore, Gerald as The Laughing Cry: an African cock and bull story (New York, 1987).Google Scholar

^{Page 172 note 2} Nuruddin Farah is commonly referred to as Farah, but that is a western misconception of first and family names.

^{Page 172 note 3} For a detailed account and judicious interpretation of Kongi's Harvest, see Jones, Eldred Durosimi, The Writing of Wole Soyinka (London, 1988 edn.), pp. 100–16.Google Scholar

^{Page 173 note 1} Kongi's Harvest, pp. 1–2.

^{Page 173 note 2} Fall, Aminata Sow, in L'Ex-père de la nation (Paris, 1987),Google Scholar details how the régime of a wellintentioned ruler becomes increasingly repressive. Key to this pattern is that schemes for selfenrichment preoccupy virtually all his political associates, as well as some members of his family. While the population is increasingly alienated, the ruler hears the masses chant his praises, as directed by his associates, who time and again assure him that all is well while the country's economy collapses. The representative of a metropolitan power, a so-called technical adviser, plays the central rôle in abetting corruption, managing misinformation, and organising repression. Achebe, Chinua as well, in his latest novel, Anthills of the Savannah (London, 1987), portrays the selfseeking machinations of the sycophantic members of a military ruler's cabinet, and his transformation into a despot.Google Scholar

^{Page 174 note 1} For a discussion of the relationship between content and stylistic variations across the three novels, see Bardolph, Jacqueline, ‘L'Évolution de l'écriture dans la trilogie de Nuruddin Farah: “Variations sur le théme d'une dictature africaine”’, in Islam et littératures africaines (Paris, 1987), pp. 79–91.Google Scholar

^{Page 175 note 1} According to Booth, James, Writers and Politics in Nigeria (New York, 1981), p. 169,Google ScholarKongi has been discredited, his power destroyed. This interpretation, and the assessment of Soyinka's position that ensues, appears to be based on a misreading of the text. The King happens upon the Organising Secretary in flight and teases him: ‘Ah my son-in-politics, is the Big Ear of his Immortality still flapping high in Kongi's breath?’ The response, ‘Kabiyesi, don't mock a ruined man’, refers to the Secretary himself, rather than, as Booth would have it, Kongi.Google Scholar In earlier passages the King referred to Kongi as his Immortality, to the Secretary as the Big Ear of his Immortality – echoes of Dionysius's ear. Moreover, the flight of the Organising Secretary, and the attempt to take the opposition leaders into exile, attest to Kongi's continued power – see Kongi's Harvest, pp. 49, 54, and 85–90. There would seem to be little reason to share Moore's, Gerald feeling in Wole Soyinka (London, 1978), p. 63,Google Scholar that Kongi is probably finished as a political force. The impact of the play will be different if presented without the final scene, called ‘Hangover’ – wherein the Organising Secretary and the King meet – and instead concludes with Kongi, deserted by his retinue, gasping in horror at the head presented to him. Such a truncated version was presented in the Arts Theatre at the University of Ibadan in 1965 or 1966 – see Berry's, Boyd M. review of Kongi's Harvest in Ibadan, 1966, pp. 23, 53–5,Google Scholar reprinted in Gibbs, James (ed.), Critical Perspectives on Wole Soyinka (Washington, D.C., 1980), pp. 87–9.Google Scholar

^{Page 176 note 1} Sweet and Sour Milk, p. 139.

^{Page 176 note 2} An altogether different response, a heart-rending scream, issues from Tansi's, Sony Labou fantastic novel, La Vie et demie (Paris, 1979). Such can be argued to be the only sane response to the horrors of tyranny, but it is bound to reach only a small intellectual élite.Google Scholar

^{Page 176 note 3} Opera Wonyosi, p. 82.Google Scholar

^{Page 177 note 1} Close Sesame, p. 20.