Soyinka Celebrated by the World at 80

 
Source: Linda Ikeji

Today marks the 80th birthday of a great Nigeria Scholar, Playwright and Essayist, Wale Soyinka. Wale Soyinka was born on July 13, 1934, at Ogun state, Nigeria.

Professor Wale Soyinka is the Africa’s first Nobel Laureate in Literature. Today, he is being celebrated by literati and arts enthusiasts round the world for his outstanding contribution in the world of literature and art.

Today, which marks the birthday of the great writer, most of his play are being displayed around the world.

In Nigeria, most of his works will be exhibited today. There will be exhibition tours of his play at certain places like Abeokuta, Osogbo, Port Harcourt, Lagos and Jos.

Some of Wale Soyinka's works include Alapata Apata, Death and the King’s Horseman, Madmen and Specialist, Dance of the Forest, Lanke Omu and Oba Koso, The Swamp Dwellers, A play of Giants, Kongi’s Harvest, Requiem for a Futurologist, Season of Anomy, A Dance of the Forest to The Lion and the Jewel among numerous others.

The no-nonsense man,

Wale Soyinka, has suggested many solutions to challenges in Nigeria. The president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Goodluck Jonathan, congratulated Prof. Soyinka for making 80 years today.

This is the man that sometime rejected the award offered to him by the Nigeria government.

Why did he reject the award offered to him by the Government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria? He did so because the former president of Nigeria, in the person of President Sani Abacha, was also given award in that occasion. Former President Sani Abacha who died in sit by unknown cause plotted to assassin Soyinka because Soyinka usually told him the truth about his (the former president) bad government either through writing or public speaking.