The Black African Theatre and Its Social Functions by Bakary Traoré (review)

Abstract

244 BOOK REVIEWS consider the possibility of a special permanent repertory company, but that the idea influenced his writing to this extent is most improbable. One might just as plausibly argue that he created all his dark eyed "poet figures" for the same actor. Professor Bogard is on much firmer and more characteristic ground when he says that the resemblances reflect the inner unity of O'Neill's work at that period (p. 386). Professor Bogard has not completely avoided the pitfalls of his search for continuity, then; his concern with O'Neill the man leads him away from the texts a little towards the end; and his admiration for the last plays makes him undervalue and, in my opinion, occasionally misinterpret O'Neill's expressionism . But these are merely the shallow obverse of a superbly organized, comprehensive, and illuminating study in depth, which must replace all previous studies as the major critical book on O'Neill. BRIAN PARKER University of Toronto THE BLACK AFRICAN THEATRE AND ITS SOCIAL FUNCTIONS, by Bakary Traore. Trans. and with a Preface by Dapo Adelugba. Ibadan: Ibadan University Press, 1972. xvii & 130 pp. $5.50. Traore's comments were first published in 1959 in Presence Africaine as "Le Theatre Negro-Africain," and were, in fact, written the year before that. As Dapo Adelugba suggests in his Preface, this gap of a decade and a half has been filled by a range of activity in African, particularly West African, theatre, that Traore hardly anticipated, though Adelugba helpfully includes Traore's 1970 essay "Les Tendances Actuelles dans Ie Theatre Africain" to balance the account. Traore's concentration upon the French speaking theatre of the 1950s is perfectly logical, and indeed it is interesting to be reminded of the enormous impact that L'Ecole William Ponty - "a real laboratory for theatrical experiment" as he describes it - had upon the drama of the old French colonial territories in Africa. But against contemporary developments and research Traore's comments are often seen to be inadequate. He makes some rather hopeful suggestions concerning the relationship between Ancient Greek, Classical French and modern African drama, which make little headway, and his discussions of the social function of African Theatre, though valid, are not as detailed or as perceptive as later scholars have been. Sometimes Traore is not as aware of what was going on elsewhere as he ought to have been. For instance, the Nigerian actor/manager Hubert Ogunde was well established with his popular theatre in Lagos by the mid 1950s, and the rich theatrical festivals of the Yoruba were there to be seen and recognised. Nevertheless, this is a valuable book to have available in English, and Adelugba's shrewd and balanced Preface guides us to the relevant parts of Traore's work and acknowledges the weaknesses that only time has proved. Indeed, if my opening comments sound severe they must be compensated with the acknowledgement that Traore's work for its time was pioneer, and BOOK REVIEWS 245 that what he didn't see, plenty of other people couldn't see either. It has only been in quite recent years that students of the African drama have begun to produce a deeper and more coherent view of its historical, cultural and social aspects, (one thinks of Clark, Soyinka, Jones, Adedeji, Beier etc.) and there is a great deal still to do. Adelugba has translated Traore's work (excellently, it should be said) in order to "supplement the English-speaking African students' investigation of modern theatre with something close to their own background and experience." For so doing Adelugba deserves our thanks, for, however we may express reservations about some of Traore's observations, there are times when he raises issues that are of fundamental importance to any discussion of African theatre, including language and organisation. On this latter point he says: ... an erudite theatre is taking the place of the popular theatre. Now, this erudite theatre is going to cut itself off from the masses more and more; the professional actor will gradually replace the amateur and the griot from whom he differentiates himsel. ... In his turn this new actor will pose a series of problems: the hierarchy of...