One day I love you and the next day or even moment, I wonder what tree you fell out of. I haven't read the book or the review. So maybe you'll end up thinking that I'm a nut today as well.
Here's what I have to say: Old people can say whatever they want to say however they want to say it. They are libraries. Soyinka is no different than any other near-octogenarian. You just listen to his stream an inevitably there will be something you can use. You won't be able to use all of it now. Some parts, you use now. Some things won't come to you as "right" until much later in life. Sadly, there are some who never have the mind or the time to get it.
I don't think the man sat down and wrote a stream of crap. I believe that his ego may prohibit such a futile exercise.
Sometimes I think you jump on the "establishment" band wagon with far too much rapidity.
Some things are meant to simmer, cher.
Vonda
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-- On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 4:01 PM, Ikhide <xokigbo@yahoo.com> wrote:
--"With the venerable Soyinka now 78, I wish I could report that his new volume of sweeping reflections is of the same stature as his best work, but sadly it is not. The book is vague, ponderous and awkward. Soyinka never says "house" when he can say "habitation," "native" when he can say "autochthon," "dominant" when he can say "hegemonic." Phrases in quotation marks float free of any source. When he makes broad generalizations and criticisms he sometimes expects the reader to mentally provide specific examples. (Do you remember exactly what President Obama said in Cairo in 2009? I had to look it up.) The book abounds in passages full of 10-dollar words that have to be read two or three times to figure out what they mean. About contentions in Christian theology, for example, he says:
"These all-consuming debates and formal encyclicals are constructed on what we may term a proliferating autogeny within a hermetic realm — what is at the core of arguments need not be true; it is sufficient that the layers upon layers of dialectical constructs fit snugly on top of one another."When a fine writer and a good man writes of "proliferating autogeny," it is probably not just because he is having a bad day."- Adam HochschildI do agree with this review 100 percent. I read the book and I thought it was awful. It was not his best outing. Surprised someone would publish it...
- IkhideStalk my blog at http://www.xokigbo.com/Follow me on Twitter: @ikhideJoin me on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ikhide
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La Vonda R. Staples, Writer
BA Psychology 2005 and MA European History 2009
"If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough."
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, This Child Will Be Great; Memoir of a Remarkable Life by Africa's First Woman President.
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