Going to work could mean your death. It was indeed a bad time. The June 12, 1993 election won by Bashorun MKO Abiola had just been annulled by the military regime of General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida. Nigeria was in deep…
Poet of the People: Niyi Osundare — Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
Poets from all over the world today do not come any loftier than Nigeria’s Niyi Osundare. In my book, he is the next poet destined to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Lovers of intellection are thrilled that on Wednesday,…
64 toasts to “Things Fall Apart” -Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
This year marks the 64th birthday anniversary of the iconic novel Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. Things Fall Apart was first published on June 17, 1958 by William Heinemann, London, and contains only 50,380 words, but it has packed…
Exploring the rudiments of Borojah’s law – Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
“Shock your wife!” I am only reiterating the law handed down to me by Borojah, a rambunctious neighbour of mine, who claims to be a poet though I’ve never come across a verse written by him. I do not know…
“A Literary Life”: Poet Sage Hassan’s film on Odia Ofeimun to premiere at LIPFEST2021
Odia Ofeimun: A Literary Life, a film directed by poet and filmmaker Sage Hassan will screen Saturday 23 October from 3 pm – 5 pm WAT during this year’s edition of the Lagos International Poetry Festival (LIPFEST2021) at Freedom Park,…
Towering testaments to a worthy wayfarer – Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
Wreaths for a Wayfarer, Nduka Otiono and Uchechukwu Umezurike, Daraja Press, 2020, 299 pages Professor Pius Adebola Adesanmi belongs to the class of people larger than life and death. When news filtered out that he was one of the 159…
There was a poet called Idzia Ahmad – Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
Many critics across the globe scoff at contemporary poetry. In an April 2, 2000 London Sunday Times review of Jonathan Bate’s The Song of the Earth, critic Bryan Appleyard wrote: “Nobody cares about poetry anymore. It is marginalised, trivial, the…
Odia Ofeimun at 70: Let’s toast to the health of the master poet – Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
There is no better way of introducing Odia Ofeimun than pointedly stressing that “Odia Ofeimun is Odia Ofeimun!” Enough said. Poet, publisher, editor, activist, polemicist, mentor, politician, columnist, factory worker, writer, dance-drama exponent, public intellectual, critic, etc, Odia Ofeimun has…
Conference, special dinner to honour Odia Ofeimun at 70
The Odia Ofeimun at 70 Committee has announced activities to mark the 70th birthday celebrations of Odia Ofeimun, saying the two-day event will begin on Monday, March 16, 2020. According to a statement by a spokesperson for the committee, a…
Odia Ofeimun: The Poet Laureate of Lagos – Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
The phone call was straight to the point: “I want you at my house this evening.” Odia Ofeimun is of course “he who must be obeyed.” When I got to the poet’s home I was handed an impossible task. Odia,…