Title:
Echoes of the Plateau
Author:
Bizuum G. Yadok
Book
category: Poetry (a collection of poems)
Book
reviewer: Peace Longdet (Mrs)
‘Echoes of the Plateau’ captures the reality of living where
life is mixture of happy and sad moments. The author makes this mixture clear
in the lines of the poems. Experiences shared are familiar to man, they
include; love, sorrow, death, disillusionment, religious convictions, hope,
eulogy, peace, natural disasters etc. These poems try to convince the reader
mainly on the poet’s belief validity by dramatizing through words the frailty
of human nature and to conscientize the audience that life consists of options.
The book, Echoes of the Plateau, has multifaceted themes.
There are themes on the pain of losing someone to the cold hands of death,
nemesis, revolution, praise, hope in the midst of despair and chaos, effects of
war based on human greed, nostalgic feelings of Africa in her pristine days
before being ravaged by colonial marauders etc. The message of the theme of
hope in the midst of despair and chaos is graphically illustrated in lines
27-30 of the eponymous poem – Echoes of the Plateau
What about the multitude of tongues?
They all
sing the same song
Listen!
Can you hear
the harmonious tune of unity?
The poet clearly depicts that despite the mixture of pain and
sorrow, years of wars – yet the song of unity can be heard.
Someone once noted that poetry gives us tools for living. A
poem like “Thank You Mr. Death” does exactly that, nudging us out of
complacency and into awareness that will better serve us. The poet acknowledges
that life is ephemeral. All mortals must one day cease to be on this side of
the universe because the leveler of all class – death – has helped in “building
the bridge that connects with eternity.” This therefore denotes that the poet
believes in life after death giving the poem a religious connotation.
‘Daughters of the Night’ begins with a lament on the havoc
raked by these “daughters of the night.” The images that describe the daughters
are familiar, “killers of man’s destiny”, “Vampires”, “Snatchers of faithful
men”, “Queens of the doomed”, these images describe the oppression and
destructive tendencies of this set of female species. A similar metaphor is
found in Wole Soyinka’s Kongi’s Harvest. The implication is that when these
tendencies are allowed to continue unabated, their victims, ‘faithful men and
virtuous women’, become more vulnerable.
In ‘The Fool’ the poet effusively states his belief in a
supernatural force – God. He admonishes his audience that in order not to be
“the unreasonable fool,” one must yield his/herself to be “God’s tool.” For by
this act is true greatness.
There are stories in the poems, too. Narratives of the pain
caused by human and natural disaster fill the collection. Titles sing their own
brief tales such as ‘Floods’, ‘I see, I hear’, ‘Victims’ blood’s cry’, ‘Uprising’
and ‘Parliament’. These poems remind us that cherishing and nurturing what we
have instills in us a passion for continuity.
The poet is quite aware of his poetic license, and thus,
verses are eclectically both formally and informally. The verses are lyrical
and rich in imagery, rhyme, and figures of speech which embellish the entire
selection. The collection also has experimentation with language choice.
Although bulk of the poems are written in accessible English, the poet made a
deliberate choice to write two poems in Pidgin and Hausa languages
respectively. This is indeed unique to the poet.
Generally, the poems in this collection give a satisfactory
reading experience. It leaves the reader with its “taste” long after the reader
has completely digested the text. This is because experiences are given to the
reader straight in simple and demystified language. Also, the poet’s
experiences are real; they are continuously encountered again, personally or
vicariously, in daily life. The subtle admonitions, questions and issues put
forward in the text are worthy of serious attention.
Bizuum Godwill Yadok is a Nigerian poet born and bred in
Plateau State. He currently teaches at Federal College of Education Pankshin,
Plateau State. ‘Echoes of the Plateau’ is his first collection and we hope his
work gets the recognition it deserves. I can’t wait for his next collection.
Yadok is a budding poet whose emergence into the vibrant
literary community adds freshness to the collections. The work is a work of
power, individuality and originality. The poet is not afraid to sing of his
philosophical belief deeply rooted in social commitment.
(copies of the book can be obtained
at Quality Educational Books, Opposite Modern Bookshop, Rwang Pam Street, Jos.
You can also reach the author via kotjyadok@gmail.com
to place your order)
Title: King of the Jungle
Author: Bizuum Yadok
Genre: Fiction
Reviewer : Posted Doug Kazé
Bizuum Yadok’s debut novel, King of the Jungle, is the latest addition to the growing library of literature set in the Plateau area of Nigeria. Written in the crime fiction style featuring drug-dealing, gangs, guns, coded gang language, fast action and detectives, King of the Jungle is a bold statement about modern Africa’s grappling with her burden of being and becoming and the modern idea of nationhood. The crime plot serves as a medium for serious social commentary about the struggle with poverty, family disintegration, unstable educational standards, hypocritical and corrupt leadership, ethnocentrism, religious hypocrisy and ethno-religious violence.
Yadok’s central character, Giwa Bako, a talented and brilliant young man with an expected successful future despite the disadvantage of fatherlessness and a poor mother, wins most of the academic prizes at the end of his secondary school days and moves on to gain admission into the university. But this journey turns around into the unexpected as Giwa encounters KC at a bar. From the day he is initiated into the campus cult, SBC, Giwa’s ambition changes from succeeding academically to becoming a quick millionaire through drug-dealing. Mentored by KC, he abandons his studies and travels with him to sell drugs to consumers in different parts of the country. After KC’s death, Giwa begins a fight from where he and KC have stopped. He avenges KC’s death and becomes his own boss employing his two erstwhile friends to help him hit his biggest drug deal. That turns out to be the end of his game as he is caught by drug law enforcement agents and then killed by thugs.
In Giwa we encounter both a product and victim of a society wrecked by lust, greed and abrasive survival-of-the-fittest struggle. The story however does not excuse Giwa from responsibility with Solomon Bakka going on to succeed despite worse conditions than his. Giwa is also an interesting embodiment of contradictions: a criminal with a passion to make money, yet consumed with compassion for those that society has trampled upon such as Amina and Jemima; a brilliant mind without an identifiable career goal for the future. The character of Giwa also operates on the symbolic status of an aborted life, exemplified in his failure to win the women of his dreams and to complete his degree programme.
Yadok carefully weaves his story around the motif of ‘this world is a small place’, in which people Giwa has left behind in his earlier life, in the days of ‘innocence’, reappear in his later life as either victims of corruption or as redeemers. Amina embodies both. A brilliant girl and a model and friend to Giwa, she becomes a victim of forced early marriage, cut short from becoming a fulfilled woman; she also liberated herself fully by getting rid of General Hamza at the epilogue in an attempt to avenge her school son’s death. Jemima resurfaces in Giwa’s life as a woman forced by circumstances to become a drug addict and a stripper trying to find her way to survive in a cold world. Hannah, Giwa’s university love, resurfaces at the end of the story providing Giwa with ultimate spiritual redemption. But the most important of this patterns is the major sub-plot of the novel, Solomon’s story. This secondary plot serves the story in a few important ways. First, it shows to the reader what Giwa could have become if he had made right choices, and then it provides the suspense that keeps the reader to the end.
King of the Jungle also takes into account the place of religion in African life. While most Nigerian writers would only project the abuse of religion in the Nigerian society, Yadok does that and also shows the positive power of religion in society. Giwa is, for instance, partly driven into his waywardness by the self-righteous attitudes of certain religious people on campus, but he also has an experience of spiritual redemption at the end of the story when the gospel is presented to him with love. Religion is clearly shown as capable of transforming people’s lives as in the life of Dr. Idoko, the drug genius, and that of Hannah. A book of this nature would definitely not forget the significance of the violent religious crises that took place in Jos in 2001. Through that we see the complicated relationship between humanity and religion.
Yadok’s strength lies in his ability not only to sustain a weave of plots on different temporal lines and engage with various thematic issues, but also in the evidence of research in the development of convincing gangster practices, the nature of various drug types and the operations of the drug law enforcement agency. Descriptions and conversations are occasionally handled with humour and local colour and typical local parlance, which reflect the realities of life in central Nigeria. King of the Jungle certainly presents to us the voice of an author who will occupy an important place in the future of Nigerian literature.
No comments:
Post a Comment