The Poems of Niyi Osundare

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The character of literary forms always evolves with the passage of times. Although African literature in its written form (as against the traditional oral form) has a relatively short pedigree, it has not failed to constantly renew itself by evolving, principally in its social functionality, either as an avenue to demonstrate a cultural point of view or a satirical vista. Consequently, this attribute is responsible for the peculiar aesthetics that particularizes the literature.
Given the peculiarity of African literature and other reasons critics in this part of the world have often been wary of the term ‘aesthetic’. For instance, African critics have always frowned at such quasi negative critical registers like Larsonist, Euro-modernist, Neo-Tarzanist etc. that have adumbrated the canon of their literature especially as they tilt the form away from its original meaning. Basically because the front-liners in the practice of criticism in Africa are the creative writers themselves – the likes of Ngugi, Soyinka, Achebe Osofisan, Nkosi, Armah, etc – it is not surprising that such feelings of disdain against the variegated portrayal of what is African are obvious in the canon of creative genres in the continent. Importantly again, the socio-political dysfunctionalities of the post independence era yield identical thematic form to the genres of African literature and what has become prevalent in Africa’s creative facets is the foregrounding of thematic variants from societies where ugly political and economic trends have remained un(re)solved after several decades of post-colonial self-rule. With these situations in mind, concerns about writer’s commitment in African literature have become as pertinent as the works themselves.

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