This evening, I was blown away by the immensity of Amos Tutuola, the author. He had just six years of education and trained as a blacksmith, practicing that trade for the Royal Airforce during World War 2 (read more here). Other vocations he tried was selling bread and messenger. While working as a messenger, he probably started writing the book. Think about this: a man with only six years of formal education, who worked as blacksmith, bread seller and messenger decided to write a book in the 1940s, and he wrote that book in English! It takes some self belief and courage to attempt a feat like this.
The second thing that amazed me was the person who acquired this book for publication. It was TS Eliot, the celebrated poet. Eliot was the author of “The Journey of the Maggi” (read it here).
It was the comment of one of the great French philosophers, Jean Paul Sartre, father of Existentialism, about Amos Tutuola’s works that I found most amazing:
it is almost impossible for our poets to realign themselves with popular tradition. Ten centuries of erudite poetry separate them from it. And, further, the folkloric inspiration is dried up: at most we could merely contrive a sterile facsimile. The more Westernized African is placed in the same position. When he does introduce folklore into his writing it is more in the nature of a gloss; in Tutuola it is intrinsic.
For TS Eliot and JP Sartre to both consider the works of Tutuola valuable is a remarkable achievement. Furthermore, his books have been translated into several languages.
Of course, he had his fair share of criticism but in the process of time, Tutuola’s work was valued and considered unique in style, and Tutuola’s work was seen in the same light as that of the likes of James Joyce and Mark Twain. Two of Nigeria’s most accomplished authors, Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe both affirmed Tutuola’s contribution to literature.
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