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Trends in Modern African Poetic Composition: Identifying the

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 UNIUYO Journal of Humanities Volume 21, No. 1, January – December, 2017

Trends in Modern African Poetic Composition: Identifying the

Canons
Mathias Iroro Orhero
+2348130890991
literarymathy@gmail.com

Abstract
This paper examines the various canons of modern African poetry. It is
predicated on the background that periodisation in African poetry has
attracted arguments over the years. The study assesses some of these
views on periodisation and harmonises them using representative works
for analysis. The concepts of literary canon and modern African poetry are
briefly highlighted before periodisation is considered. The study identifies
eight broad canons of modern African poetry: pioneer poetry, modernist
poetry, disillusionment poetry, civil war poetry, alter/native poetry,
apartheid poetry, Niger delta/eco poetry and contemporary poetry, a recent
tradition. The distinctive features of these traditions have been examined
from the thematic and stylistic levels using representative works for
analysis. It has been observed that every tradition possesses features that
mark it out from other traditions. Findings also show that modern African
poets fall into many canons because of the continuity of their writings and
the fluidity of themes and techniques.
Introduction
This paper examines the fluidity of modern African poetry, in
terms of themes and techniques, which has given rise to various canons
within the artistic manifestation now referred to as modern African poetry.
These canons have produced works with varied thematic interests. The
trends keep changing and canonisation becomes a very difficult task to
accomplish. The problem this study seeks to address is that African poetry

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scholarship on the issue of canonisation is yet to proffer and agree on a

standard and acceptable delineation of trends. This has led to contradictory
and polemical categorisations of African poetic compositions. However,
this paper attempts a comprehensive canonisation of modern African
poetic output from its earliest inceptions till date. Before the trends are
identified, it is important to clarify important concepts with which this
paper is concerned.
Literary Canon/Trend and Generations
The concept of literary canon is tied together with the concept of
literary periods and trends. Other terms used to refer to this concept
include phases and generations. The use of generations comes handy
mainly when the poets are concerned. The concept of a literary canon is
not easy to define because so many factors come to play. Wilczek believes
that the term canon has “come to signify authors and works that either
used to be included in literature syllabi or textbooks, or those works that
repeatedly appear in standard volumes of the history of literature,
bibliographies, and literary criticism” (1687). This view assumes that
canon is based on what appears in books as the literature of the period. It
is apt to fault this view by saying that not every work produced in a period
may be anthologised. However, to Ojaide, a canon constitutes a “people‟s
overall experience and aesthetic values” (4). He further asserts that a
canon possesses “strong cultural and historical underpinnings” (4).
Ojaide‟s opinion is hinged on socio-historical and cultural grounds. He
believes that a canon is a product of a people‟s culture and history as made
manifest in works of art. This view leads to another problem. What about
works that may not necessarily reflect a people‟s culture and history?
Harold Bloom lends his voice to the issue of a literary canon by
asserting that literature “breaks into the canon only by aesthetic strength,
which is constituted primarily by an amalgam: mastery of figurative
language, originality, cognitive power, knowledge, exuberance of diction”
(29). This view rests mainly upon literary style as the indicators of a

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literary canon. Kaplan and Cronan attempt a definition of literary canon

from the pedagogical perspective. According to them, a literary canon is
“the list of authors and works included in basic literature courses because
they are deemed to comprise our cultural heritage-from a unique angle"
(xvii). Kaplan and Cronan simply believe that literary canons are
conceived in the study of literature itself. Other critics and scholars
generally base their arguments on the concept of literary canon on theme,
history, culture and style. For instance, Guillory believes that a canon is
formed by “unique historical conditions” (85) and Meadows believes that
a canon is simply formed by “the beauty of literature” and that it
documents “the values of the culture” (18).
From the foregoing, it is quite easy to understand the concept of a
literary canon as a collection of literary works, written in a particular
historical period/time, and connected by similar themes and techniques
which are mainly developed by the writers as a reaction to socio-political
realities. This view of a canon surmises the earlier views of critics.
However, the question of who determines a canon or what are the
yardsticks in determining a canon is still left unanswered. The answer is
quite simple. Writers write from their own impulses and experiences.
However, it is the job of the critic to bring together these varied works and
establish connections. The connections that are established, over time,
metamorphose into a literary canon/trend/period. Meadows asserts that the
first critic to identify literary canons in scholarly terms is Samuel Johnson
whose work, The Lives of the Poets (1781), set the pace. From that point,
other critics and scholars have published books, anthologies, monographs,
articles, etc, to document literary works in an attempt to separate great
works from myopic works. A literary canon is formed by connections in
themes and techniques. Critics often find out that writers of a particular
period echo themselves one way or another and this constant echoing or
intertextualisation forms the bedrock for the formation of a literary canon.
It is also possible that there may be diverse themes and styles in a period.

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It, therefore, becomes the job of the critic/scholar to categorise and

subcategorise these in line with the dominant themes and styles in order
for a literary canon to evolve from them. Canons are formed at the
continental level, i.e. African poetry, at the sub-continental level, i.e. West
African poetry, at the national level, i.e. Nigerian poetry, at the thematic
level, i.e. protest poetry, at the stylistic level, i.e. Metaphysical poetry, at
the level of periodisation, i.e. Postmodernist poetry, and even at the
philosophical/artistic level, i.e. Existentialist poetry.
Modern African Poetry
Modern African poetry is a hard concept to define. Attempts have
been made over the years by a myriad of critics to ascertain the true nature
of modern African poetry. The difficulty in generating an acceptable
definition is anchored on such issues as: language, form, theme, technique,
socio-political and economic realities, etc. These issues manifest in
various forms in African countries and therefore, cases of poetic works not
resembling others in the mainstream of the African poetic canon comes to
play. This paper attempts to formulate a wholesome concept of modern
African poetry.
By modern, we simply mean written and contemporary as opposed
to traditional and oral. By African, we mean produced by an African, for
Africans and sharing the African experience. By poetry, we simply mean a
genre of literature written in verse form using grand and figurative
language in order to express feelings and emotions. If these terms are
harmonised, modern African poetry can simply be said to mean written
poetry emanating from the African continent, written by Africans, for the
African audience and authentically portraying the African experience. The
concept of modern African poetry above excludes the medium of
composition. Language is a factor that must be watched when defining
African poetry. This issue has sparked up polemical scholarship by Obi
Wali, Ngugi wa Thiong‟O and others who believe that African literature
must be written in African language, and Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe

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and others who believe that European languages can be bent and mastered
in order to convey the complex African experience. This debate continues.
However, for the sake of this paper, modern African poetry includes
works written in European languages, African languages and African
works in translated forms. On the nature of African poetry, Oniyitan avers
that:
Poetry is by no means a recent import into Africa from Europe. It
is an important and living part of African culture, going back into
the distant past in nearly all African societies there has been (and
still in many places) a thriving oral tradition of poetry. Poetry and
song are basic human expression to accompany the activities of
daily life, to give utterance to their joy and sorrow, to comment on
life or simply to entertain (1).
This view is anchored on the grounds that modern African poetry is not a
new phenomenon and even before the advent of the written tradition,
Africans had had their oral forms of poetic expression. A good example of
traditional oral African poetry is the Udje song-poetry of the Urhobo
people of Nigeria. The Urhobo Udje song-poetry tradition is usually
performed by rival communities on appointed days. The rival communities
haul invectives at each other in highly poetic and dramatic forms. Through
the use of satire and a whole gamut of figures of speech, Udje performers
thrill their audience while performing their duty of punishment by words
to erring members of the society. Luke Eyoh likens Udje with the Yoruba
Ijala in its role of checking social vices and he believes that it promotes
“communal/national stability and development” (“Indigenous Oral Poetry”
84). Tanure Ojaide believes that the Udje tradition is “one of the most
poetic of Africa‟s indigenous poetic forms” (44). J.P. Clark pioneered
studies on Urhobo Udje while G.G. Darah and Tanure Ojaide collected
Udje works, translated them to English and examined their literary
aesthetics. Clark and Ojaide are influenced by the Udje tradition in their

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written poetry. Nyong Udoeyop and Eyoh have written on the nexus
between Urhobo Udje and Clark‟s poetry.
Apart from its oral origins and influence, modern African poetry is
conceived of by Tanure Ojaide as:
[...] unique in possessing a repertory of authentic African features.
This authenticity manifests itself in the use of concrete images
derived from the fauna and flora, proverbs, indigenous rhythms,
verbal tropes and concepts of space and time to establish a poetic
form […] In fact, an authentic African world forms the back drop
of Modern African Poetry (104).
Ojaide‟s view centres on the local colour that can be found in African
poetry. This local colour is drawn from the African environment and
culture and without it, there is little left of African poetry. Friday Okon
believes that modern African poetry expresses “the problems, peculiarities
and prospects of politics in the African world in the twentieth century and
beyond” (94). Going by Okon‟s opinion, modern African poetry is fuelled
by history and politics in the African continent and it gets its sustenance
from these.
In all these, it is clear that modern African poetry is a
manifestation that covers a lot of concepts, works and writers. Modern
African poetry comprises works inspired by oral traditions, translations of
oral works, works that mirror African socio-historical and political
realities, works that showcase the richness of African heritage, culture and
norms, works that represent the African environment and images, works
that are written by Africans; for Africans and which portrays the African
total experience.
The Trends in Modern African Poetry
It has been established in this paper that modern African poetry is a
very large body of writings emanating from Africa. These writings have
been produced at different points in time and against different conditions.
Some of these works are continentally tied while others are national in

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outlook. It is imperative to identify the trends, canons and generations that

constitute the overarching modern African poetic canon.
The concept of a literary canon has been mentioned earlier on. In
Africa, canonisation of works is an arduous task, not because the works
cannot be connected, but because the line is thin and traditions overlap one
another (Soyinka 13). This overlapping of traditions is mainly because
writers known for a particular period still write and their works progress
into another generation. Other writers who may not belong to a particular
canon attempt to write like members of such canon and thus intertextualise
them. This is better put by Garuba thus:
Even at the most propitious of times, when a convergence of
historical events and creative ferment of the imagination appear to
announce their evidence, literary periodization remains a messy
business. The happy coincidence of history and the foregrounding
of particular thematic and formal preoccupation in literature are
often one such moment when a period or school seems inevitably
to come into being. But the inevitability is deceptive, masking the
constructedness of the category we devise for framing our
understanding of it and the time-lines we draw to mark it. For,
once timelines are drawn and writers and writing are placed within
them, the intuitive clarity of the lines blur, as writers who should
be within the period by the nature of their preoccupations and
styles fall outside and others within very clearly pronounce their
unbelonging in their work. The struggle to both maintain and
reconstruct the boundaries then begins as critics scramble to
recuperate the distinctiveness of the classification often with
qualifiers such as „early‟ or „late‟ while the unrecuperable writing
continues to mock their best efforts. As boundaries demarcating
neat categorizations, therefore, literary periods and schools are
porous as they come. As markers of general trends, however, they
retain some usefulness, more like provisional maps, open-ended

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rather than closed, always inviting revision; their reversibility

inscribed, as it were, at the heart of their making (51).
All these factors that have been outlined and which Garuba has surmised
come to play when considering the generations of modern African poetry.
However, this paper‟s crux is the examination of the generations and the
nomenclatures they go by as well as their main thematic and stylistic
thrusts using representative works.
A cursory look at modern African poetic output will reveal eight
distinct literary canons/trends. This statement is predicated upon
contemporary findings. Previous researchers have identified various trends
even though the crux remains the same. Nwoga is often cited for his
division of African poetry into the pioneer phase and the modern phase
(121-142). Okon identifies some of these canons and labels them: the
pioneers, nationalist struggles, post-independence period, which he further
divides into: the older generation (1960-1970) and the younger generation
(1970-date), and recent echoes. Okon‟s categorisation is quite detailed and
comprehensive. However, some canons have been omitted and these will
be addressed in this paper. Ogunyemi is another scholar who has
attempted to delineate the canons of African poetry. He divides these
canons which he calls voices into four generations which are divided by
historical progression (229). Ogunyemi‟s study is akin to that of Ushie
who also identifies four generations. The following canons/trends will be
examined in this paper: pioneer poetry, modernist poetry, disillusionment
poetry, civil war poetry, the alter/native tradition, Niger delta/eco poetry,
apartheid poetry and contemporary poetry.
Pioneer Poetry
This is the earliest phase in modern African poetry. This is
generally regarded as the point when African poets started to use the
written medium for poetic expression. This period spans the 1920s till the
late 1940s. Poets who wrote in this tradition were largely amateurs who
had just acquired European education and decided to write for various

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reasons, mostly nationalistic. Their poetry can simply be regarded as

„apprentice poetry‟ which reflected Western forms and styles (Okunoye
41). Patrick Oloko believes that these pioneer poets should not be taken
seriously but seen as mere “historical curiosities” (3). There are two major
traditions in this canon which developed almost simultaneously in
Anglophone and Francophone African countries: the nationalist poetry and
the poetry of Negritude.
Nationalist pioneer poetry was written mainly by Anglophone
African poets who had finished receiving Western education in England
and had returned to face the realities of colonialism and self-denigration.
Through the use of propaganda, these poets wrote highly political poems
which reflected the “politics of anti-colonial struggle” (Okon 95). Their
poems were highly simplistic in style with the use of the free verse form.
The poems lack the literary sophistication of later poets in terms of style.
Their themes were mainly on African nationalism and glory. Some of the
poets of this canon include Dennis Osadebey, Nnamdi Azikiwe, R.E.G.
Armattoe, Gladys Casely Hayford, Michael Dei-Anang, B.W. Vilakazi,
Benibengor Blay, among others. A representative work of this period is
Dennis Osadebay‟s “Young Africa‟s Plea”. This poem thematises African
nationalism and the superiority of African culture and artefacts. The poet
persona says: “Don‟t preserve my customs/ as some fine curios/ to suit
some white historian‟s tastes” (Nwoga 17). These poems condemn the
exploitation of Africa‟s traditional heritage by the Europeans. The poet
then moves ahead to establish that African wisdom and lore are superior to
the European ways of life by saying: “Let me play with the whiteman‟s
ways/ let me work with the blackman‟s brains/ let my affairs themselves
sort out”. One can see the poet‟s attempts at parallelism as a style as well
as the play on words. These constitute the simplistic style of the pioneers.
Their diction is simple and the poet attempts to express, rather than
conceal which is the forte of poetry. The poet persona, like other pioneer
poets, also addresses the issue of racism and proclaims the greatness and

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superiority of the black man by saying: “Those who doubt my talents/ in

secret fear my strength/ they know I am no less a man”. All these
constitute the main standpoints of nationalist pioneer poetry.
Negritude poetry is the other tradition of pioneer poetry. Some
scholars, however, treat Negritude poetry as a different canon entirely.
This paper treats Negritude together with nationalist poetry because of the
similarity in themes and style as well as the period in which the poems
were written. Negritudism is a philosophical and artistic movement that
evolved in France through the writings of Leopold Senghor, Leon Damas
and Aimé Césaire. In African poetry, Negritude evolved as a response to
France and her hypocritical system of assimilating blacks and making
Frenchmen out of them. The French system suppressed African identity
and culture and portrayed African culture as inferior. The Negritude poets
revolted against this and wrote poems that romanticised and idealised
Africa personified as a woman. They idealised and made good, all that is
African through the use of “African imagery, symbols and speech
cadences” (Okon 98). Their themes centred largely on the greatness of
Africa, especially the landscape, history and culture, and Africans. They
also wrote on themes that dealt with the hypocrisy of the colonial masters.
The main literary techniques employed by Negritude poets were imagery,
symbolism, satire and hyperbole. Some of the poets include Leopold Sedar
Senghor, David Diop, Birago Diop, Tchicaya U‟ Tamsi, Bernard Dadié,
and others.
Senghor‟s “Black Woman” is used for representative analysis. It is
one of the most popular Negritudal poems. The poem thematises African
innocence and pristine beauty. This innocence is captured in the lines:
“Naked woman, black woman/ clothed with your colour which is life, /
with your form which is beauty!” (Nwoga 96). Through the idea of
“nakedness”, African innocence is affirmed. The colour of the African
skin is praised as “life”. This deliberate, and sometimes exaggerated,
romanticisation of African colour is one of the things Negritude is known

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for. At the stylistic level, the poem is richer than the nationalist pioneer
poems. The poem contains imagery, metaphors and symbolism, among
other devices. In the last few lines, the poet uses symbolism when he says:
“Before jealous Fate turn you to ashes/ to feed the roots of life” (97). The
word “Ashes” is used as a symbol for decay and death in this instance.
Modernist Poetry
Modernist African poetry is a canon of works influenced by
European Modernist period. African poets in this tradition wrote mainly
through the 1950s and early 1960s. They wrote highly obscure and private
poems with techniques which resembled the modernist poems of Ezra
Pounds, T.S. Eliot, G.M. Hopkins and W.B.Yeats, among others. The
poetry of this tradition was imitative and full of novel techniques. This
was the beginning of serious and academic poetry in Africa. The poets
were not concerned with propaganda or idealising Africa. In the words of
Aiyejina, the poetry was preoccupied with “the poet's private grief and
emotions over and above social tragedies and triumphs. It was also poetry
distinguished by an undue eurocentrism, derivationism, obscurantism and
private esotericism” (112). Their themes centred on the self and the
individual. They explored private thoughts, emotions, loss, love,
hopefulness, anticipation, experiences and the environment. These themes
were engineered using Eurocentric techniques such as imagism,
allusiveness, fragmentation, syntactic jugglery, neologisms and
symbolism, among others (Chinweizu, Jemie and Madubuike 163). Some
of the poets in this period include Wole Soyinka, Christopher Okigbo,
Gabriel Okara, Mac Akpoyovwaire, Aig Imokhuede, J.P. Clark, and
others.
A representative poem of this period is Christopher Okigbo‟s “The
Passage” in which the poet thematises his personal and private experience
with the goddess Idoto. This experience is captured by the poet thus:
“Before you, mother Idoto, / naked I stand, / before your watery presence,
/ a prodigal / leaning on an oilbean, / lost in your legend” (Soyinka 295).

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This extract is basically the poet‟s personal experience which may not
even be easily identified with by the reader. Ofure Aito acknowledges the
poem‟s intensity and its “ability to reflect profundity in the exploration of
individual‟s sensibility as it evolved in a ferment compounded out of the
confrontation between traditional interests and modernity” (9). At the
stylistic level, one can observe the use of syntactic jugglery in the lines.
An example of this is: “Before you, mother Idoto, / naked I stand”. This
diction has been syntactically juggled much like the poems of Manly
Hopkins. The syntax of the poem would have been “I stand naked before
you/ Mother Idoto”.
Disillusionment Poetry
The poetry of disillusionment is the term used to refer to the poetry
of the 1960s. The poetry of this period was coloured by the experiences of
independence. After the struggle for independence, most African countries
were eventually free of European rule by the year 1960. The prospect of
independence and self-rule brought high expectations. Africans thought
that self-rule would bring forth an Eldorado and the continent would
transform into a utopia. Unfortunately, this was not the case. African
leaders became grossly corrupt and dictatorial. Expectations were
shattered. There was disappointment which later metamorphosed into
disillusionment. The poetry of this period was socio-political and poets
decried the corruption of African leaders. Nwachukwu Agbada describes
this period as that of “Afro-Pessimism” (73). Most of the poets of this
period had written earlier but had not been socially concerned. However,
the activities that permeated the society were too gloomy for the poets to
be private and obscure. They wrote to address the failure of leaders to
meet expectations. Their themes centred on bad leadership, tyranny,
corruption, and social commitment. Their techniques were largely
Modernist and based on techniques such as imagery, realism, symbolism,
etc. Poets of the time include Wole Soyinka, Christopher Okigbo, Lenrie
Peters, Kwesi Brew, Kofi Awoonor, and others.

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Christopher Okigbo‟s “Hurrah for Thunder” is analysed as

representative. The poem addresses the dashed hopes of the people in the
newly independent African society. This poem has been regarded as
prophetic by some critics. The poet persona thematises corruption in the
verse: “But already the hunters are talking about pumpkins: / If they share
the meat let them remember thunder” (Okigbo 67). The poet persona airs
his angst through the metaphor of “thunder”. The “hunters” is used as a
symbol of corrupt politicians and the idea of sharing the “meat” suggests
the looting of the collective wealth of the people. Stylistically, the poem is
full of symbols and images. In the first few lines of the poem, the
“elephant” is used as a symbol to represent Nigeria‟s federal and regional
governments “whose tenacity in monopolising power made the thunder
clap inevitable” (Eyoh, “Political Leadership” 80).
Civil War Poetry
The poetry of civil war in Africa is informed by the numerous civil
wars fought in the African continent over the years and most notably the
Nigerian civil war which was fought from 1967-1970. African civil wars
are usually caused by socio-political and ethnic tensions. Corruption,
tribalism, nepotism, military incursion and dictatorship usually serve as
background to the outburst of a civil war. The Nigerian civil war was
fought between the Biafran secessionists which were mainly Igbo and the
Federal Republic of Nigeria. The war was fought to keep Nigeria as a
united federation against the secession and formation of the Biafran
Republic. This secession was informed by ethnic tensions, military
incursion and human rights abuses. Apart from the Nigerian civil war,
other wars fought in the African continent included: the Liberian civil war
and the Sierra-Leonean civil war. Civil war poetry usually thematises pain,
the horrors of war, grief, anguish, hunger, famine, death, etc. The
techniques include realism, symbolism, imagery and satire. Some of the
known civil war poets are J.P. Clark, Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe,
Mamman Vatsa, Christopher Okigbo, Pol Ndu, among others.

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J.P. Clark‟s “Dirge” is a modern African civil war poem. The

poem thematises grief, pain, loss and destruction. The poet persona says:
“Show me a house where nobody has died, / Death is not what you cannot
undo / yet a son is killed and a / Daughter is given...” (Clark 25). In these
lines, pain is conveyed by the theme of death. Death is so pervasive that
there is no house where none has died. This is the true image of war.
Iyabode Daniel believes that Clark decries, in this poem, the loss of
community and nationalism among Nigerians “over and above his pain
over the loss of his friends” (152). Eyoh confirms the foregoing when he
asserts that the poems in Clark‟s Casualities, in which “Dirge” is found,
deal with “violence, pain, loss, and sorrow [...] with war” (A Study 113). In
terms of style, the poem is simplistic and it employs vivid imagery and
realism to convey the war experience.
Alter/Native Poetry
The term “alter/native” was employed by Funso Aiyejina to refer
to the generation of poets that wrote in the 1970s and 1980s. These poets
are referred to as the younger generation by Okon (102). These poets were
tutored and influenced by the poets of the earlier generation. Their poetry
was mass-oriented and it employed the Marxist ideological stand. The
poets wrote against the background of military dictatorship, corruption,
gloom, ethnic unrest and mass hysteria. They wrote in simple diction and
employed oral poetic strategies in the poems. Their themes were centred
largely on corruption, disillusionment, military dictatorship, revolution,
nepotism, etc. Their techniques include realism, oral aesthetics and satire,
among others. Some of the poets include Tanure Ojaide, Niyi Osundare,
Jack Mapanje, Syl Cheney Coker, Kofi Anyidoho, Funso Aiyejina, Ossie
Enekwe, Harry Garuba, Odia Ofeimun, Jared Angira, Steve Chimombo,
Frank Chipasula, and others.
A representative poem of this period is Odia Ofeimun‟s “How Can
I Sing?” This poem thematises corruption at its worst manifestation and
the role of the poet in treating societal ills. These themes are laid bare in

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the lines: “I cannot blind myself/ to putrefying carcasses in the market

place/ pulling giant vultures / from the sky” (Soyinka 123). In this verse,
the poet thematises societal ills and refers to them as “putrefying
carcasses”. These ills, caused by the corrupt leaders, attract “giant
vultures” which are symbols of war, death and decay. The poet, however,
assures the readers of his commitment to fighting these ills by saying that
he cannot blind himself. Stylistically, this poem uses symbolism as a form
of satire. The poet uses the symbol of “carcasses” and “market place” to
represent the dearth of the African society and its propensity towards
corruption.
Niger Delta/Ecopoetry
This canon of modern African poetry developed mainly in the
1990s. The poets in this tradition are mainly from Nigeria‟s Niger Delta
Region. Other poets, who write mainly eco poetry, come from a wide
variety of backgrounds. These poets all have something in common; they
decry the constant destruction of our natural and environmental habitats.
The Niger Delta poets, however, take it more personal due to oil
companies which exploit their crude and destroy their flora and fauna
without any succour whatsoever. Nigeria made a great deal of fortune
from the oil boom of the 1980s. This fortune was made at the cost of the
Niger Deltans whose lands/environments have been desecrated, fishes
poisoned, animals killed and human inhabitants sent packing. The
ecopoets decry the destruction of the ecosystem by human activities and
modernisation. They predict a final decline in the ecology which will be
detrimental to all life. The Niger Delta and Ecopoets write using satire,
symbolism and realism. Some of the poets in these traditions include
Tanure Ojaide, Ogaga Ifowodo, Niyi Osundare, Onookome Okome, Joe
Ushie, Bassey Nnimmo, Ibiwari Ikiriko, Chin Ce, etc.
In Ifowodo‟s “Jesse”, we find the themes of pain, bitterness and
environmental devastation. The poet decries the ill maintenance of oil
pipelines which causes oil spillage that kills and destroys the ecology. He

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describes these oil pipes “as corroded and cracked/ by the heat of their
burden” (Ifowodo 17). The poet also decries the destruction of forests and
natural habitations saying: “The forest quivered as trunk after trunk
snapped/ and a nameless rage wagged greenfingered/ branches in the air as
they fell to the hungry axe” (3). All these inform the thematic thrust of
Niger Delta and Eco poetry. Stylistically, the poet employs symbolism to
represent some of the factors militating against the ecology and the Niger
Delta at large. An example of such symbol is the “hungry axe” which
stands for man‟s destructive tendencies to his own environment.
Apartheid Poetry
The poetry of apartheid is informed by the South African black
experience. Apartheid was instituted as a form of racial segregation in
South Africa. The white South Africans instituted racially discriminatory
laws which limited the freedom and total life of black South Africans.
Blacks were not allowed to go to the same schools, attend churches and
live in the same places with whites. Blacks were not allowed to vote or to
be voted for. The aboriginal blacks were thus reduced to mere tenants in
their land. Some poets wrote to address these divisions and talk to the
conscience of the white oppressors. Most of these poets were harassed and
even detained. Their themes included segregation, protest, pain,
inequality, racism, oppression, etc. Their major technique was the protest
form, critical and socialist realism, imagery and symbolism. Poets in this
tradition include Mazizi Kunene, Lewis Nkosi, Dennis Brutus, Oswald
Mtshali, Wally Serote, Richard Rive, Njabulo Ndebele and others.
A representative poem of this tradition is Oswald Mtshali‟s “The
Master of the House” where the poet decries the displacement of Africans
from their traditional abodes. The poet presents the pain and anguish of
the black people using the lines: “I am a faceless man/ who lives in the
backyard/ of your house/ I share your table/ so heavily heaped with/ bread,
meat and fruit/ it huffs like a horse/ drawing a coal cart” (Mtshali 55).
Black people are referred to as “faceless” people, without identity, who

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have been displaced and made to live in the “backyard” of the white man‟s
house. This, and many others, inform the themes of apartheid.
Stylistically, visual imagery is used to present the extremities of the
conditions of the black man in apartheid South Africa. Instances of visual
imagery abound in the verse rendered above. The poet paints the visual
image of a man who lives in the backyard of another man whose table is
heaped with good food. This imagery is used to contrast the conditions of
the white man with that of the black man.
Contemporary Poetry
The term, “contemporary poetry”, is used as a ubiquitous term to
cover the writings of poets who started writing from the 1990s and the 21 st
century poets. Okon calls these poets “Recent Echoes from a Globalised
Africa” (107). Contemporary African poetry addresses issues of
globalisation, corruption, the ICT, migration, exile, and others. The poets
in this tradition were influenced and taught by the alter/native poets. Their
styles are similar and some of them are socio-politically concerned. Other
poets of this generation employ the Parnassian philosophy and write using
the philosophy of arts for art‟s sake. They write of love, emotions, grief,
hope, pain, etc. Some of these poets include Remi Raji, Tanure Ojaide,
Wunmi Raji, Niyi Osundare, Ebi Yeibo, Rome Aboh, Imo Okon, Akachi
Ezeigbo, Ebele Eko, Afam Akeh, Chin Ce, Ogaga Ifowodo, Onookome
Okome, Joe Ushie, Nnimmo Bassey, Peter Onwudinjo, Esiaba Irobi, Olu
Oguibe, Isidore Diala, and others.
A representative poem of this period is Ebi Yeibo‟s “Tsunami
Reminds Us…”. This poem addresses the tsunami that wrecked havoc in
Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand, Maldives and Somalia, in the year
2004 and which killed a large number of people. The poet persona says:
“Tsunami, Tsunami, / Why did you do this to me? / Tsunami, my grief,/
Tsunami, our scourge; / Tsunami, the destroyer of our world” (Yeibo 13).
This poem thematises the pain and destruction meted out on people by the
Tsunami. Although the tsunami was not in Nigeria, through globalisation,

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the poet has sympathised with the victims of the tsunami. Stylistically, the
poem uses repetition, apposition and parallelisms. These are used to
express the gravity of the experience.
Conclusion
Modern African poetry has been examined as a unique literary
manifestation which is made up of various canons/trends. These trends are
informed by socio-political happenings. The periodisation of modern
African poetry is no easy task because of the fairly new nature of this
literary tradition. The poets that wrote in the early periods are still writing
till date and new poets are writing like the poets of the earlier generations.
This situation creates a problem in canonising African poetry. However,
this paper has identified eight broad canons of modern African poetry and
these include pioneer poetry, modernist poetry, disillusionment poetry,
civil war poetry, alter/native poetry, apartheid poetry, Niger delta/eco
poetry and contemporary poetry. These appellations have been used by the
researcher based on the dominant issues each period concerns itself with.
The paper has also analysed some of poems, in terms of theme and style,
of the various poetic canons with the aim of identifying their significant
features. While the researcher does not assert that this study is
prescriptive, he hopes that knowledge has been contributed to the broad
discussion on the periodisation of modern African poetry.
***Mathias Iroro Orhero is of the Department of English, University of
Uyo, Nigeria

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