Cultures and Continents; 1; Images of Africa

Africa, you were once just a name to me, but now you lie before me with somber green challenge. Go up country, so they said, to see the real Africa. For whosoever you may be, that is where you come from. Go for bush. Inside the bush you will find your hidden heart, your mute and sustol spurt. And so I went, dancing on my way. Now you lie before me, passive, with your unanswered green challenge. Those were lines from a poem by one of Africa's leading contemporary writers, Sierra Leone's

Abbiose Nikol, who is also principal of the oldest college in West Africa. His work, like that of his fellow poets and novelists, tells us a great deal about the complex experience of being African. This program will explore Negro Africa and its people, as African literature portrays them. Cultures and continents presents images of Africa with Ambassador Mercer Cook. Mr. Cook is United States Ambassador to the Republic of Niger in West Africa and a member of the US delegation to the 18th General Assembly of the United Nations. He has written and translated works by and about Africans and was formerly professor of romance languages at Howard University. Black Africa, as it is called, is Africa south of the Sahara. Is the Africa of an ancient and proud Negro culture, which flourished in surroundings of almost bewildering variety,

from grass plains to deep forests, impenetrable jungles, dizzying mountain heights, and arid pasture land. On this vast continent, the African lived in small, family, and tribal groups. His life flowing in traditional patterns passed on from generation to generation. He created beautiful poems and songs, which celebrated his gods, his history, his children. The main theme of his existence and his literature was continuity, the unbroken flow of past into future. With sharp suddenness, this continuity was broken. The white man came to Africa, bringing with him new ideas, new tools, new learning, new religion, and frequently, the new experience of oppression, indignity, and servitude. Contemporary African literature rings with indignation over that experience.

To many African writers, it is the expression of Africa, the theme of broken continuity of disrupted tradition. Today in Africa, where the oldest of lands has given birth to the youngest of nations, old and new exist side by side, like a startling mosaic. The young lawyer trained at Oxford may be the son of a village coffer. The broad new road may pass through villages where women still watch their clothing at the river's edge. As one African writer states his theme, it is the mixed sound of jungle drums and the concerto. These are the central themes of the literature of Black Africa, continuity, radical change, and the new life which encompasses both. These of course do not exhaust all the themes of African life, but they are the images of Africa most frequently found in its literature. We begin now with the words of Africa's most celebrated poet, Leopold Siddharth Senghor, president of the Republic of Senegal.

Listen to the song, hear the dark blood beat in our veins, hear the deep pulse of Africa sounding through the mist of lost villages. For the African, everything lives. The trees, forests, winds, speak with the voices of living things, even the past is more than a memory. It too has life. For the African, nothing dies. The old man dead is reborn in a new child, and the new child grown old and dying is born again in his children's children. The African believes there is no end to life and no thing without life. Listen more often to things than to beings.

Hear the fire's voice. Hear the voice of water. Hear the sobbing of the bush in the wind. It is the breath of ancestors. Those who have died have never left us. They are in the paling shadow and in the thickening shadow. The dead are not beneath the earth. They are in the rust and tree. They are in the groaning woods. They are in the flowing water and in the still water. They are in the hut. They are in the crowd. The dead are not dead. Those who have died have never left us. They are in a woman's breast, in a child's crying, in a kindling brand of fire. The dead are not beneath the earth. The dead are not dead.

For the African, the immortality of his people is assured with the birth of a child. African folk poetry sings of the tragedy of barrenness and the joy of birth. Yalode, who cures the children, helped me to have my own child. Her medicines are free. She feeds honey to the children. She is rich and her words are sweet.

Large forest with plenty of food. Let a child embrace my body. The touch of a child's hand is sweet. A man child is born. A man child is born. May he become old, very old. Joy, joy, praise, praise. A child is like a rare bird. A child is precious like coral. A child is precious like brass.

You cannot buy a child on the market. Not for all the money in the world. A child is the beginning and end of happiness. African history, too, is alive to the African. The richness of the African past is something we are just beginning to rediscover today. Yet, five centuries ago, the European historian and traveler, Leo Africanus, could write. I saw in West and Central Africa 15 kingdoms of the Negroes where trade flourished and the arts were practiced. For streets well cared for, magnificent fields, men clad in brilliant costumes of silk and velvet.

Great states well-ordered, powerful sovereigns, rich industries, civilized to the very marrow of their bones. Invasion and slavery shattered this history into a thousand fragments. African literature resounds with pride of the past and grief at its disruption. I hear the beat of the drums, the atumpan drums. I hear the beat of the prempared drums or say to the drums, I hear the call of Noah Uttar. I ponder the valor of the moaned and the mighty, African might.

I sense the resonance of Daru beats, Tonton Sansan, Tonton Sansan, Sansan. I muse upon Ghana, Melee and Songai. I hear the echo of Fountainfront, the beat of impending drums, Dhammerifa, Dwy, Dwy. Dhammerifa, Dwy, Dwy. Dhammerifu, Enou. I hear the beat of the drums, I hear the beat of the talking drums. Then one day silence, the rays of the sun seem to die. In my heart, now empty of meaning, your voice too had died. The chains of slavery cut into my heart. Tom-toms of night, Tom-toms of my fathers.

The white man killed my father. My father was proud. The white man seduced my mother. My mother was beautiful. The white man burned my brother beneath the noon day sun. My brother was strong. His hands red with black blood, the white man turned to me. And in the conqueror's voice said, Hey boy, a chair, a napkin, a drink. The European came to Africa. His impact was not quite the same in every part of the continent. And African literature reflects these differences. In the south, Desert Land gives way to a temperate climate. And here the European settle to lead a life much like the one he left behind him.

For the African, this invasion came with great shock. From the southern part of Africa comes literature of violent protest. Walk the paths now of the migratory worker of Africa's south, as he makes his way to the city to work in the factory and the mine. When he leaves his village, the past book he carries tells him how he must go, where he may stay and for how long. He may be gone one year, two years, five. He cannot take his family with him. In the words of Phyllis and Tantala. Widowwood. A life of void and loneliness. The daily lot of tens of thousands of African women, whose husbands are torn away from them to go and work in the cities, mines, and farms. Husbands who, because of the migratory labor system, cannot take their wives with them.

And because of the stavation wages they receive, are forced to remain in the work centers for long periods. These women remain alone. They watch alone the ravages of drought, when the few stock drop one by one, because there is no grass on the field. They watch alone the crops in the field, wither in the scorching sun. Alone they bury their babies one by one. And lastly, their unknown lovers, their husbands, whose corpses alone are sent back to the reserves. Small wonder that most of them are old women at the age of 30. Emissated, tired, and worn out. My love has gone to a goalie,

far far from the running stream. He said he would come back to me, back to the slim girl with the bright bracelets. Here in the evening, I draw water for my father, but I draw no water for him, my love. For he has gone to the city of gold, far far from the bold running stream. A mighty bell is six o'clock.

I went to Kini and found the men driven by six o'clock. I went to Konsei and found the men, toiling at six o'clock. Back at Tinara, I found the men bullied by six o'clock. Thunder away machines of the mines, deafened with noise that we may not be heard, though we cry out aloud and groan as you eat away the joints of our bodies. Thunder away from dawn till sunset. The worker lives in a location of segregated township, twenty miles or more from where he works. His life is one of constant restrictions. Take off your heart.

What is your home name? Who's your father? Who is your chief? Where do you pay your tax? What river do you drink? There is the pickup then. Now what have we done to you pick up then? All around is the pickup then. Now what have we done to you pick up then? Where's your passboy? Where's your passboy? Where's your passboy? Where's your passboy? Saturday night, far to the west end of Maraba Stutt, a police whistle, the barking of dogs, heavy-booted footsteps, a person running away from the law, the police sells the caught and jail. Saturday night,

and it's ten to ten. I can hear the big curfew bell at the police station peel, ten to ten, ten to ten, ten to ten, for the black men to be out of the streets, to be at home, to be out of the policemen's reach. Year after year every night, the sound of the bell floats in the air at ten minutes to ten, and the black men must run home, and the black men must sleep, or have a night special permit. Those were the words of South Africa's celebrated novelist, now an exile, Ezekiel Emphaleli. Let us turn now to the other black Africa above the Calahari Desert, the Africa of jungle and forest, and heat and mosquito. The white man's grave, this part of Africa has been called. The European did not come to stay here, and even in the days of colonialism,

the traditional African way of life was not disrupted at its roots. The ways of Europe and Africa mingle in these lands, which are free, are almost free. And the literature of these countries reflects the journey quite different from the one we have just followed. Here we have a journey in reverse, as poets and novelists explore their roots. Go up country, so they said, to see the real Africa. For whosoever you may be, that is where you come from. Go for bush. Inside the bush you will find your hidden heart, your mute ancestral spirit. And so I went, dancing on my way. There are many variations on this theme. Here is Gabriel Alcara of Nigeria. When at break of day, at a riverside, I hear the jungle drums telegraphing

the mystic rhythm, urgent, raw like bleeding flesh, speaking of primal youth and the beginning. My blood ripples, turns torrent, topples the years, and at once, I mean my mother's lap is suckling. At once I'm walking simple paths, rugged, fashioned with a naked warmth of hurrying feet, and groping hearts, in green leaves and wildflowers pulsing. We dance to our sixteen drums, that sound jinging, jinging. We shake our shoulders, we shake our hips, monose, monose, monose, and dance to our sixteen drums. Then I hear a wailing piano solo, speaking of complex ways in tear-forward concerto,

of faraway lands and new horizons with coaxing, diminuendo, counterpoint, crescendo. But lost in the labyrinth of its complexities, it ends in the middle of a phrase at a dagger point. And I, lost in the morning mist of an age at a riverside, keep wandering in the mystic rhythm of jungle drums and the concerto. The road which leads the right up back to its roots runs two ways. It leads also to its future, and strewn across its path, her signs of yesterday and tomorrow, in casual combination. Again, Abiose Nikol. This long and even red road,

this occasional succession of huddled heaps of four mud wars and thatched, falling grass roofs, sometimes enabled by a thin layer of white plaster and covered with thin, slanting corrugated sink. The pedaling cycle is wailess by on the wrong side of the road, as if uncertain of this new emancipation. The squawking chickens, the pregnant she goats, lumber awkwardly with fear across the road. Across the windscreen view of my four-cylinder kit car, an oven-laden lorry, speeds madly towards me, full of produce, passengers with gravel leaning out into the swirling dust pilot is swinging, obsessed vehicle alone. He drives on at so-so many miles per hour, peering out with bloodshed eyes, unshaped face, and dedicated look. His march will paint it on each side, sunshine, transport. We get you there quick, quick, the Lord is my shepherd.

I came back, sailing down the guinea coast, loving the sophistication of your brave new cities. Dakar. Akra. Kotunon. Legos. Bathurst and Bissar. Liberia. Freetown. Libreville. Freedom is really in the mind. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. God bless you. There is nothing as sweet as independence. It is a great day on which the slave buys his freedom. When a slave can go to fetch water and nobody can tell him you are coming late.

When a slave will fetch firewood and use it to cook his own food. When the slave does not serve anybody, when he is merely serving himself. What a day when the slave wakes up to rest, not to go to another man's farm. When the slave starts planting his own farm, 420 rows of yam. And then he will plant the maize and dig the yam. He will sell his crop and use it for his own family. No longer will he do unpaid work. No longer waste his old age serving others. The slave will rejoice, rejoice, rejoice. He will jump into the air and slap his body with his arms. He will sing the song and say, help me to be thankful I am lucky. Here is a modern parable by the great pioneer educator.

Agree of Africa. Once there was an eagle taken from the egg and raised with a bunch of chickens in a barnyard. Fed with chickens and housed with chickens. It came to believe that it was a chicken. So it acted like one, pecking in the scrawny earth for food and keeping its head bowed to the ground. One day, a man passed who was an expert on birds. He looked into the barnyard and said, that's no chicken, but a mighty eagle. And though it has been raised with the chickens and taught to act like one, still it is an eagle of the skies. Twice he took the eagle to the open fields and to the mountains and said, you are an eagle, not a chicken. Stretch out your wings and fly. Twice the eagle flapped its wings but could not fly. Then for a third time he took the eagle to the mountains to the very summit of the highest peak. It was a moment of sunrise.

And as the golden light touched the mountain top, the eagle turned his face to the sun. Shook his mighty wings and with a sound like thunder soared into the sky. You are not a country, Africa. You are a concept. Only those within you who know their circumscribed plot can from the harvest then look up and say, this is my Africa. Meaning, I am content and happy. I am fulfilled with in, without, and round about. I have gained the little longings of my hands, my loins, my heart, and the soul following in my shadow. I know now that is what you are, Africa. Happiness, contentment, and fulfillment. And a small bird singing on a melody. Happiness, contentment, and fulfillment.

Happiness, contentment, and fulfillment. Happiness, contentment, fulfillment. This is NET, National Educational Television.