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² Adedeji, Joel, ‘A Profile of Nigerian Theatre, 1960–1970’, in Nigeria Magazine (Lagos), 107–9, 1971, p. 3.Google Scholar

³ Lindfors, Bernth, ‘The Early Writings of Wole Soyinka’, in Lindfors, (ed), Critical Perspectives on Nigerian Literatures (Washington, D.C., 1975), p. 184.Google Scholar

⁴ July, Robert W., ‘The Artist's Credo: the political philosophy of Wole Soyinka’, in The Journal of Modern African Studies (Cambridge), 19, 3, 09 1981, p. 488.Google Scholar

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⁶ Soyinka, Wole, ‘The African Approach to Drama’, International Symposium on African Culture, Ibadan, 19–24 December 1960.Google Scholar

⁷ Gibbs, James, Wole Soyinka (London, 1986), p. 20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁸ Esso World Theatre Production, 1963. Ann Dundon discusses the masquerade sequence in ‘Soyinkan Aesthetics in Culture in Transition: an essay on film’, First Ibadan Annual African Literature Conference, 6–10 July 1976, pp. 11–12, kindly supplied by James Gibbs.

⁹ Soyinka, Wole, Myth, Literature, and the African World (Cambridge, 1976), p. 38.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Soyinka, Wole, ‘Penthouse Theatre’, in Morell, Karen L. (ed.) In Person: Achebe, Awoonor and Soyinka at the University of Washington (Washington, D.C., 1975), pp. 94–100.Google Scholar

¹¹ ‘Interview: Wole Soyinka’ by Harding, Jeremy, in New Statesman (London), 27 02 1987, p. 22.Google Scholar

¹² Details of Soyinka's activities in 1960 can be found in the following: Gibbs, James, ‘“Yapping” and “Pushing”: notes on Wole Soyinka's “Brske Time Bar” Radio Series of the Early Sixties’, in Africa Today (Denver), 33, I, 1986, pp. 19–26;Google ScholarGordon, Tim, ‘Nigerian Night's Entertainment’, review of Brecht's The Good Woman of Setzuan, in Ibadan, 9, 06 1960, p. 20;Google ScholarLindfors, Bemth, ‘Wole Soyinka Talking Through His Hat' and ‘The Early Writings of Wole Soyinka’, in Maes-Jelinek, Hena (ed.), Commonwealth Literature and the Modern World (Brussels, 1975), pp. 115–25 and 165–90;Google Scholar and Lindfors, Bernth, ‘Egbe's Sworn Enemy – Soyinka's Popular Sport’, in Lindfors, (ed.), Early Nigerian Literatures (New York, 1982), pp. 143–53.Google Scholar

¹³ For the egungun, see Soyinka, Wole, Ake: the years of childhood (London, 1981), pp. 31–5.Google Scholar

¹⁴ For example, Ferguson, John, ‘Nigerian Drama in English’, in Modern Drama (Toronto), 11, 05 1968, p. 10,Google Scholar and Finnegan, Ruth, Oral Literature in Africa (Oxford, 1970), p. 500.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Banham, Martin, ‘Notes on Nigerian Theatre: 1966’, in BAALE (Freetown), 4, 03 1966, pp. 33–4;Google ScholarCrowder, Michael, ‘Tradition and Change in Nigerian Literature’, in Tri-Quarterly (Evanston), 5, 1966, pp. 117 and 124–5;Google Scholar and Mahood, Molly, ‘Drama in New-Born States’, in Présence africaine (Paris), 60, 1966, p. 33.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Banham, Martin, ‘A Piece That We May Fairly Call Our Own’, in Ibadan, 12, 06 1961, p. 18,Google Scholar and ‘Notes on Nigerian Theatre: 1966’, p. 34. This writer concedes in a later article that there is a fusion of traditional Yoruba dramatic forms and universal influences in Soyinka's later plays, but is reluctant to extend this perception to the plays written before 1965. Banham, Martin, ‘Nigerian Dramatists in English and the Traditional Nigerian Theatre’, in Walsh, William (ed), Readings in Commonwealth Literature (Oxford, 1973), p. 136.Google Scholar

¹⁷ ‘Wole Soyinka’, in Duerden, Dennis and Pieterse, Cosmo (eds.), African Writers Talking (London, 1972), p. 170.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Maclean, Una, ‘Soyinka's International Drama’, in Black Orpheus (Lagos), 15, 1964, pp. 46–51.Google Scholar

¹⁹ For example, Jeyifo, Biodun, The Truthful Lie: essays in a sociology of African drama (London, 1985), pp. 26–7.Google Scholar Some echoes of western plays are discussed in detail by Gibbs, James, ‘Grafting is an Ancient Art: the relationship of African and European elements in the early plays of Wole Soyinka’, in World Literature Written in English (Toronto), 24, Summer 1984, pp. 87–99.Google Scholar

²⁰ This interplay is explored at length by Gibbs, ibid.

²¹ Sekoni, Ropo; ‘Metaphor as Basis of Form in Soyinka's Drama’, in Research in African Literatures (Austin, Texas), 14, Spring 1983, pp. 46–50.Google Scholar

²² Adedeji, Joel, ‘Aesthetics of Soyinka's Theatre’, in Adelugba, Dapo (ed), Before Our Very Eyes (Ibadan, 1987), pp. 115–18.Google Scholar

²³ Asagba, Austin, ‘Roots of African Drama: critical approaches and elements of continuity’, in Kunapipi (Aarhus, Denmark), 8, 3, 1986, p. 95.Google Scholar For the relevant scene in A Dance of the Forests, see Soyinka, Wole, Collected Plays, Vol. I (Oxford, 1973), p. 14.Google Scholar

²⁴ Awoonor, Kofi, The Breast of the Earth (New York, 1975), p. 323.Google Scholar

²⁵ Ogunba, Oyin, ‘Traditional African Festival Drama’, in Ogunba, and Irele, Abiola (eds.), Theatre in Africa (Ibadan, 1978), p. 20.Google Scholar

²⁶ Adedeji, Joel, ‘The Literature of the Yoruba Opera’, in Ballard, W. L. (ed.), Essays on African Literature (Atlanta, 1973), pp. 59–60.Google Scholar

²⁷ Adedeji, Joel, ‘Trends in the Content and Form of the Opening Glee in Yoruba Drama’, in Lindfors (ed), Critical Perspectives on Nigerian Literatures, pp. 41 and 45, and ‘“Alarinjo”: the traditional Yoruba travelling theatre’, in Ogunba and Irele (eds.), op. cit. p. 45.Google Scholar

²⁸ Awolalu, J. O., Yoruba Beliefs and Sacrificial Rites (Harlow, 1979), pp. 60 and 65.Google Scholar

²⁹ Ibid. p. 60.

³⁰ Soyinka, Collected Plays, Vol. I, p. 5.

³¹ Ogunba, ‘Traditional African Festival Drama’, p. 16.

³² Ogunba, Oyin, ‘The Traditional Content of the Plays of Wole Soyinka’, in African Literature Today (London), 5, 1971, p. 106.Google Scholar