Literature and Politics-A Review of George Orwell’s Animal Farm And Chinua Achebe’s A Man of the People (Published)
Philosophical discussion of the topic “the interrelations of literature and politics” can take many forms. For instance, one might be concerned to argue for or against the claim that literature must be understood as a product of the social and political forces that are at work when it is produced. Or, one might be concerned to assess the claim that literature is a form of political critique, perhaps even a preeminent form of it. Or, one might argue that literature can induce political change, that is, can be revolutionary—perhaps that it should be. Further questions involve how political and aesthetic properties interact in works. Does the presence of both sorts of property in a work create difficulty for aesthetic judgment? If one thinks that aesthetic judgment requires separating aesthetic from political properties in some strict way, the presence of political properties in the work will be problematic for aesthetic judgment. The problem might go as well to the heart of artistic production—that is, formalism of various stripes holds that one isn’t “really” creating art, if one is creating political “art.” Or one might be concerned that political and aesthetic properties are so intertwined that strongly negative or positive political judgment might spoil aesthetic judgment.Recent cases in the relationships of literature and politics often are drawn from music or cinema, for example, Dady Lumba’s Nana oye winner (A signature tune of the present ruling New Patriotic Party,NPP, a political party in Ghana), and Dee Aja’s Onaapo (A signature tune of the National Democratic Congress, NDC, the main opposition political party in Ghana today). Typically, issues of the political nature of art center on conceptions of artistic content, even where content is considered in relation to aesthetic form. In this paper, we focus instead on the interrelations of literature and politics from the print point of view. More specifically, we investigate claims that literature can criticize and alter political belief by being experienced in terms of its form in Chinua Achebe’s novel A Man of the People and George Orwell’s Animal Farm which are admired by some for their technical innovations and formal composition but reproached for their political content by others. This battle of complementation and condemnation of political satires applies to other standard cases such as Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Luís Bernardo Honwana Who kill mangy dog, and Knut Hamsun’s Hunger, Kwame Nkrumah’s I Speak of Freedom.This study indulges the political satire in George Orwell’s Animal Farm and Chinua Achebe’s A Man of the People.
Keywords: Animal Farm, Interrelations, Literature, Politics, Satire, a Man of the People
REALISATION OF THE MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS (MSGs): WHAT ROLE FOR NIGERIAN AND AFRICAN LITERATUR (Review Completed - Accepted)
This article clearly defines the terms of the Millennium Development Goals and the roles literature should play in the realisation of the vision. In its view, literature has existing structures prior to the launch of the programme by the United Nations in 2000 and which the objectives can conveniently fit into. These structures comprise political criticism, feminist criticism, eco-criticism or environmental literature and utopian or futuristic literature. Through political criticism, the world can entrench good governance which in turn will eradicate poverty as well as guarantee Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), better health care or find remedies to diseases. The paper goes ahead to argue that feminist criticism in literature has got the capacity to sensitise the world on gender equality and other gender issues by presenting highly educated and empowered women as characters in literary works. Eco-criticism alerts us on the danger of environmental degradation while utopian literature has the sheer force of catapulting us to an ethereal world where we will forget the present anomy and give a breaststroke thrust to the future. These are the concrete facts the paper discusses. It concludes by stating that as the mandate of MDGs supposedly ends in 2015, literature could continue the good work it has been doing for mankind before the advent of the Millennium Development Goals.
Keywords: Eco-criticism, Feminist criticism, Literature, Millennium Development Goals, Political criticism
Literature as Instrument for Development: A Survey of Sembene Ousmane’s Guelwaar (Published)
That there is a relationship between literature and a society, which produces it, is no longer news. However, the extent of the perceived interconnectivity between literature and its milieu remains a serious argument among literary theorists, historians and other practitioners of creative arts generally. In an attempt to contribute to the debate on the meeting point between literature and the environment which paves the way for its creation and production, we examine Sembène Ousmane’s Guelwaar with the view that Art is not only for its own sake and purpose but also for the development of the society, which it claims it is a product of. This paper therefore is premised on the pragmatic approach which stresses that literature performs certain functions. The paper concludes that literature is a potential tool for sustainable developments in various human societies.
Keywords: Corruption, Culture, Development, Empowerment, Literature, Society, Woman Emancipation