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This is a continuation of the 'proverbial quotes', which began last week. All lizards lie prostrate: how can a man tell which lizard suffers from bellyache? In time, the pain will make one of them lie flat on its back, then shall that which has been unknown be made known. Page 23 A chicken eats corn, drinks water, swallows pebbles, yet she complains of having no teeth. If she had teeth, would she eat gold? Let her ask the cow who has teeth yet eats grass. Page 26 Is it not ignorance that makes the rat attack the cat? Page 28 The hyena flirts with the hen, the hen is happy, not knowing that her death has come. Page 29 The lion's liver is vain wish for dogs Page 37 Because the farm-owner is slow to catch the thief, the thief calls the farm-owner thief. Page 46 The mangrove tree dwells in the river, but does that make it a crocodile? Page 51 Can the cockroach be innocent in a gathering of fowls? Page 53 The toad likes water,...

Though the title says 'quotes', the following quotes are more of proverbs than quotes. The richness of a culture, the values a group of people hold and their philosophies, distilled through time tested means, are quickly learnt from their proverbs. And every culture has one. It is not changing into the lion that is hard, it is getting the tail of a lion Page 7 Kolanut last long in the mouths of them who value it Page 7 Joy has a slender body that breaks too soon Page 8 When the chameleon brings forth a child, is not that child expected to dance? As we have made you King, act as King. Page 9 When the rain falls on the leopard, does it wash off its spots? Has the richness of kingly life washed off the love of our King for his people? Page 10 My people. Children of our fathers. Sickness is like rain. Does the rain fall on one roof alone? No. Does it fall on one body and not on another? No. Whoever the rain sees, on him it rains. Does it not? It is the same with sickness.  Pa...

Title: The Gods are not to Blame Author: Ola Rotimi Genre: Play/Tragedy Publishers: University Press PLC Pages: 72 Year of First Performance: 1968 Place of First Performance: Ife Festival of Arts, Nigeria Year of First Publication: 1971 (this edition, 1990) Country: Nigeria In this play, Sophocle's Oedipus Rex , is given a Nigerian treatment and having not read Sophocle's, I really enjoyed Ola Rotimi 's rendition. The gods are not to blame  is a play that questions destiny: are we in control of our destiny or we are the product of our destiny? Can we escape it? At the end of the play, the question is still not answered as an individual can argue both for or against this theme. The play opens with someone narrating the events surrounding the birth of King Adetusa's first son. Queen Ojuola, King Adetusa's wife, has just delivered her first son and the soothsayer has been summoned to foretell the future of this newly born son. The soothsayer,...

Title: Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again Author: Ola Rotimi Genre: Play Publishers: University Press PLC Pages: 86 ISBN: 978 154003 6 Year of First Performance: 1966 Place of First Performance: Yale School of Drama Year of First Publication: 1977 (this edition, 1999) Country: Nigeria This is the first time I have read a play written by an African and the second play book I have read since Shakespeare's Macbeth. And save one or two issues, I enjoyed it. Extremely. The issues has to do with reading the instructions given in the play, such as telling the director of the play that a particular statement was made off-stage or something else. Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again is a hilarious comic play by Ola Rotimi. It tells the story of Lejoka-Brown, a soldier and a man of many wives. One of the wives he married himself while fighting in the Congo, the other (Mama Rashida) was the wife of his elder brother who was married to him by default after the death of his bro...