Theatre of the absurd?
GOODNESS me! Is it really 52 years almost to the day since I first went up to University College, Makerere, as it was then called? University College: because at that time it was affiliated to London University in an umbilical sort of way. London Universi
By John Nagenda
GOODNESS me! Is it really 52 years almost to the day since I first went up to University College, Makerere, as it was then called? University College: because at that time it was affiliated to London University in an umbilical sort of way. London University, England, how we puffed our chests!
It was around that time that I first met Samuel Beckett’s play, Waiting for Godot. What was one to make of it? It was obviously of great import, heightened by the fact that the t was silent (because Beckett, although an Irishman, was living in Paris, France).
Since we were informed by our lecturer, a lugubrious Briton (I can see his face as I write, but forgotten his name) that this play was the forerunner of the Theatre of the Absurd, as I read it I thought, Sure, and more or less dismissed it from further thought.
Let the absurd go to their absurdity.
I did wonder though whether “Godo†did not in some way refer to God, given the Nigerian o at the end of their sentences! Yesterday’s Friday morning (the 13th!) brought me sharply awake with the thought that the finally consummated union in Zimbabwe between the horrific Mugabe and the somewhat naïve Tsvangirai (what a name to spell!) belonged firmly in the field of the Theatre of the Absurd.
It is, God knows, obvious that anything and every thing must at least be tried and tested in an attempt to put an end to Zimbabwe’s agony under Mugabe. He has brought his country to the very edge of the grave. The economy, if that’s the word, hardly registers a heartbeat, its inflation rate in the millions.
For the majority of people death might even come as a relief, whether from the plagues that now afflict them, or in many cases by the terrifying brutality towards those in incarceration. Pictures this week showed skeletons to rival those inflicted on Jews in Hitler’s Germany, or Stalin’s pogroms and Siberian Death Camps. A stench lies over Zimbabwe which cannot be denied.
Morgan Tsvangirai and his opposition MDC party were damned if they joined a “unity†government under Mugabe, and damned if they didn’t! Mugabe has them by the “proverbialsâ€. Probably the course they have chosen by taking part in government is the lesser of two evils.
It will all depend what real (as opposed to hoped-for) powers are thrown their way by the eternally vengeful Mugabe. First signs were not promising: new Premier Tsvangirai used his by going to a prison where his supporters were languishing, (although “languishing†might be too leisurely a word to describe their brutalised state) and immediately called for their release. It did not happen, or at least not immediately. Certainly it would have sent out signals, however merely symbolic, if the MDC member and brand new PM had got his way.
The cynical (or just hopeful) might say that the MDC, and for that matter the battered nation of Zimbabwe, will outlast the rickety president. It is a mere crumb, but that is better than complete zero. God turn Your mighty gaze on Your poor and forgotten Zimbabweans! Even Jesus cried out on the cross to His Father: “Why hast thou forsaken me!â€
****************
Still on the Theatre of the Absurd. You remember the Israelis we last left at their killing fields of Gaza, where a huge number of Gazans, children inclusive, perished?
Well, on the crest of that wave they strutted back and held their elections between their merely vengeful and extremely vengeful leaders: names and policies interchangeable. Guess what? It is draw at the top.
Nothing will change anyway in their absurd cruelty to Arabs, whatever permutations are employed! Sometime ago I postulated a theory about the Jews (and Israelis are mostly Jews, although not all Jews are Israelis, an important degree of separation on Israeli issues). My theory: Down the loom of years, the Jews have been quite simply outstanding in the many fields of civilisation.
Talk of the sciences, of music, of art: and you will always find Jews among the top. Do not forget the Arabs either, great mathematicians, astronomers, and for example one in particular, Ibn al-Haytham, who beat Isaac Newton’s Theory of Gravitation by seven centuries. Just something in the air of the Middle East, or the fact that Arabs and Jews are Semite cousins!
But one thing God withheld from (at least modern) Jews is the art of politics and governance.
In Israel you have to go back 40 years to the matronly and wonderfully wise premier Golda Meier to find such mix of kindliness and purpose towards the Arabs. Yitzhak Rabin, some years later, was, trying to show signs, when he was slain by a fellow Jew. How is this seeming dichotomy, between brilliancy in so many fields, and almost none in this, to be explained? ****************
Back home the Theatre of the Absurd was as usual well and flourishing. Within the week two headlines caught the eye. “President warns Agriculture Minister Onekâ€, followed two days later by, “Minister Onek warns NAADS staffâ€; clearly the warning was percolating down nicely. We await NAADS warning somebody in turn: the tea lady?!
Not to be outdone, my longtime friend, Col Amanya Mushega, upped up in the FDC, to contest a top position within that party. Eh? I never even knew he was in it, and all ready not for him to aim lower! The FDC boss is a Colonel, the one contesting for his job is a Major General. Top heavy brass, (all rtd)!?
GOODNESS me! Is it really 52 years almost to the day since I first went up to University College, Makerere, as it was then called? University College: because at that time it was affiliated to London University in an umbilical sort of way. London University, England, how we puffed our chests!
It was around that time that I first met Samuel Beckett’s play, Waiting for Godot. What was one to make of it? It was obviously of great import, heightened by the fact that the t was silent (because Beckett, although an Irishman, was living in Paris, France).
Since we were informed by our lecturer, a lugubrious Briton (I can see his face as I write, but forgotten his name) that this play was the forerunner of the Theatre of the Absurd, as I read it I thought, Sure, and more or less dismissed it from further thought.
Let the absurd go to their absurdity.
I did wonder though whether “Godo†did not in some way refer to God, given the Nigerian o at the end of their sentences! Yesterday’s Friday morning (the 13th!) brought me sharply awake with the thought that the finally consummated union in Zimbabwe between the horrific Mugabe and the somewhat naïve Tsvangirai (what a name to spell!) belonged firmly in the field of the Theatre of the Absurd.
It is, God knows, obvious that anything and every thing must at least be tried and tested in an attempt to put an end to Zimbabwe’s agony under Mugabe. He has brought his country to the very edge of the grave. The economy, if that’s the word, hardly registers a heartbeat, its inflation rate in the millions.
For the majority of people death might even come as a relief, whether from the plagues that now afflict them, or in many cases by the terrifying brutality towards those in incarceration. Pictures this week showed skeletons to rival those inflicted on Jews in Hitler’s Germany, or Stalin’s pogroms and Siberian Death Camps. A stench lies over Zimbabwe which cannot be denied.
Morgan Tsvangirai and his opposition MDC party were damned if they joined a “unity†government under Mugabe, and damned if they didn’t! Mugabe has them by the “proverbialsâ€. Probably the course they have chosen by taking part in government is the lesser of two evils.
It will all depend what real (as opposed to hoped-for) powers are thrown their way by the eternally vengeful Mugabe. First signs were not promising: new Premier Tsvangirai used his by going to a prison where his supporters were languishing, (although “languishing†might be too leisurely a word to describe their brutalised state) and immediately called for their release. It did not happen, or at least not immediately. Certainly it would have sent out signals, however merely symbolic, if the MDC member and brand new PM had got his way.
The cynical (or just hopeful) might say that the MDC, and for that matter the battered nation of Zimbabwe, will outlast the rickety president. It is a mere crumb, but that is better than complete zero. God turn Your mighty gaze on Your poor and forgotten Zimbabweans! Even Jesus cried out on the cross to His Father: “Why hast thou forsaken me!â€
****************
Still on the Theatre of the Absurd. You remember the Israelis we last left at their killing fields of Gaza, where a huge number of Gazans, children inclusive, perished?
Well, on the crest of that wave they strutted back and held their elections between their merely vengeful and extremely vengeful leaders: names and policies interchangeable. Guess what? It is draw at the top.
Nothing will change anyway in their absurd cruelty to Arabs, whatever permutations are employed! Sometime ago I postulated a theory about the Jews (and Israelis are mostly Jews, although not all Jews are Israelis, an important degree of separation on Israeli issues). My theory: Down the loom of years, the Jews have been quite simply outstanding in the many fields of civilisation.
Talk of the sciences, of music, of art: and you will always find Jews among the top. Do not forget the Arabs either, great mathematicians, astronomers, and for example one in particular, Ibn al-Haytham, who beat Isaac Newton’s Theory of Gravitation by seven centuries. Just something in the air of the Middle East, or the fact that Arabs and Jews are Semite cousins!
But one thing God withheld from (at least modern) Jews is the art of politics and governance.
In Israel you have to go back 40 years to the matronly and wonderfully wise premier Golda Meier to find such mix of kindliness and purpose towards the Arabs. Yitzhak Rabin, some years later, was, trying to show signs, when he was slain by a fellow Jew. How is this seeming dichotomy, between brilliancy in so many fields, and almost none in this, to be explained? ****************
Back home the Theatre of the Absurd was as usual well and flourishing. Within the week two headlines caught the eye. “President warns Agriculture Minister Onekâ€, followed two days later by, “Minister Onek warns NAADS staffâ€; clearly the warning was percolating down nicely. We await NAADS warning somebody in turn: the tea lady?!
Not to be outdone, my longtime friend, Col Amanya Mushega, upped up in the FDC, to contest a top position within that party. Eh? I never even knew he was in it, and all ready not for him to aim lower! The FDC boss is a Colonel, the one contesting for his job is a Major General. Top heavy brass, (all rtd)!?