Tutuola, who died in 1997, had very little education and his English, as you will notice, tends to be rather bizarre, to put it mildly.
So his great success did not amuse the educated Nigerians at that time, especially as they were trying to prove to our English masters that we were sophisticated and ripe enough to earn be given our independence from colonial rule. They thought Tutuola’s book was being deliberately and mischievously praised by the duplicitous British, in collusion with their agents in the British press, in order to mock our ignorance, and hence further delay the independence struggle.
Therefore it was many years afterwards before Nigerians came to read and appraise Tutuola objectively without that taint of inferiority complex, and to see finally the magic he had wrought in modernizing our traditional folklore.
The story I am going to read from the book is entitled “The Beautifully Dressed Gentleman, or The Complete Gentleman.” Some of you probably know it already. But listen now to how Tutuola recounts the appearance of the man at the market:
He was a beautiful ‘complete’ gentleman, he dressed with the finest and most costly clothes, all the parts of his body were completed, he was a tall man but stout. As this gentleman came to the market on that day, if he’d been an article or animal for sale, he would be sold at least for £2,000.
As this complete gentleman came to the market on that day, and at the same time that this lady saw him in the market, she did nothing more than to ask him where he was living, but this fine gentleman did not answer her or approach her at all. But when she noticed that the fine or complete gentleman did not listen to her, she left her articles and began to watch the movements of the complete gentleman about in the market and left her articles unsold.
By and by the market closed for that day then the whole people in the market were returning to their destinations, etc., and the complete gentleman was returning to his own too, but as this lady was following him about in the market all the while, she saw him when he was returning to his destination as others did, then she was following him (complete gentleman) to an unknown place. But as she was following the complete gentleman along the road, he was telling her to go back and not to follow him, but the lady did not listen to what he was telling her, and when the complete gentleman had tired of telling her not to follow him or to go back to her town, he left her to follow him.
But when they had travelled about twelve miles away from that market, they left the road on which they were travelling and started to travel inside an endless forest in which only all the terrible creatures were living.
As they were travelling along in this endless forest then the complete gentleman in the market that the lady was following began to return the hired parts of his body to the owners and he was paying them the rentage money. When he reached where he hired the left foot, he pulled it out, he gave it to the owner and paid him, and they kept going; when they reached the place where he hired the right foot, he pulled it out and gave it to the owner and paid for the rentage. Now both feet had returned to the owners, so he began to crawl along on the ground, by that time, that lady wanted to go back to her town or her father, but the terrible and curious creature or the complete gentleman did not allow her to return or go back to her town or her father again…
When they went furthermore, then they reached where he hired the belly, ribs, chest, etc., then he pulled them out and gave them to the owner and paid for the rentage. Now to this gentleman or terrible creature remained only the head and both arms with neck, by that time he could not crawl as before but only went jumping on as a bullfrog and now this lady was soon faint for this fearful creature whom she was following. But when the lady saw every part of this complete gentleman in the market was spared or hired and he was returning them to the owners, then she began to try all her efforts to return to her father’s town, but she was not allowed by this fearful creature at all. When they reached where he hired both arms, he pulled them out and gave them to the owner, he paid for them; and they were still going on in this endless forest, they reached the place where he hired the neck, he pulled it out and gave it to the owner and paid for it as well…
When the lady saw that the gentleman became a Skull, she began to faint, but eh Skull told her if she would die she would die and she would follow him to his house. But by the time that he was saying so, he was humming with a terrible voice and also grew very wild and even if there was a person two miles away he would not have to listen before hearing him, so this lady began to run away in that forest for her life, but the Skull chased her and within a few yards, he caught her, because he was very clever and smart as he was only Skull and he could jump a mile to the second before coming down. He caught the lady in this way: so when the lady was running away for her life, he hastily ran to her front and stopped her as a log of wood.
By and by, this lady followed the Skull to his house, and the house was a hole which was under the ground…
Let us stop here. You can imagine the rest. A fantastic story, you will agree. Just another gifted author exercising his imagination; and the story has nothing at all to do with reality. But you will be wrong. Look at it again, and you will see that far from being a mere fantasy it is in fact an accurate and uncanny trope predicting the future that the novelist himself had not seen, but which we Nigerians live right now, sixty years after he wrote it. Indeed, that picture of the Complete Gentleman is an exact mirror of the present-day Nigerian.
You and me, all of us in this assembly, what else are we individually, but the assembled bricolage of spare parts borrowed or hired from different parts of the world?
If you don’t believe me, I have another story to prove it.
This is from a young Nigerian writer called Elnathan John, who is just at the beginning of his career, but who I believe will soon become famous as a contemporary Jonathan Swift.
Just a few months ago on the occasion of the Nigerian Independence anniversary, John, who writes a column for the Sunday Trust, declared himself a Presidential candidate for the coming elections.
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