THE AFRICAN SLEUTH

  SOMETHING IN THE WATER  BY  MATSHIDISO P TALENG  Every evening when Mathapelo came home from playing with her friends her dress would always be muddy, her mother would always ask her where she’s been playing. ‘’By the river Mom’’ she’d reply. Mathapelo was only 7 years old and her mother didn’t like the idea Of her playing by the river, but because she was going there with other older kids, she let her  Be. Mathapelo was a shy young girl and had an imaginary friend that went with her everywhere. At night when the family would sit in the lounge and watch television, Mathapelo would be in her room playing with ‘’Pinky’’ the imaginary friend  Her older brother Kamo who was 12years old, would always come in Mathapelo’s room and tease her by throwing away the   te a set she had prepared for her and Pinky, telling her that she should stop her nonsense because P inky didn’t exist. Mathapelo would go crying to their mother and...

  An interesting work, focusing on Africa many decades ago... with modernisation taking root. But still many aspects and beliefs of the past still hold sway. A young girl Tona has died under rather strange circumstances. Her funeral is a rather eerie one. Why are things proceeding in bizarre fashion here? What makes the girl's death mysterious and suspicious? The author 's narrative grips us, as we read: "I heard the (funeral) procession approaching but the sounds that accompanied it frightened me ... the coffin reached us. The four men appeared to be in a trance. Their eyes stared without blinking, their movements were jerky... although the movements of the coffin were so irregular the men acted in perfect accord with it... "The child will not go to the cemetery" my father said.. "She did not die a natural death. She wishes to be avenged..."   "I began to understand. The wish-bird had flown over the town. Tona had died. Her body had refuse...

  Wole Soyinka needs no introduction as a world-class African and global playwright, as the very first African to be honoured with the Nobel prize for literature. Pundits often praise the superb imagination and dazzling language of the playwright, but here we are briefly concerned with the unexpected developments in his plays. Two examples will suffice. In Soyinka's celebrated play, Kongi's Harvest , the tyrant (Kongi)  is often contrasted with the traditional African king. But it is clear that Kongi would ride roughshod over everybody as the leader. He condemns many people to death, as the drama unfolds. Then near the end, we are horrified as Kongi finds himself presented with the head of a hanged man! It is the head of the father of Segi, a notable woman, which stealthily finds its way in a salver to the strongman Kongi himself! And people take to their heels!! In another of Soyinka's excellent plays ( The Lion and the Jewel) the traditional leader Baroka...