Important sources

The famous play written by Wole Soyinka, “The strong breed” tells the story of Emen, who lives in a strange village and has to sacrifice his life in order to save the village.

It is a highly symbolic play. The play seems to suggest that death is a crucial marker in the struggle between individual will and community wholeness. Here Soyinka blends the past with the present. The play is marked with flashbacks between Eman’s past and the present where he sees images of his father and his dead wife Omae. His father’s reminder that they were destined to be carriers prompts him to go back to his village after twelve years. The protagonist (Eman) is a stranger who has come to this particular village to act as a teacher and share his education. On the night of the purification ceremony he learns that Ifada, a helpless idiot boy whom he has befriended has been selected as ‘carrier’ and victim; and he is driven by compassion to take Ifada’s part in the ritual. The crisis brings back memories.  While checking the pedigree of Eman’s family, we can identify that his father was also a carrier and sacrificed his life. So Eman has fled the family tradition of symbolic sacrifice.

Important sources

1: Malayalam movie, Thaniyavarthanam (1987)  which tells how deep the blind faith is in rural india and how our perception of something , makes it right or wrong rather thatn what really it is. Balan Mash (protagonist) is a teacher who lives in a tiny hamlet in Kerala. Balan Mash has a uncle who is mentally challenged. His uncle became a mental patient after a separation with his lover; this underlines the deep-rooted belief among their family that one male from each generation will go mad.One night changes it all, when Balan has a nightmare. People start suspecting Balan of following the footsteps of his uncle into madness because Balan's uncle fell mentally ill with a nightmare.

Now Balan's community evaluates each and every move he makes; he is deemed a lunatic and his actions are misinterpreted. Eventually his family joins the gang and he is sent to the asylum. The doctor declares him sane. But society doesn't agree. Helpless, Balan plays mad. Ultimately, Balan's mother poisons him to free him from the world.

2:Agnisakshi, malayalam novel written by Lalithambhika Antharjanam

It is the story of a Nampoothiri woman’s struggle to rise above the shackles of tradition and her journey towards self-realisation. Based on a novel by the same name by noted Malayalam writer Lalithambika Antharjanam, Agnisakshi is the story of two individuals who love and respect each other, but whose life together is doomed right from the beginning. Set against the turbulence of the freedom struggle, the film showcases the conflict between tradition and progressive reforms, the caste system and the emancipation of women.

3: Dadi Budha, Oriya novel written by Gopinath Mohanty

In this novel author portrayed tribal life very clearly. At one level, their visions are almost identical: they visualize the disintegration of a primitive community under the impact of a new faith or an alien value-system. But to see the disintegration of Lulla village (In the novel, Dadi Budha) and the tribal community in Umuofia (In Things Fall Apart) as parts of the same process of change is to play down the role of colonialism as an agent of disruption. Achebe’s allusion to W.B. Yeats is not a gesture of submission; it interrogates its cosmic, universalist vision of change. Although Gopinath does not directly refer to Yeats, he also focuses the traumatic expression of colonialism in his work.

4: Disgrace, novel written by J.M Coetzee

The novel takes its inspiration from South Africa's contemporary social and political conflict, and offers a bleak look at the country. As in all of his mature novels, Coetzee here deals with the theme of exploitation. His favorite approach has been to explore the innocuous-seeming use of another person to fill one's gentler emotional needs.This is a story of both regional and universal significance. The central character is a confusing person, at once an intellectual snob who is contemptuous of others and also a person who commits outrageous mistakes. His story is also local; he is a white South African male in a world where such men no longer hold the power they once did. He is forced to rethink his entire world at an age when he believes he is too old to change and, in fact, should have a right not to. The novel also explores the difficulty of communication between men and women, between parents and children, and between humans and animals.

The critical analysis of the play 'The strong breed' written by Wole Soyinka

The critical analysis of the play 'The strong breed' written by Wole Soyinka

 The famous play written by Wole Soyinka, “The strong breed” tells the story of Emen, who lives in a strange village and has to sacrifice his life in order to save the village. So it’s a tragedy that ends with an individual sacrifice for the sake of the communal benefit. Sunma, who is deeply in love with Eman, was very possessive about her love. The behavioral patterns of these two characters are extremely different. Here Eman has been portrayed as Jesus Christ because he is both a teacher and a healer and sacrifices his life to an insensitive village.

The themes of the play are very much linked to the Yoruba culture. In this play, Soyinka presents a ritual based on Yoruba festival on the NewYear where the villagers sacrifice a ‘carrier’. Eman represents the whole victims of the evil ritual of sacrificing “carrier”. This type of ritual and customs can see in different communities of the world, mostly among the tribal communities.

It is a highly symbolic play. The play seems to suggest that death is a crucial marker in the struggle between individual will and community wholeness. The crisis brings back memories.  While checking the pedigree of Eman’s family, we can identify that his father was also a carrier and sacrificed his life. So Eman has fled the family tradition of symbolic sacrifice.

There is an undercurrent of repressive ideology operating beneath the ritual.According  to Althuser"Ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence". According to Althusser, by contrast, ideology does not "reflect" the real world but "represents" the "imaginary relationship of individuals" to the real world; the thing ideology (mis)represents is itself already at one remove from the real.

 Sati,The caste system in Kerala, Mannappedi or Pulappedi were the major repressive tools in the post-colonial India till 1980. At that time the socalled hegimonised Hindu’s  are the dominant figures. They exploited the minority for theirown prosperity.

How deep the blind faith is in rural india and how our perception of something , makes it right or wrong rather thatn what really it is. In rural area people are do not Bothered  about  the consequences of  the misconception. When we shift our attention to the socio-political atmosphere of  Kerala , we can see the conflict between tradition and progressive reforms, the caste system and the emancipation of women.

Like in ‘Disgrace’, novel written by J.M  Coetzee , it deals with South Africa's contemporary social and political conflict, exploitation,and offers a bleak look at the country. This novel focuses the traumatic expression of colonialism and treated it as an agent of disruption with the help of tribal life.

The Yoruba ritual is a cultural product. But the ideology works in such a way that dominant ideology of the dominant class in the society is used to exercise hegemony over the weaker sections of the society and establish continuity to the oppression.

Critical analysis of the play ‘The Hungry Earth ‘

         Maishe Maponya is a South African playwright. He was also a victim of the apartheid system that existed in South Africa during the colonial rule. These experiences drew him in to the path of political theatre; he later became the part of Black Consciousness Movement. The Hungry Earth (1978) is one of the important plays of Maponya dealing with the miserable plight of rural as well as migrant labourers working in mines. Maponya clearly traces the living and working condition of the Black people in this play.

                        Maponya concentrated on plays where he presented the cruelties of  colonial rule and thus to make the people aware about their condition and to rise against colonial powers. The play makes use of the traditional gumboot dancing as a mode of protest. The labouring people were not allowed to talk to each other, so they found out a solution for their problem, that resulted in introducing gumboot dance as a means of communication between the workers. Later it was exhibited for tourists.

There are six scenes in the play. Each scene is depicting various harassments faced by the mineworkers in various places. The play also reflects social, economic and cultural effects of south African migrant labour system. The first scene is set in the hostel room where four workers share experiences such as humiliation from the hands of the whites. Scene two, the sugar plantation depicts the condition of labour on a plantation where wages are low, working condition are poor and children are made to do manual labour to earn poverty wages.

Scene three ,the train, presents the picture of rural men travelling to Egoli, on their way they were ill treated by the white people. Johannesburg represents wealth and opportunity. On the train,

however, a brutal ticket inspector arrests the men for smoking 'dagga1, a scene of police brutality follows, and the scene ends with these words directed at the audience.

"Most of us were requested to produce passes and permits.

Those who failed to produce them spent two weeks in jail

And were deported to their respective homes on their release.

This is the inhuman and unjust procedure to endorse the

Unjust laws that make another a stranger in the land of his

Birth and rob him of his freedom to move wherever he wants.

Is freedom not the law of nature? Then what? "

 Scene four is set in the mine. Here the working conditions of miners are depicted: the danger, the dissatisfaction with living conditions, the relationship between makhulubaas, naduna and workers. The final scene, the mining compound, presents a picture of the living conditions, the loneliness, the poverty. The scene ends with the story of the death of a young husband on the mines and the lamentation by his wife. Above all, there is a social consciousness which attempts to make audiences aware of the disorders and malfunctions in its social institutions.

While coming to Indian context we can find similar plays dealing with the exploitation of poor people. And through these plays they protest against the authorities to attain their rights.