Wole Soyinka is a literary giant. Apart from being the first black African to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, in 1986 (Algerian-born Albert Camus won in 1957), the Nigerian writer has led an eventful life. His moving memoirs and novels about Africa have affected millions, and he is also a passionate advocate of human rights. In 1967 he was jailed for two years during the Nigerian civil war, and, under the regime of Gen Sani Abacha in the 1990s, he escaped Nigeria on a motorcycle and was sentenced to death in absentia.
Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth is Soyinka’s first work of prose fiction in nearly 50 years. At more than 400 pages, this tome is the result of the post-pandemic lockdown that propelled him to finish writing it.
The sprawling plotline of this satire is set in a fictionalised Nigeria haunted by the ghost of its colonial past. Soyinka takes no prisoners with his unrestrained commentary on the corruption at the very core of Nigerian life. The story features a dizzying array of characters and intersecting storylines, which at times results in dense prose, especially for readers not well acquainted with the country’s politics.
The narrative is laced with allusions to the perplexing and turbulent political landscape. In this fictional Nigeria, the major political party is the People on the Move Party, POMP, which claims credit for the country’s year-round festivals – “religious, secular, memorialist”.
In the second chapter, The Gospel According to Happiness, Soyinka’s caustic humour is on glorious display when he deadpans that “not many nations . . . could boast a Ministry of Happiness. Yet, this was an innovation that came from one of the most impoverished states within that federated nation.” He goes on to describe how the pioneer minister was the spouse of “the imaginative governor”.
This is inspired by real-life events. In 2001 a study in the UK’s New Scientist magazine concluded that the happiest people in the world live in Nigeria. In another instance of reality being stranger than fiction, the governor of Imo state in Nigeria appointed an official, who just happened to be his sister, as the state’s first Commissioner for Happiness and Purpose Fulfilment.
The book is replete with such bizarre instances that seem exaggerated but are rooted in actual events. Soyinka is clearly not afraid of caustic barbs about the two fundamental powers in the country – religion and politics.
Tibidje is a reformed fraudster who realises that his true calling is his evangelism. He rebrands himself as Papa Divina after the game-changing epiphany of formulating an amalgamation of the two dominant religions that were “united in victimology” in the form of Chrislam. “Papa Divina had only one commodity to offer – spirituality. All it required was creative packaging, and that was his forte.”
Papa Divina is eventually shown to be in cahoots with the prime minister, an allusion to the dark alliance of politics and religion prevalent in most countries.
The Gong of Four (as they like to call themselves) of Nigerians who have studied in Europe form the lynchpin of the plot. They had the dream of returning home, armed with western knowledge, to build an ideal country, a vision they named Brand of the Land. The most determined is Duyole Pitan-Payne, an engineer and business entrepreneur. The second is Dr Menka Kighare, a brilliant but jaded surgeon who has been desensitised by years of attending to victims of war crimes, incest and ritualistic killings.
Dr Menka is approached one day to become a partner in a thriving business of human body parts. He decides to quit surgery after the horrible realisation that the potential partners were so confident about him coming on board, they even left him a price catalogue of body parts. “That was what rankled.” He is disillusioned to find out that his own staff had been selling body parts for years, even the washed-down blood from the emergency room, right under his nose. Both the protagonists plan on exposing this demonic trade and the influential people behind it, but things quickly go awry.
The novel, featuring plenty of action and mordantly humorous anecdotes, consists of several circuitous strands with rapidly shifting timelines and narrative voices. It takes 200 pages for the erratic plotline to finally settle down and flow, largely due to Dr Menka becoming the predominant narrative voice, which makes it easier to follow the proceedings.
Ultimately, Soyinka highlights that the enemy is not the state but our greed – for money, power, stature. Chronicles from the Land of the Happiest People on Earth is a chronicle of the corruption of humanity.
