The interpretation: Director Kola Tubosun has made a documentary about Wole Soyinka (above). Photo Keystone-France/Getty Images
An old photo of the acclaimed Nigerian playwright, Nobel laureate and cultural icon Wole Soyinka seated on the front steps of his former home at the University of Ibadan is the impetus for Ebrohimie Road: A Museum of Memory.
Struck by this photo, which appears — wrongly, as we later come to understand — on the cover of Ibadan: The Penkelemes Years, one of Soyinka’s memoirs, director Kola Tubosun goes on a journey back in time to present a portrait of the artist as a young man.
The film’s release was timed for this year’s celebration of Soyinka’s 90th birthday.
With talking-head contributions from Soyinka’s family, including his ex-wife Olaide and his children, Tubosun’s film zeroes in on this particular moment in his life, shedding light on some of the conflicts that he was dealing with at the time.
What emerges is a moderately interesting documentary. It comes alive most in the arguments made for conscious preservation of cultural artefacts such as 9 Ebrohimie Road. The film is therefore more interesting as academic discourse than creative achievement.
No surprise here as Tubosun made his name as a poet, linguist and publisher before turning to film.
Soyinka himself, who has since assumed larger-than-life status, participates in the project, but from a considered remove that gives the impression that he is only doing it as a polite favour to the filmmaker.
For a man perfectly capable of documenting his own colourful life, and has spent considerable time doing that, there must be little excitement in observing an outsider dig through the bones of what was left off.
This article first appeared in The Continent, the pan-African weekly newspaper produced in partnership with the Mail & Guardian. It’s designed to be read and shared on WhatsApp. Download your free copy here