A Survey of African Poetry in the London Times, Sunday Times, Financial Times, the Times Literary Supplement 1865-1985

Christopher Okigbo was born in Ojoto, Nigeria in 1932 and studied Western classics at the University of Ibadan. He joined the Biafran side during the Nigerian Civil War and was killed in 1967 during an offensive by Nigerian forces against Nsukka. He published three poetry collections, Heavensgate (1962), Limits (1964), Silences (1965), and a posthumous collection in 1971 titled, Labyrinths.

The legacy of Okigbo the Poet-Soldier is chronicled in three news reports: "A Poet in Arms (Guns, Sub-machine 9mm, 1007)" an Insight story, "Full Analysis of the War Awaited" by Kaye Whiteman "of West Africa," and "The Arrest of Ken Saro-Wiwa" by A.M Daniels. Together, these three reports provide a view of Okigbo's pre-war political ideologies and legacy chronicled in western media. Even in literary discourses, Okigbo is often cited in connection to the circumstances of his death, this helped to create a myth around his poetry and legacy.

The first report, "A Poet in Arms (Guns, Sub-machine 9mm, 1007)" published in the "Insight" column of The Sunday Times of October 30, 1966 refers to Okigbo, W. B Yeats, Patrick Pearse, Garcia Lorca, Geothe, and Byron as "…poets doubling as men of action."

The Sunday Times was launched in 1822, it promised to uphold the freedom of the press against anyone who would stifle it. In 1963, it formed the Insight team, which became world famous for cutting-edge investigative journalism. The "Insight" team broke many of the key stories of the twentieth century.

The "Insight" report describes an illicit arms deal in Birmingham, "[Okigbo] planned the deal with a French ex-policeman, Paul Favier to transport 1007 submachine guns to defend the Ibo against the ravages of the Hausa tribesmen from Northern Nigeria." Okigbo was said to have changed his mind at the last minute and decided not to board an "ancient DC 4." The plane crashed in Cameroon, and Okigbo's suitcase and books were found in its wreckage.

The "Insight" report carries an interesting comment, "His poetry, as at yet, shows no signs of political commitment." This comment is important because Okigbo was still alive when this was published. It may represent the beginning of the popularization of associating politics, protests, and wars with the poet. Indeed, the construction of romantic revolutionary heroic figures was not uncommon in that time. The medical doctor and Cuban revolutionary, Che Guevara, stands out as the poster child of such figures, and Okigbo's identity was being constructed in the same mold. The "Insight" quoting one of T. S Elliot's refrains "& the mortar is not yet dry…" alludes to a future where Okigbo would write of his war experiences.

The second report "Full Analysis of the War Awaited" by Kaye Whiteman published in The Financial Times of March 6, 1972 is a complaint about the inability of Nigerian writers to write about the Nigerian Civil War. Whiteman attributes the unavailability of war stories to the survivors urge to bury the past in the postwar mood of reconciliation, and the discreet silence maintained by the main actors in the war who still hold valuable posts in government.

Martin Kaye Whiteman, journalist and editor, was born 9 March 1936 and died 17 May 2014. His obituary in The Guardian reads that, "He met most of the key African leaders from the period of decolonisation and independence, both English- and French-speaking, and was in touch with many of those involved in public service throughout the continent. Whiteman also reported on the Nigerian civil war of 1967-70, witnessing the surrender of the Biafran general Philip Effiong to General Yakubu Gowon of the federal government." Whiteman was the deputy editor, editor, editor-in-chief, and general manager of the weekly West Africa magazine. He was a contributing editor of Africa Today from 2002 onwards. His advocated for African journalism, the history of the continent and its preservation. He wrote a book, Lagos: A Cultural and Historical Companion (2012).

Whiteman doesn't show any concern for the lives lost during the war or the effect of the Nigerian Civil war on the country, rather he focuses on Nigeria being "…an immensely rich field for any researcher interested in building a picture of what was…" He specifies the type of researchers by casually adding that, "…there are few if any outsiders who are able, willing or qualified to do this." Whiteman declares the few available accounts of the war as unreliable and meaningless, but desires that the dairies kept by Nigerian soldiers during the war be published. He justifies his demand to know, by mentioning the need to archive history.

Some may argue that these war stories archived in history would be a testimonial of the experiences of victims, but this is not the case the Whiteman is making. The stories he craves wouldn't be for the gain of the war victims, but an opportunity for outsiders to experience the war through the chronicled accounts of victims.

Whiteman drags Okigbo into this conversation, a sort of rude awakening of the dead to partake in a conversation he was not privy to. He recaps Okigbo's activities during the war in one sentence, "Okigbo joined the Biafra war and was killed" an allusion to the poet-soldier legacy. Okigbo's use in the report ends abruptly in that single line. Whiteman notes the impact of the war on creative writing by furthering the stance of the Insight team report, Okigbo's yet to be defined politics, "…Nigeria's writers not initially very obviously politically committed, became caught up in the turbulence of event." He ends the his report with the hope that the war stories would be written in the future, "…if sensibilities were numbed, there is now, on the part of the defeated, at least a well of creative activity, much of it perhaps an attempt to record the passions before the memory passes."

On July 2, 1993, twenty-six years after Okigbo's death another news report that makes a reference to him appears in The Times Literary Supplement, "The arrest of Ken Saro-Wiwa" by A.M Daniels.

Anthony Malcolm Daniels was born in 1949 and known by the pen name Theodore Dalrymple. He is an English cultural critic, prison doctor and psychiatrist, who worked in some Sub-Saharan African countries. Daniels has written extensively on culture, art, politics, education, and medicine – drawing on his experiences as a doctor and psychiatrist in Africa and the United Kingdom. His most notable works are: Life at the Bottom: The Worldview That Makes the Underclass (2001), Our Culture, What's Left of It (2005), Spoilt Rotten: The Toxic Cult of Sentimentality (2010).

Daniels' report summarizes the events that led to the arrest of Ken Saro-Wiwa who is from the Niger Delta specifically Ogoniland, part of the seceding side, Biafra, during the Nigeria Civil war. Okigbo is mentioned when the reporter points out a connection with Saro-Wiwa, both men attended the same secondary school, Government College Umuahia, though they were hardly contemporaries—Saro-Wiwa being almost ten years younger than Okigbo.

However, Daniels writes that is where the similarities between both men end. Saro-Wiwa opposed the Biafran secession, "…he saw an Ibo state as a worse threat to the safety and wellbeing of ethnic minorities within it than in a federal Nigerian state."

It seems that whenever there is an unrest or protest in Nigeria being campaigned for by a writer or a reference to the Biafra war made in the media, the poet-soldier, Christopher Okigbo must make an appearance to provide a comparison, historical connection, or credibility to the new activist. These news reports or articles, however, reveal shallow and reductionist portraits of Okigbo, without any in depth reference to his writing or even to his history. In this sense, Okigbo the poet-soldier is a convenient symbol, though what exactly he symbolizes is never extremely clear in these reports.

Olufunke Ogundimu was born in Lagos, Nigeria. She's a doctoral student in Creative Writing at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She's a graduate of the University of Lagos, and University of Nevada, Las Vegas MFA International program in fiction. March 21. 2020.