By Edozie Udeze
William Shakespeare had many years before now, captured the hollowness of life when he described the world as a stage. It is a stage where every man comes, plays his roles and departs. This is the case with Professor Tejumola Olaniyan, who kissed the world goodbye on November 30. But how does one begin to talk about this ebullient, classical, deep and quiet scholar, a man who chose to dwell fundamentally on the rudiments of literature to overcome the world?
When he was not trying to help humanity, Olaniyan was busy in his measured mien and cultured characteristic, managing people and organizing big literary and academic events to advance the society. At the University of Wisconsin at Madison, USA, where he held a professorial seat on African languages, he was a beacon, a colossus, a restless scholar who delved into various issues of Blacks in the Diaspora to develop and research more into pop culture, criticisms and analysis. This was an area where he constantly encountered works, particularly films and cultural presentations of most Black Americans, using same to reappraise the roles of Africans in the New World. Such artists included Eddie Murphy whose Coming to America captured the attention of Olaniyan.
A great man of letters, encountering him thrice in the line of duty was quite heartwarming for me. Beyond his sound academic roles in Africa and the Diaspora, and African literatures generally, he also showed his love towards prominent Nigerian scholars, more so, those of Yoruba descent. Around 2011, he and other equally robust literary scholars formed the D. O. Fagunwa Study Group essentially to advance and promote, and celebrate Yoruba literary scholars when and where necessary. Therefore in 2011 in Akure, Ondo State, the first international conference was organized to mark a milestone in the literary life of the late D. O. Fagunwa, the progenitor of Yoruba Literature. Again at the University of Ibadan a few years after, a book on the conference was presented to the public.
Then last August in Akure once more, Olaniyan convened another international literary bazaar to celebrate Professor Wole Soyinka at 85. Those three encounters will remain deep and evergreen in my memory. He had a deep interest in interdisciplinary teaching and research. He once said: “My primary aim and goal in life dwells within the critical self-reflexivity about our expressions and their many contexts.” So he focused extensively on post-colonial African states. Within this context, he extended his torchlight far afield into various areas of pop culture-music, art, films, entertainment. One of his prominent works on Fela Anikulapo-kuti titled Arrest the Music! Fela and His Rebel Art and Politics, explores and situates in a more holistic form his total concept of Pop culture as weapon of conquest.
Educated at the University of Ife, (now OAU), in 1982, he proceeded abroad where he bagged his PhD in Literature. This was in 1991 and henceforth, he remained an international scholar, teaching at Wisconsin, and moving from place to place to organize and deliver papers.
He died of heart failure while preparing to leave his base in the States to Europe for an international conference. Born in 1959, Olaniyan could easily be described as a scholar who came, who saw, who dared, who conquered and who finally left his imprints on the sand of time. With over 35 works, books, research materials, articles in over 100 publications world-over, he has truly overcome the world. Adieu a great scholar, mentor, organizer, thinker, achiever…
Leave a Reply