The Bacchae of Euripides: A Communion Rite

by Wole Soyinka (Adaptation)

Wole Soyinka has translated—in both language and spirit—a great classic of ancient Greek theater. He does so with a poet's ear for the cadences and rhythms of chorus and solo verse as well as a commanding dramatic use of the central social and religious myth. In his hands The Bacchae becomes a communal feast, a tumultuous celebration of life, and a robust ritual of the human and social psyche. "The Bacchae is the rites of an extravagant banquet, a monstrous feast," Soyinka writes. "Man reaffirms his indebtedness to earth, dedicates himself to the demands of continuity, and invokes the energies of productivity. Reabsorbed within the communal psyche he provokes the resources of nature; in turn he is replenished for the cyclic rain in his fragile individual potency." The blending of two master playwrights—Euripides and Soyinka—makes for an unforgettable experience.

Genres: Plays, Drama, Classics, Mythology, Fiction, School, African Literature

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Akinwande Oluwole Babatunde Soyinka, known as Wole Soyinka, is a Nigerian playwright, novelist, poet, and essayist in the English language. He was awarded the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature for his "wide cultural perspective and... poetic overtones fashioning the drama of existence", the first sub-Saharan African to be honoured in that category.
Soyinka was born into a Yoruba family in Abeokuta. In 1954, he attended Government College in Ibadan, and subsequently University College Ibadan and the University of Leeds in England. After studying in Nigeria and the UK, he worked with the Royal Court Theatre in London. He went on to write plays that were produced in both countries, in theatres and on radio. He took an active role in Nigeria's political history and its campaign for independence from British colonial rule. In 1965, he seized the Western Nigeria Broadcasting Service studio and broadcast a demand for the cancellation of the Western Nigeria Regional Elections. In 1967, during the Nigerian Civil War, he was arrested by the federal government of General Yakubu Gowon and put in solitary confinement for two years, for volunteering to be a non-government mediating actor.
Soyinka has been a strong critic of successive Nigerian (and African at large) governments, especially the country's many military dictators, as well as other political tyrannies, including the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe. Much of his writing has been concerned with "the oppressive boot and the irrelevance of the colour of the foot that wears it". During the regime of General Sani Abacha (1993–98), Soyinka escaped from Nigeria on a motorcycle via the "NADECO Route". Abacha later proclaimed a death sentence against him "in absentia". With civilian rule restored to Nigeria in 1999, Soyinka returned to his nation.
In Nigeria, Soyinka was a Professor of Comparative literature (1975 to 1999) at the Obafemi Awolowo University, then called the University of Ifẹ̀. With civilian rule restored to Nigeria in 1999, he was made professor emeritus. While in the United States, he first taught at Cornell University as Goldwin Smith professor for African Studies and Theatre Arts from 1988 to 1991 and then at Emory University, where in 1996 he was appointed Robert W. Woodruff Professor of the Arts. Soyinka has been a Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and has served as scholar-in-residence at New York University's Institute of African American Affairs and at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, California. He has also taught at the universities of Cambridge, Oxford, Harvard and Yale, and was also a Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Duke University in 2008.
In December 2017, Soyinka was awarded the Europe Theatre Prize in the "Special Prize" category, awarded to someone who has "contributed to the realization of cultural events that promote understanding and the exchange of knowledge between peoples".

Reviews

[Samir Rawas Sarayji · Rating 4 out of 5]

Soyinka’s version of The Bacchae of Euripides is a divergence from his more locally-themed earlier plays. As I have not read the original play by Euripides, I can only comment by comparing this version to Soyinka’s work in general. What is familiar here are the elements of Greek tragedy, but not so much to forget that this is a rather unusual take with some characteristic Soyinka added to it.

In the play, the messiah factor is really strong with Dionysos claiming to be a god and having the power to exhibit his claims. The king and his cousin, Pentheus, wants him arrested for sedition. But Dionysos is a powerful orator, like all successful prophets, his preaching, and his skills of persuasion sway all except Pentheus. I could not help visualizing Cecile B DeMiles’ version of The Ten Commandments where Moses urges pharaoh several times to accept the rule of god and pharaoh refuses. But Pentheus is clearly the voice of reason, for his whole world changed under him while he was working for the benefit of his empire:

PENTHEUS: I shall have order! Let the city know at once
Pentheus is here to give back order and sanity.
To think those reports which came to us abroad are true!
Not padded or strained. Disgustingly true in detail.
If anything reality beggars the report. It’s disgusting!
I leave the country, I’m away only a moment
Campaigning to secure our national frontiers. And what happens?
Behind me—chaos! The city in uproar. Let everyone
Know I’ve returned to re-impose order. Order!
And tell it to the women especially, those
Promiscuous bearers of this new disease.

While this disbeliever grasps with the reality around him, he finally succeeds in having his guards bring Dionysos in chains in front of him. Pentheus questions Dionysos to trap him with logic, but true to form, Dionysus responds with riddles.

PENTHEUS: So it is all, and must remain a secret?
DIONYSUS: To those in whom Dionysos is not born.
To others there are no secrets for
Their minds are open.
PENTHEUS: You are clever, but not clever enough.
If there were no shameful acts in this
New worship, you would hardly wait to speak.
DIONYSUS: Mysteries are only for the initiates.
And in this worship all, even you Pentheus
May enter into the Mysteries.
PENTHEUS: Very clever. Your answers are designed
To make me curious. Tell me this at least
What benefits do the initiatives derive,
The followers of this god?
DIONYSUS: Again I am forbidden to say. But they are
Well worth knowing.
PENTHEUS: I see your game, it so transparent.
You think to play on my curiosity.

Like other Soyinka plays, however, this one does not shy away from his stage directions of frenzy and dance on the stage. With drums and movement so paramount, it is once again worth repeating as in my other reviews that Soyinka is really for the stage and not for textual analysis.

The wine-girl is almost never away from the bridegroom. The performing dancers resume their jigs. The bridegroom drinks. The bride transfers to and fro between devastating glares at the wine-girl and loving smirks at her groom. Her groom drinks more and more. Suddenly he leaps up, brushing aside the restraining arm of his bestman, he strides among the dancers, stops the musicians and gives them instructions. He begins to dance. Already, a transformation has commenced. The music quickens. He stops, flings off his mask and garments. Underneath, the Dionysian fawn-skin. The bridal group registers predictable shock at the scantiness. He begins to dance. He DANCES!

Such detailed direction involving music and movement are common and to be expected in Soyinka’s plays. Strangely, however, there is an unusual passage early in this play that hints at Soyinka’s anxiety of… adopting a western play, perhaps? In it, he instructs what not to do more forcefully rather than the more effective what to actually do only. And the juxtapositions might be at best considered snobbish, but they do seem to show the direction he does not want this play to take.

The scene which follows needs the following quality: extracting the emotional color and temperature of a European pop scene without degenerating into that tawdry commercial manipulation of teenage mindlessness. The lines are chanted not sung, to musical accompaniment. The Slave Leader is not a gyrating pop drip. His control emanates from the self-contained force of his person, a progressively deepening spiritual presence. His style is based on the lilt and energy of the black hot gospellers who themselves are often first to become physically possessed.
The effect on his crowd is however, the same—physically—as would be seen in a teenage pop audience. From orgasmic moans the surrogate climax is achieved.

I would say that the play is well-constructed and entertaining but does not really introduce anything new. The Moses-Pharaoh image and the arch of a Greek tragedy are too prominent to overlook. It feels more of the same with flourishes of Soyinka’s characteristic dance and music on stage to capture mood and energy appropriately. A newcomer to Soyinka’s plays would benefit starting elsewhere, like Kongi’s Harvest or The Lion and the Jewel for a more authentic Soyinka experience.

[Phillip · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a hard play to talk about. On the one hand, I think it is a good play in its own right, and Soyinka is an extremely socially and politically conscious writer. However, I think that we can't forget that this is a reworking of Euripides' The Bacchae, and I think Soyinka has lost one major element of what made Euripides' play such powerful tragedy--our eventual sympathy for Pentheus. Soyinka spends so much time building Pentheus up as the oppressive, slave-owning military dictator that it is hard for us to feel bad when he is eventually killed. I think that, like the slaves who play a prominent role in Soyinka's play, we are rather pleased that the reign of Pentheus is over. We might feel bad for his mother and grandfather, who are the victims of Dionysus' violent revenge, but we don't sympathize with Pentheus. He goes from being a brutal dictator to a prancing fool, and the indictment of Dionysus for his brutal vengeance is somewhat weak. Of course, this change isn't surprising, given Soyinka's cultural and philosophical position as a postcolonialist and a Maxrist. And, a very critical viewer/reader might be deeply disturbed by our own sense of satisfaction at Pentheus' death, even though he was such a brutal and unlikeable character.

[Cestmoi]

spectacularly good, probably gonna be thinking about this for weeks. now need to see a production that follows soyinka's (fantastic) stage directions.

[Zuzanna W]

suicide seems like the better right about now

[katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Nobel-prize winning Nigerian playwright made an incredible adaptation of Euripides' The Bacchae. The introduction is key, where Soyinka explains the similarities between Dionysos and the Yoruban god Ogun, also the god of wine. The lines drawn between the cult of Dionysos and Yoruban religion are striking, and the story also reflects the effects of European colonialism on Africa.

[Jacques Bromberg · Rating 2 out of 5]

This play is undoubtedly one of Euripides' masterpieces, but I just couldn't get into Soyinka's translation. To me, the play is NOT about what Soyinka thinks it's about.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this adaptation as a case study for Professor Fiona Macintosh, Leo Kershaw, and Alex Silverman's collaborative seminar on Tragedy and Its Reception. I've come across Wole Soyinka's poetry before - most prominently at GCSE, where I studied a poem that I believe had something to do with a phone box (although might have entirely misremembered that). I love Euripides' Bacchae, and find it an endlessly interesting play, so I thought I might find this one interesting.
And it is. I really enjoyed the slave chorus in Soyinka's version, and the slightly schadenfreudic response to the upper-classes' suffering. I also enjoyed the fact that Pentheus spoke in rhetoric vaguely reminiscent of UK border enforcement. The ending, as well - with *SPOILERS* 'Why us? / 'Why not?' - was FANTASTIC.
The reason I'm only giving this three stars, though, is because I don't think it works as a text. I think this needs to be experienced in performance, and the text will always pale in comparison. I'm hoping to find a video performance that I can watch before Thursday, essentially.

[juliana · Rating 4 out of 5]

i love this lol

i feel like there is less room for sympathy when it comes to pentheus (in contrast to the euripides version) and dionysus is much more wrathful and forceful. i think it also does well in illustrating the manic passion of the bacchae, which is something i felt less of in the original version. there were also lines here i felt resonated more with me,, there is something about this version that feels more engaging. though i think in terms of establishing malevolence and destruction, it lacks in contrast to euripides. dionysus feels more unforgiving here, but at the same time the text doesnt have the same sense of foreboding danger embedded in the original version.

edit: omg i think i know what made this version less severe (in terms of vibes lol),, there was no chorus!!! instead of a chorus, this version showcased more of the individual feelings of the bacchae instead of having a kind of collective consciousness.

[Fee · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt something was lost in Wole Soyinka’s reworking of The Bacchae. The parallels he draws in his introduction to the Yoruba god of metalwork never quite land for me, coming across as more decorative than integral, and for a play about Dionysus, he's not in it enough.

Much of the text feels padded out unnecessarily, particularly the scene with Cadmus and Tiresias preparing to climb Kithairon, which adds length but not depth. There’s no sympathy for Pentheus here, which I don’t mind in theory, but without it Agave’s torment dissipates into a vengeful muddle, along with much of the play’s humanity.

I did love the final scene though, I imagine seeing it staged would be incredible.

[E.H.]

The introduction was interesting and delightful. The play itself would probably be really amazing performed. I think the last few lines would be alternately extremely tragic and extremely hilarious.

I do think Soyinka's Dionysus is transgressive not because of who he is but because of who his followers are. It's justified, but it makes the play much more grounded in certain respects.

[Brenna · Rating 3 out of 5]

This play was a little weird and had some oddly sexual language. The ending was a little weird too, when Pentheus' head squirts blood into his moms mouth and like....It just seems sexual how she just sort of drinks his blood. Weird adaptation of this play, but I didn't hate it.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was not sure I wanted to read a play but this was very good. Applies to today as well as the past.

[Michael Capstack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Is it wrong that I enjoyed this more than the original Euripides? I definitely enjoyed the banter a lot more.

[Marina Moonbeam · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this perception of Dionysus. 4.5

[nashaly · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 and a half stars!

[nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 / 5

[Samara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Was pretty good but nothing amazing. I liked the language and the simplicity of the play. I might read the original to see the differences in Soyinka’s version.

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Soyinka creates a powerful and dynamic version of an already excellent play. While I would not recommend this as a text for the careful study of Euripides, I would love to see it performed. Soyinka creates in Dionysos a very enigmatic, and potent divine figure. He uses the play to comment on more modern global conditions, particularly the relationships of the west with Africa, and does so very successfully. He shows just how powerful and relevant classical works can be, even today.