|
The Awakening Age, composed by Ben Okri, is a poem that
portrays the hardships of the African people. In this poem, the speaker makes
a call for unity, peace, and solidarity among human beings from different
parts of the world. This poem is taken from the Class 12 English textbook. The
following summary, analysis, and exercise will help the readers understand
the text. For the readers’ convenience, the original poem, The Awakening Age,
by Ben Okri, has also been mentioned.
|
|
{getToc} $title={Table of Contents}
|
The Awakening Age by Ben Okri
[summary, analysis, and exercise]
|
About the poet Ben Okri
A winner of the Man Booker prize for his novel The Famished
Road, the Nigerian poet, fiction writer, and essayist Ben Okri (1949-) spent
his early childhood in London. Informed by folk tales and dream logic, Okri’s
writing also treats his family’s experience of the Nigerian civil war.
His parents were teachers. They wanted their son to have a
better life than they did, so they sent him off to boarding school when he
was young, which is why he grew up away from home for most of his childhood.
When he was older, he studied business and law in college before deciding to
pursue a career as a writer.
He is currently a professor of creative writing at the
University of East Anglia in Norwich, England. Okri has won many awards for
his writing including the Man Booker Prize for Fiction which he won in 1991
for his novel The Famished Road.
In an interview for The National, Okri stated, “I grew up
in a tradition where there are simply more dimensions to reality: legends and
myths and ancestors and spirits and death. You can't use Jane Austen to
speak about African
reality.
Which brings the question: what is reality? Everyone's
reality is different. For different perceptions of reality we need a
different language.”
|
Summary of The Awakening Age
The Awakening Age, by Nigerian poet Ben Okri, explores
themes of freedom and spirituality in the face of historical oppression and
political unrest. The Awakening Age is one of Okri’s most famous poems and
has been translated into many languages.
The poem was written in 1991, on the eve of Nigeria’s first
free election after decades of military rule, but it is still relevant today
as the country continues to grapple with issues of poverty and corruption as
well as an ongoing insurgency from Boko Haram terrorists.
The poem has been discussed by Nigerian poets over the
years and has been featured in poetry anthologies in other countries such as
South Africa and Ghana.
Okri’s poem The Awakening Age is about the journey that
African people have gone through to reach their present state. They have gone
through a lot and have worked hard to get to where they are today.
The poem also talks about how humans are meant to work
together, not live apart. There was a time when the world was divided, but
that time has now ended because all nations need each other for the earth to
survive.
The poem tells the story of the past, present, and future
of Africa. The narrator starts by telling us about the past of Africa when
people lived under different hardships, tortures, troubles, and poverty. Then
he moves on to talk about what Africa is like now, with its many different
cultures living side by side peacefully without any conflict or fighting
between them. Finally, he tells us what Africa will be like in the future as
well as what people can do to help make it happen sooner rather than later.
|
Stanza-wise analysis of ‘The
Awakening Age’
The poem is broken up into three parts: the past, the
present, and the future. In the first stanza, the narrator talks about the
different hardships Nigerian people have gone through in the past.
The second stanza describes the present, which is full of
hope for the future. It says that even though there are still wars going on
in Africa, there is still peace among the people themselves. This shows how
far Africans have come since the days of old, when they were constantly at
war with one another over things such as religion and race.
The third stanza talks about the future, which will be even
better than the present if people continue working together towards a common
goal instead of working against one another.
The fourth stanza brings the poem back to the past so that
the reader can see just how much progress has been made since those dark
times.
The fifth and final stanza gives the reader advice on what
they can do to help bring about the future faster. People must keep moving
forward with their education so that they may become leaders themselves
someday and change the world for the better. If everyone does their part,
then one day soon enough, Africa will be free of poverty, hunger, disease,
corruption, etc., and everyone will live happily ever after.
To sum up, this poem is about how people are supposed to
live together with one another, not apart from each other like they have been
doing for so long now. In addition, he makes a call for unity, peace, and
solidarity among human beings from different parts of the world.
|
Understanding the poem
Discuss the following questions.
a. Why do you think people from your country migrate to
another country?
b. Do people from other countries migrate to your country?
Why?
|
The Awakening Age by Ben Okri [Original Poem]
O ye who travel the meridian line,
May the vision of a new world
within you shine.
May eyes that have lived with
poverty's rage,
See through to the glory of the
awakening age.
For we are all richly linked in
hope,
Woven in history, like a mountain
rope.
Together we can ascend to a new
height,
Guided by our heart's clearest
light.
When perceptions are changed
there's much to gain,
A flowering of truth instead of
pain.
There's more to a people than their
poverty;
There's their work, wisdom, and
creativity.
Along the line may our lives rhyme,
To make a loving harvest of space
and time.
|
Glossary [Word meaning of The
Awakening Age]
|
|
meridian line (n.):
|
any imaginary circle round the earth that passes through
both the North and South Poles
|
|
rage (n.):
|
violent anger
|
|
harvest (n.):
|
the act of cutting and gathering grain and other food crops
|
Understanding the poem
Answer the following questions.
a. Who are the people ‘who travel the
meridian line’?
b. What does the poet mean by ‘a new
world’?
c. How are people connected to each
other?
d. What can we gain after our
perceptions are changed?
e. How are we benefited by new
people?
f. Describe the rhyme scheme of this sonnet.
|
Reference to the context
a. What does the poet mean by ‘the
awakening age’?
b. Why, in your view, have these
people ‘lived with poverty’s rage’?
c. Why does the poet appeal for
solidarity among the people?
d. Does the poet present migration in
a positive light? Why? Why not?
e. Nepal is also known for its economic as well as
educational migrants. Have you noticed any change in the perceptions and
behaviours of these migrants when they return home from abroad?
f. Relate the rhyme scheme of this sonnet to the kind
of life idealized by the poet.
|
|
Reference beyond the text
Write an essay on 'The Impacts of Migration on Nepali
Society'.
|