The Defence of Lawino [Wer pa Lawino].(Book review)

The Defence of Lawino [Wer pa Lawino]

BY OKOT P'BITEK, TRANS. TABAN LO LIYONG

1969. Kampala: Fountain, 2001.

ISBN 9970022695. xvi + 115 pp.

Foreword by S. Raditlhao, preface by Taban to Liyong, and glossary.

Distributed by African Books Collective Ltd.

Let's start with an intriguing bit of literary archeology. Or maybe it's just idle gossip. Back in 1974, in the preface to his book The Horn of My Love, Okot p'Bitek admonished his fellow writer and countryman Taban to Liyong:

 
   When, recently, my friend Taban to Liyong wept bitter tears over 
   what he called the literary desert in East Africa, he was suffering 
   from acute literary deafness, a disease which afflicts those who 
   have been brainwashed to believe that literature exists only in 
   books. Taban and his fast dwindling clan are victims of the 
   class-ridden, dictionary meaning of the term literature, which 
   restricts literary activity and enjoyment to the so-called literate 
   peoples, and turns a deaf ear to the songs and stories of the vast 
   majority of our people in the countryside. (ix) 

With an almost gratuitous slap, p'Bitek concludes the opening …