Foluke Ogunleye

Foluke Ogunleye is a theatre director and actress, and a lecturer at the department of African languages and literature at the University of Swaziland, Kwaluseni. She has produced and directed many pl...

Nest in a Cage

Foluke Ogunleye

For a long time, Nigerian theatre has been mostly in the hands of men. Female figures in Nigerian drama, and the images of women portrayed have been limiting. However, things are changing: female dramatists are emerging, and plays are being written and directed from women’s viewpoints. On such play is Nest in a Cage. The playwright describes her work as ‘a modern morality play’, ‘which debunks the myth among many modern young girls that material success can only be attained through consorting with debauched rich old men’. Her play throws patriarchal structures into relief, and unpicks what she terms the ‘patriarchal fallacy of the polygamous instinct, which allows men, no matter how old, to seek adulterous trysts with girls young enough to be their daughters’.

The story is told as a flashback: Dr Adaguno, a medical doctor of great repute has been invited to address a group of secondary school girls about good behaviour. However, in true adolescent spirit, one of the students challenges her to talk about her past.

African Books Collective, Oxford