JALA Winter-Spring 2008-Vol 2 No 1 - African Literature Association

The most remarkable of the post-war pamphlets are the dramatic
piece, Twenty Years for the Director (1973) and the non-fiction, No Heaven
for the Priest (1971). In the former, Ogali returns to the theme of corruption.
The story revolves around Okoro, the Managing Director of a big
Company, who is not only a sexual predator but also a “bribe-taker” per
excellence. It is one of the later Onitsha market pamphlets and it has a
clear date of publication. There is a “List of Other Books” at the back
cover of this pamphlet, which advertises books “to be published” by the
author. Talisman for Love, Dimgba, and No County is Civilized are the
pamphlets advertised to be published. No Heaven for the Priest has a pretty
long “Forward.” Ogali informs the reader in the pretext to the pamphlet
that “not all those who call on the name of the Lord shall go to heaven,”
because “Those who preach on (sic) holy things, must themselves be
holy.” This pamphlet deals essentially with those who are
“themselves…morally bankrupt.” It deals essentially with religious
charlatanism. If Ogali debates the religiously depraved thaumaturge of
his time in this pamphlet, he also wears the toga of a religious purifier.
He defends “the poor and defenceless” against the treachery of these
new men of God. In No Heaven for the Priest, Ogali A. Ogali calls attention
to the corruption of the soul and those responsible for these corrupting
influences.
There are lesser known works of Ogali Ogali. Emmanuel
Obiechina’s book, An African Popular Market Literature: A Study of Onitsha
Market Pamphlets points to some of these pamphlets. There are such
titles as Agnes the Faithful Lover, Angelina My Darling, Adventures of
Mirinda, The Voice of Love, and The Love That Fights. There is also the lesser
known pamphlet written in the Igbo language, Adanwa Nwam. Obiechina
also credits Ogali with the publication of Do You Know Them? and The
Road to Success. The former pamphlet deals with what Obiechina describes
as a source of “general knowledge” and the latter with the “essay,”
meaning a do-it-yourself-pamphlet that describes, if not prescribes, how
to write “a good essay.” Is This Politics, another example of the lesser
known of the pamphlet produced by Ogali, is also categorized as
belonging to the sub-genre of the “essay.” The Adventure of Constable Joe
is a dramatic piece about the corruption and brutalities of the police.
Ogali’s literary output is colourful, diverse in the use of literary
genres and thematically relevant to his time. But it was Veronica My
Daughter, the rather simple story of girl who insists on having a hand in
the selection of her life-partner that made him one of the quintessential
authors of the Onitsha market pamphlets. Ogali A. Ogali is certainly not
the most prolific of the Onitsha market authors. He has formidable rivals
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