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

ank where he is a small time clerk. He is caught and sent to jail. Carol
who has “no need for a prisoner” soon finds another “moogoo”1 in Igwe.
But Igwe, who has just “returned from Toronto...with a PhD in
Biochemistry”, proves to be smarter. She gets pregnant by Igwe and
although she tries very hard to abort the pregnancy, she succeeds only
after a long while. In the meantime, she is beginning to lose her glamour
and men no longer flock to her. In an unexplained narrative turn, Caroline
finds religion. A suitor, Simplicity, comes along. She is happy to go with
him. Caroline is saved from the deadly fate of Mabel,2 one of the most
colourful female characters of the whole of Onitsha Market collection.
Smile Awhile and Long Long Ago are the two other well known
fictional works, which Ogali Ogali wrote in the late 1950s. Reinhrd W.
Sander puts the dates for both pamphlets as 1957. We may only assume
that Sanders got this information from the author himself and not from
the original versions of the pamphlets. The Onitsha market pamphlets
at the Bruce Peel Special Collections depository at the Rutherford Library
of the University of Alberta do not have any clear dates of publication,
which is not surprising. However, it clear that the pamphlets. Smile
Awhile and Long Long Ago form part of the pre-war collections. There are
obvious textual markers to prove this. Smile Awhile, which is a short tale
about the character, Abanidiegwu, is also part of the longer and more
ambitious novel, Long Long Ago, which is written in six parts. Each part
explores a distinct character and location. The first of the six-part-novel
begins with “Young Jackie,” a story about Jackie who made it to Oxford
to read Latin. He comes back to a disappointing Nigeria after his study
abroad but in time, he grows wiser and soon becomes a village chief
because wisdom comes with abandoning the “old fooleries.” The second
story is titled “Okokobioko.” The chief character of this story is a
flamboyant personality, Okokobioko. There is a bit of myth-making in
this story of a man whose name means, “fondling” in the traditional
Igbo language. He takes on the “power of Atlas,” the “wisdom of
Solomon” and “the speed of mercury.” He becomes a soldier-warrior
for mankind and ultimately ends the evil in the world. Booboo is the
main character of the third story, “The Man Who Knew Everything.”
His antagonist is the diminutive man “whose name and origin no one
knew.” The giant, Booboo, faces a formidable enemy in this diminutive
personality. It is a story that reminds one of the Biblical David and Goliath
story. The trouble is, “The Man Who Knew Everything,” is not as well
told as the Biblical story of David and Goliath. “Smile Awhile,” which I
have already referred to, is about the return of the rogue, Abanidiegwu,
whose roguery made him the “richest man in the land of Potopo.” Luck
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